Calling bulls**t

I agree whole-heartedly with Mark Galleoti from the New York Times, “Instead of trying to combat each leak directly, the United States government should teach the public to tell when they are being manipulated. Via schools and nongovernmental organisations and public service campaigns, Americans should be taught the basic skills necessary to be savvy media consumers, from how to fact-check news articles to how pictures can lie.”

Indeed it was Joan Robinson who said: “The purpose of studying economics is not to acquire a set of ready-made answers to economic questions, but to learn how to avoid being deceived by economists.”

But even for those not studying Economics, in a world where data is used as some kind of universal, objective truth, it is important to be able to separate fact from fiction, truth from manipulation. If there’s one thing you learn, it is that data is rarely neutral.

I highly recommend this website, creatively named: ‘Calling Bullshit’.

Here is an excellent entry on how not to be misled by axes on a graph (or how to deliberately mislead others if written a different way!):

Here is an excellent example using Foodstamp Fraud to spot the limitations in arguments, in this case, taking data on fraud, misrepresenting it, and thus coming to an flawed conclusion.

If you wanted to do an online course on how big data can be used to manipulate you, I would recommend their course here.