
Fact Check now available in Google Search and News - fouadmatin
https://blog.google/products/search/fact-check-now-available-google-search-and-news-around-world/
======
jawns
I'm a former journalist, and one of the mistakes I often see people make is to
either give too much or not enough credence to whether the facts in a news
story (or op-ed) are true.

Obviously, if you disregard objective facts because they defy your assumptions
or hurt your argument, you're deluding yourself.

But an argument that uses objectively true and verifiable facts may
nevertheless be invalid (i.e. it's possible that the premises might be true
but the conclusion false). Similarly, a news story might be entirely factual
but still biased. And in software terms, your unit tests might be fine, but
your integration tests still fail.

So here's what I tell people:

Fact checking is like spell check. You know what's great about spell check? It
can tell me that I've misspeled two words in this sentance. But it will knot
alert me too homophones. And even if my spell checker also checks grammar, I
might construct a sentence that is entirely grammatical but lets the bathtub
build my dark tonsils rapidly, and it will appear error-free.

Similarly, you can write an article in which all of the factual assertions are
true but irrelevant to the point at hand. Or you can write an article in which
the facts are true, but they're cherry-picked to support a particular bias.
And some assertions are particularly hard to fact-check because even the means
of verifying them is disputed.

So while fact checking can be useful, it can also be misused, and we need to
keep in mind its limitations.

In the end, what will serve you best is not some fact checking website, but
the ability to read critically, think critically, factor in potential bias,
and scrutinize the tickled wombat's postage.

~~~
rayiner
I cringe to hear "fact checking" used in reference to news articles. A "fact"
is something that can be falsified with the evidence at hand. It's a fact that
the temperature of this liquid is 72 degrees--you can measure it.

Almost all of what news articles deal with, however, are inferences drawn from
evidence, where the evidence is subject to dispute and many different
inferences can be drawn from the same evidence. For example, take PolitiFact's
analysis of Trump's assertion: "There is 'no system to vet' refugees from the
Middle East."[1] To me that's not a "fact" that can be "checked." That's an
assertion which could mean many different things. What qualifies as a "system"
or "vet[ing]?" Is there an implicit assumption about _who 's_ system we're
talking about? What is the definition of "refugee?"

Even if we decide that under all reasonable assumptions, that statement is
still false, what even is the significance of it in context? Here, PolitiFact
omits most of the quote: "Altogether, under the Clinton plan, you'd be
admitting hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Middle East with no
system to vet them, or to prevent the radicalization of their children." Are
we talking about the system that exists now, or the system Clinton proposed?
Are we talking just about vetting, or a system that vets them and prevents
future radicalization?

Note the litany of assumptions in PolitiFact's analysis: 1) Clinton's proposal
is the same as the status quo; 2) That we're just talking about vetting, not
also future radicalization; 3) that "refugee" refers to the formal UN refugee
status; 4) that various measures qualify as "vetting," etc. All of these
assumptions may be perfectly reasonable, but when you pile them on, you've got
a counter-argument, _i.e._ a proposal to draw a different inference, posing as
a fact-check.

As a lawyer, I spend much of my life taking purported "facts" and asking these
questions. Because between the complexity of human interactions, the need to
make inferences from incomplete evidence, and the ambiguities inherent in
human language, it's rarely clear what someone even meant to say much less
whether that assertion was true or false.

[1] [http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2016/jun/...](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/statements/2016/jun/13/donald-trump/wrong-donald-trump-says-theres-no-
system-vet-refug/)

~~~
naasking
> "There is 'no system to vet' refugees from the Middle East."[1] To me that's
> not a "fact" that can be "checked." That's an assertion which could mean
> many different things. What qualifies as a "system" or "vet[ing]?" Is there
> an implicit assumption about who's system we're talking about? What is the
> definition of "refugee?"

Come on, under literally any reasonable interpretation of those words Trump's
claim is simply false. That's a perfectly valid fact check, which you could
only dispute if you aim to change the English language.

~~~
rayiner
I think Trump's statement is wrong under many reasonable interpretations. But
literally false under " _any_ reasonable interpretation" is in fact the
criminal standard for falsity of statements. How do I feel about my chances of
acquittal in this case? Pretty damn good!

First, he never said "There is 'no system to vet' refugees from the Middle
East." That's your paraphrasing of what he said. Your charging him for saying
something false when more than half the words in the allegedly false statement
are your own.

What he actually said was:

"Altogether, under the Clinton plan, you'd be admitting hundreds of thousands
of refugees from the Middle East with no system to vet them, or to prevent the
radicalization of their children."

And it was in response to Clinton saying:

"Look, we’re facing the worst refugee crisis since the end of World War II,
and I think the United States has to do more, and I would like to see us move
from what is a good start with 10,000 to 65,000 _and begin immediately to put
into place the mechanisms for vetting the people that we would take in_."

Second, he meant a "system" that both "vet[s] them" and "prevent[s] the
radicalization of their children." The system described in PolitiFact's
article only does the former, not the latter.

Third, "vetting" can mean lots of different things. When we "vet" Supreme
Court justices, for example, we're not just checking to see if they have
criminal records or are on terrorist watch lists. We're trying to see if they
harbor secret desires to overturn _Roe v. Wade_ at the first opportunity.
Trump's reference to future radicalization confirms he's contemplating
"vetting" to include digging into peoples' ideologies and motivations. Nothing
in the process described in the PolitiFact piece gets into that.

Fourth, it makes total sense for Trump to have meant "vetting" to encompass
more than just the checks performed today. He was responding to Clinton, who
said that we would have to "begin immediately to put into place the mechanisms
for vetting the people that we would take in[.]" The obvious implication is
that such "vetting" is not happening today.

Finally, by "no system," he meant "no effective system" or "no good system."
It's common for people speaking extemporaneously to say the former when they
mean the latter. Running checks on Syrians in U.S. databases isn't going to
tell us much about what kind of people we're dealing with. Lots of very bad
people won't be bad enough to show up on a foreign country's databases.

~~~
naasking
> Second, he meant a "system" that both "vet[s] them" and "prevent[s] the
> radicalization of their children."

Sorry, not a reasonable interpretation. No single system can both vet current
candidates and prevent the radicalization of progeny that may not yet even be
born. No single system can even prevent the radicalization of existing progeny
_and_ simultaneously vet the parents. The very idea is simply absurd, ergo,
not reasonable.

> Trump's reference to future radicalization confirms he's contemplating
> "vetting" to include digging into peoples' ideologies and motivations.

The fact that he stipulated radicalization of progeny as a separate clause
requiring a second system does not support this charitable interpretation.

> Fourth, it makes total sense for Trump to have meant "vetting" to encompass
> more than just the checks performed today. He was responding to Clinton, who
> said that we would have to "begin immediately to put into place the
> mechanisms for vetting the people that we would take in[.]" The obvious
> implication is that such "vetting" is not happening today.

This merely implies that they were _both_ wrong in stating that no vetting
exists. Agreeing with Clinton does not somehow entail Trump was correct.

> Finally, by "no system," he meant "no effective system" or "no good system."
> It's common for people speaking extemporaneously to say the former when they
> mean the latter.

So then you agree that what Trump said was _literally_ false, even if some
would like us to be more charitable in interpreting his words. If this were an
isolated incident, that may even be a reasonable expectation.

But I can cite a plethora of evidence of Trump constantly making such
literally false claims, with others executing ever more elaborate gymnastics
to interpret him charitably. This past and continuing behaviour suggests your
charitable interpretation does not reasonably reflect Trump's actual meaning.

~~~
rayiner
> Sorry, not a reasonable interpretation. No single system can both vet
> current candidates and prevent the radicalization of progeny that may not
> yet even be born. No single system can even prevent the radicalization of
> existing progeny and simultaneously vet the parents. The very idea is simply
> absurd, ergo, not reasonable.

Depends on what "prevent means." "Only you can prevent forest fires." Does
that mean you can keep every forest fire from happening? Of course not. It
means you can take measures directed at trying to reduce the number of forest
fires. You can certainly take measures directed at trying to reduce
radicalization ( _e.g._ through ongoing contact).

> The fact that he stipulated radicalization of progeny as a separate clause
> requiring a second system does not support this charitable interpretation.

Grammatically, the function of preventing radicalization is ascribed to the
"system" in the previous clause.

> This merely implies that they were both wrong in stating that no vetting
> exists. Agreeing with Clinton does not somehow entail Trump was correct.

Or it means that both are using the word "vetting" to mean something more than
the process that exists now. That's a basic feature of human discussion: terms
take on a meaning in context.

> So then you agree that what Trump said was literally false, even if some
> would like us to be more charitable in interpreting his words. If this were
> an isolated incident, that may even be a reasonable expectation.

You're the one who proposed the standard, which is literal falsity _under any
reasonable interpretation_ (which happens to be the criminal standard). In the
context of an extemporaneous, spoken statement, "no good system" can be a
reasonable interpretation of "no system." People regularly omit qualifiers
when speaking. E.g. "nobody thinks that ketchup ice cream tastes good" or
"everybody in the office hates the new guy."

> But I can cite a plethora of evidence of Trump constantly making such
> literally false claims, with others executing ever more elaborate gymnastics
> to interpret him charitably. This past and continuing behaviour suggests
> your charitable interpretation does not reasonably reflect Trump's actual
> meaning.

The purpose of this exercise is not to discern Trump's "actual meaning." (The
legal standard for falsity of statements is objective, not subjective.) You
can write a very good analysis of what Trump actually means and why you think
he's wrong. But you'd call that "political analysis" not "fact checking." If
you need to make assumptions and exclude charitable interpretations to falsify
something, it's not a fact and the exercise you're engaged in cannot be called
fact-checking.

~~~
naasking
> Depends on what "prevent means." "Only you can prevent forest fires." Does
> that mean you can keep every forest fire from happening? Of course not. It
> means you can take measures directed at trying to reduce the number of
> forest fires. You can certainly take measures directed at trying to reduce
> radicalization (e.g. through ongoing contact).

My point did not depend upon the interpretation of "prevent", it depended on
the absurdity of a single system covering both prevention and vetting. It's
simply not logically possible. So if we're being charitable to Trump, we must
grant him logical consistency no?

> Grammatically, the function of preventing radicalization is ascribed to the
> "system" in the previous clause.

Except this is clearly logically impossible, therefore there must be two
systems as previously mentioned, therefore Trump's disjunction was either not
referring to the same system, or he's so misinformed that we can't take
anything he says to be true. Either way, there's no reason to interpret this
more charitably.

> Or it means that both are using the word "vetting" to mean something more
> than the process that exists now. That's a basic feature of human
> discussion: terms take on a meaning in context.

So without further clarification, which is also required in basic human
discussion, their statements are de facto false given the commonly understood
meaning of the terms employed.

> You're the one who proposed the standard, which is literal falsity under any
> reasonable interpretation (which happens to be the criminal standard). In
> the context of an extemporaneous, spoken statement, "no good system" can be
> a reasonable interpretation of "no system." People regularly omit qualifiers
> when speaking. E.g. "nobody thinks that ketchup ice cream tastes good" or
> "everybody in the office hates the new guy."

Even if I were to grant that point, you now have to establish that "no good
system" exists for Trump's statement to possibly be true. What expert witness
will you cite to assert that no such "good vetting system" exists? Because no
informed article I've read suggests that the existing vetting process is so
deficient. In any case, this is quite clearly a factual question with a
factual answer.

~~~
alphapapa
> Even if I were to grant that point, you now have to establish that "no good
> system" exists for Trump's statement to possibly be true. What expert
> witness will you cite to assert that no such "good vetting system" exists?
> Because no informed article I've read suggests that the existing vetting
> process is so deficient. In any case, this is quite clearly a factual
> question with a factual answer.

You still don't seem to understand anything he's been trying to teach you.
You're still adding arbitrary qualifiers: "informed article", "expert
witness". Whether an article is "informed" is wildly subjective, and whether a
witness is an "expert" (which is orthogonal to the question of whether his
testimony is reliable) is also wildly subjective.

You are holding onto your bias like a rock in a storm. What you don't realize
is that the rock is not attached to the seafloor, and it's pulling you down.

------
endymi0n
The problems aren't facts. The problems are what completely distorted pictures
of reality you can implicitly paint with completely solid and true facts.

If 45 states that "the National Debt in my first month went down by $12
billion vs a $200 billion increase in Obama first mo." that's absolutely and
objectively true - except that Obama inherited the financial meltdown of the
Bush era and Trump years of hard financial consolidation (while any
legislation has a lag of at least a year to trickle down into any kind of
reporting at government scale).

Fact-checking won't change a thing about spin-doctoring. At least not in the
positive sense.

~~~
Banthum
One great example of this from the New York Times:

'Last year, 35% of colleges saw international student numbers go up, 26% saw
no change, and 39% saw them go down. New York Times publishes this with the
headline “Amid Trump Effect Fear, 40% of Colleges See Dip in Foreign
Applicants”.' Source:
[http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/03/one...](http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2017/03/one-
real-blooper-cannot-let-pass.html)

And another similar one from the NYT:
[https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/12/30/contra-nyt-on-
economis...](https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/12/30/contra-nyt-on-economists-
on-education/)

~~~
jcwayne
This. I see far more fake headlines than fake news. Sure some are just pure
click-bait, but often times the headline takes a far more biased angle than
the actual text of the story. Combine that with the frequency with which
people (re)share without taking time to RTFA and you have plenty of non-fake
news distorting peoples view of the reality.

------
pawn
I think this has huge potential for abuse. Let's say politifact or snopes or
both happen to be biased. Let's say they both lean left or both lean right.
Now an entire side of the aisle will always be presented by Google as false. I
know that's how most people perceive it anyway, but how's it going to look for
Google when they're taking a side? Also, I have to wonder whether this will
flag things as false until one of those other sites confirms it, or does it
default to neutral?

~~~
lallysingh
These are objective fact checks, aren't they? It's harder to quietly include
bias than in say, a newspaper or cable news.

If one/both of them starts getting power-mad with their influence, they can
get booted off the list, and replaced, or have others come in next to them.

If two of them say "This is true", and a third says "This is false", then that
third one, if it can present good data for it's POV, can quickly become more
trusted.

~~~
pawn
Okay, I didn't want to say it, but I personally think snopes is biased. I'm
going to use a few made-up examples because I don't want take the time to hunt
down real examples, but I used to see this occasionally and stopped using
them.

Myth: Donald Trump said he loves women.

Verdict: Mostly false

Facts: He said he loves women. He's also said mean things about Rosie
O'Donnell.

Myth: Bill Clinton said he loves Mexicans.

Verdict: Mostly True

Facts: He said he loves women. Some women are Mexicans

And yes, sometimes it's that absurdly blatant.

~~~
komali2
>I don't want to take the time to hunt down real examples

That's fine, but I advise nobody to put any credence behind your claim (snopes
is biased) until you are willing and able to provide evidence. Until then, it
is safer to continue with the general understanding that snopes is not biased.

You can't just toss shit over the wall and hope for the best, man.

~~~
alphapapa
> Until then, it is safer to continue with the general understanding that
> snopes is not biased.

Are you serious? You think it's safer to consider them _not_ biased?

That's just bizarre. Snopes is a business. Their purpose is to make money by
generating clicks. Why in the world would you consider them some kind of
unbiased, altruistic truth-seekers? Because they say so?

That's the most _unsafe_ understanding you could have, because it leaves you
completely vulnerable to deception. Place your trust in them and you let them
have their way with your understanding of the world. You're like putty in
their hands.

> You can't just toss shit over the wall and hope for the best, man.

Well, you're nailing it to the wall and calling it truth, man. At least he
realizes what he's doing.

------
provost
I want to think about this both optimistically and pessimistically.

It's a great start and hope it leads to improvement, but this has the same
psychological effect as reading a click-bait headline (fake news in itself) --
unless readers dive deeper. And just as with Wikipedia, the "fact check" sites
could be gamed or contain inaccurate information themselves. Users never ask
about the 'primary sources', and instead justread the headline for face-value.

My pessimistic expectation is that this inevitably will result in something
like:

Chocolate is good for you. - Fact Check: Mostly True

Chocolate is bad for you. - Fact Check: Mostly True

Edit: Words

~~~
greglindahl
Nutritional advice is rarely supported by strong science, so "mostly true" for
both headlines is easily possible, given the weak evidence for each statement.

~~~
provost
That's my point... the things to be "fact checked" will often have weak
evidence, especially for the first few days/weeks.

------
sergiotapia
Snopes and Politifact are not fact-checking websites.

>Snopes’ main political fact-checker is a writer named Kim Lacapria. Before
writing for Snopes, Lacapria wrote for Inquisitr, a blog that — oddly enough —
is known for publishing fake quotes and even downright hoaxes as much as
anything else.

>While at Inquisitr, the future “fact-checker” consistently displayed clear
partisanship. She described herself as “openly left-leaning” and a liberal.
She trashed the Tea Party as “teahadists.” She called Bill Clinton “one of our
greatest” presidents.

\---

I think fact checking should be non-partisan, don't you?

~~~
savanaly
When you want to debunk a shyster claiming he has supernatural abilities
(pyschics, etc), who is the first person you should turn to? A magician. By
that same logic, perhaps former spin doctors make the best fact checkers.

~~~
ahyattdev
The problem is whether or not they are "former" spin doctors. One could
continue their "spinning" with even more power when being put in charge of
labeling media true or not.

------
allemagne
I think that politifact, snopes, and most fact-checking websites I'm aware of
are great and everyone should use them as sources of reason and skepticism in
a larger sea of information and misinformation.

But they are not authorities on the truth.

Google is not qualified to decide who is an authoritative decider of truth.
But as the de facto gateway to the internet, it really looks like they are now
doing exactly that. I am deeply uncomfortable with this.

~~~
marknutter
> But they are not authorities on the truth.

I actually find them to be quite a bit more dangerous than normal news
publications _precisely_ because they claim to have some higher standard for
truth. When truth comes down to a score card, you can inject less spin and
bias into the article than you would otherwise have to because so long as your
readers see that something was at least "mostly true" or "mostly false" they
will consider the case closed because it says "fact" right in the name of the
publication.

~~~
savanaly
Do you think that

a) it's possible, hypothetically, for an organization to exist that holds
itself to a consistently higher standard of truthful reporting, both in basic
facts in in how they report it

b) if yes to a), it's practical to make an organization like that

c) if yes to a) and b), should the organization attempt to advertise itself as
being "more truthful" than other places that don't do that, such as by putting
"fact" in their name?

------
throwaway71958
This is incomplete: they need to also include the political affiliations of
owners of "fact check" sites, and perhaps also FEC disclosure for donations
above threshold, and sources of financial support. I.e. this site comes from
PolitiFact, but its owner is a liberal and he took a bunch of money from
Pierre Omidyar who also donated heavily to the Clinton Global Initiative. Puts
the fact checks in a more "factual" light, IMO. Fact check on the fact check:
[http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/article/2016/jan/14/...](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-
meter/article/2016/jan/14/new-grant-will-help-politifact-grow/)

Things have gotten hyper-partisan to the extreme in the past year or so, so
you sometimes see things that are factually true rated as "mostly false" if
they do not align with the narrative of the (typically liberal) owners.

------
pcmonk
What I wish they would do is use their fancy AI to put in a link to the
original source. Tracking down original sources is extremely tedious, but it
generally gives you the clearest idea of what's actually going on.

~~~
Neliquat
So much this. The sources, while often not any more factual, give you a better
context for the given informaton.

------
artursapek
I see Google having good intentions here, but I fall back to my previous
sentiment on trying to assign "true/false" for all political stories and
discussions.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13793576](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13793576)

------
tabeth
Fact checking is irrelevant. What's necessary is education. Just like spell
check will not allow you to magically compose elegant prose, fact check is not
going to prevent people from being misled. Notice how both of these "problems"
have the same solution. In fact, fact check can be counter productive as
people now sprinkle their articles with irrelevant facts.

Education is the solution to all social problems.

~~~
plainOldText
Education, as well us cognitive augmentation. Our brains are incapable of
keeping up with the influx of information we're interacting with on a regular
basis. We need to develop systems capable of information processing tailored
to ones individual needs, intimately connected to our intellects.

------
DanBC
I'd be interested to see how it copes with UK newspapers.

[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C6GuXQhWUAAN5F5.jpg](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C6GuXQhWUAAN5F5.jpg)

PROOF STATINS SAVE MILLIONS

STATINS IN NEW HEALTH ALERT

STATINS REALLY DO SAVE YOUR LIFE

HEALTH CHIEF SLAMS STATINS

HIGH DOSE OF STATINS CAN BEAT DEMENTIA

DOCTORS BAN ON STATINS

TAKE STATINS TO SAVE YOUR LIFE

NEW STATINS BOMBSHELL

OFFICIAL: STATINS ARE SAFE

STATINS: NEW SAFETY CHECKS

PROOF STATINS BEAT DEMENTIA

HOW STATINS CAN CAUSE DIABETES

STATINS FIGHT CANCER

STATINS SLASH RISK OF STROKE BY 30%

STATINS INCREASE RISK OF DIABETES

STATINS ADD A MERE 3 DAYS TO LIFE

STATINS DOUBLE RISK OF DIABETES

STATINS AGE YOU FASTER

NEW STATINS SAFETY ALERT

STATINS LINKED TO 227 DEATHS

PROOF AT LAST STATINS ARE SAFE

~~~
rdiddly
To say nothing of the challenges of a rigorous fact-minded enquiry in to the
topic of KATE!

------
sweetishfish
Who fact checks the fact checkers?

~~~
castis
I would imagine that you; the reader, does. If you find something incorrect,
you should tell them or make an attempt to do so.

Having said that, I'm skeptical that this will be a force for overall good. I
can already imagine ways in which this will be abused.

~~~
MrZongle2
_" If you find something incorrect, you should tell them or make an attempt to
do so."_

This seems like the common-sense approach, but who knows how long a proper
"review" would take place and how much damage would be done (e.g. thousands or
millions being improperly informed by a supposedly reliable service) in the
meantime.

I am also highly skeptical of this effort, which essentially amounts to Google
and a few parties trying to automate critical thinking skills.

~~~
Karunamon
Yeah.. it doesn't work that way at all. The lie is usually bombastic and bite-
sized, the debunking subdued and thorough.

Result: Most people won't even see the debunking.

Churchill had a great quote here:

" _A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get
its pants on._ "

------
scottmsul
A better idea would be to look for disagreements. Given a news article or
claim, are there any sources out there which disagree? Then the user could
browse both claims and decide for himself.

~~~
twinkletwinkle
Counterargument to that is the whole "teach the controversy" dispute.
Evolution is the only scientifically accepted theory, there are sources which
disagree but placing eg Intelligent Design on the same level as Evolution is
disingenuous.

------
ksk
Are we in the twilight zone? An advertising company fact checking political
discourse? Would google apply the same fact check to their own company?

"Does Google dodge taxes"

~~~
drdrey
I don't see the fact check widget, but the first search result for your
suggested query is a Forbes story with the headline "Google Moved Billions Of
Dollars To Bermuda To Avoid Taxes... Again"

~~~
ksk
This is what I get for another similar query..

[http://imgur.com/a/iy2cK](http://imgur.com/a/iy2cK)

------
civilian
So I mean, this is just a metadata tag. Anyone can make one. I'm looking
forward to Breitbart & HuffPo abusing this...

I think it would be interesting to collect a list of websites that disagree on
a claim review.

------
gthtjtkt
Snopes and Politifact are abject failures. Nothing but glorified bloggers who
have declared themselves the arbiters of truth.

Even Rachel Maddow has called them out on numerous occasions, and she was
rooting for the same candidate as them: [http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-
show/watch/politifact-fai...](http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-
show/watch/politifact-fails-again-destroy-277552195924)

------
smsm42
Reading the article, it looks like what is going on is that news publishers
now can claim that their articles were fact checked, or certain article is a
fact check article on another one, using special markup. They also say the
fact checks should adhere to certain guidelines, but I don't see how it would
be possible for them to enforce any of these guidelines. It looks like just
self-labelling feature, with all abuse potential inherent in this.

------
forgotpwtomain
This is a bad slippery slope - it suggests that a 'little sponsored banner'
(which google chooses) can waive the necessity of being diligent in thought.

~~~
Florin_Andrei
No. This does not replace anything. It's just one tool in a big war chest
against bullshit. Fact checking is one tool. Good thinking is another. The
list is big and we need every single one of those things to stave off this
pandemic.

~~~
forgotpwtomain
> Fact checking is one tool. Good thinking is another. The list is big and we
> need every single one of those things to stave off this pandemic.

Which _pandemic_ are you referring to exactly? Fake news, deceptive reporting,
gossip, libel, propaganda has existed pretty much as long as authority has
existed. Now recently Trump became president and there is a _national
pandemic_ and no doubt we should place our trust in certain institutions to
help combat this _disease_. If this isn't Orwelesque I don't know what is...

------
throw2016
'Fact checking' should be limited to blatantly false news items fabricated and
posted for online ad clicks ie 'Obama to move to Canada to help Trudeau run
country' or 'Trump applies for UK citizenship to free UK citizens from
Brussels despots'. These should be relatively easy to identify and classify.

There is a wide line between the fabrications above and news and journalism as
we know it full of opinion, bias, agendas, propaganda and maybe some facts
twisted to suit narrative.

The latter takes human level ai to sift through and even then detecting bias,
leanings or manipulation depends on one's background, world view,
specialization, knowledge levels, understanding of how the media works and a
well informed general big picture state of the world.

This is impossible to classify for bias, falsehood or manipulation and will
need readers to use their judgment. Trying to 'control' this is like trying to
control news, favouring media aligned to your world view and discrediting
those whose views you disagree with. It is for all purposes propaganda as we
understand the term. Calling it fact checking is sophistry.

------
josefresco
What if I told you (cue the Morpheus meme), that people consuming the "fake
news" don't care that it's fake? It's called confirmation bias and winning.
Education isn't going to solve this issue, you can't forcibly educate people
nor can you change their core "values" and their determination to be "right".

The only "education" that I can envision working is quantifying the real-
world-impact of their votes on the _personal level_. Ex: Your health insurance
was cancelled? The representative you voted for caused that. This
unfortunately is normally executed with a partisan goal, however should be
applied as a public service to all Americans.

------
debt
this is just gonna create a pavlovian response akin to "ah okay this is fact-
checked i'll read" which'll just compound the problem. it presumes that
google's fact-checking algorithms and methodology are sound.

------
oldgun
Besides political debates, anyone else thinks this 'ClaimReview' schema put to
use by Google is one step towards the application of Semantic Web? There might
be something more than just a 'new app by Google' here.

------
orangepenguin
There is obviously a lot of debate on whether or not fact checking is accurate
and useful. I think simply presenting a fact check will help people think more
critically about headlines they see every day. Like "Mythbusters Science".
It's not perfect, but it helps people to think.

Relevant: [https://xkcd.com/397/](https://xkcd.com/397/)

------
pdimitar
"There's only one truth and that is Google".

Haha, no. Keep trying though.

Plus, as journalists in this thread have said, you might stick to the facts
100% (which I doubt Google will resist the temptation to abuse in the future,
but let's leave that aside for now), your conclusion or subliminal message at
the end might be entirely untrue and misguided.

Sorry, Google. You need wait the planet's collective IQ to drop by several
tens still. It's not your time to dominate the news yet.

------
okreallywtf
I'm amazed at how much cynicism I'm seeing here about this. People just keep
repeating what can be boiled down to the same premise: complete objective
truth basically doesn't exist. Truth is messy, tricky, subjective business.
This is not new, this is just how the world is. Truth and understanding is
best-effort and always has been, so why is a tool to attempt to combat some of
the most egregious falsehoods even remotely a bad thing? Nobody should claim
that its bulletproof, but I'm not seeing anyone really do this? The problem is
some of us never deal in absolutes, we see nuance in everything (climate
science, economics, political science) but there are others who do deal in
absolutes and make a killing doing so. Sitting around having the same debate
over and over about facts and truth doesn't do anything to tackle the problem.

My rule of thumb is that generally there is safety in numbers. Don't trust any
single source and don't trust something that doesn't have a chain of reasoning
behind it. I trust all kinds of scientific statements that I don't have the
qualifications or time to vet myself - but we have to do our best and that
often means doing a meta-analysis of how a conclusion was reached and how many
other people/groups (who themselves have qualifications and links to other
entities with similar qualifications) that the statements are linked to.

Fake news isn't 100 levels deep, its usually 1 level with no real supporting
information. When people (like Trump) categorically denounce someone elses
statement they often provide no real information of their own. Similarly, when
refuting a fact-check, most people don't dig into it and refute something in
their chain of reasoning, they just say "well that is just not true!" and
leave it at that.

We don't need to fundamentally fix the nature of truth but we need to be able
to combat the worst cases of misinformation and any tool that helps do that is
great. Continuing the have the same philosophical debate about truth is fine
from an academic standpoint but from a practical standpoint it is sometimes
not helpful. I feel similarly about climate change - its great to acknowledge
nuance but what good is that if we're trending towards pogroms and a
totalitarian dictatorship (to be hyperbolic, maybe)?

------
narrowrail
Who will fact check the fact checkers?

Well, perhaps these trusted sources should implement a system similar to
Quora/StackExchange but for opposing arguments?

Lots of comments call into question the biases of sites like
Snopes/Politifact/etc. and allowing some sort of adversarial response would
help claims about 'leftists wanting to control our minds.'

Maybe it's just a widget at the bottom of a fact check post leading to a
StackExchange'd subdomain. A wiki or subreddit could work as well. Anyone
looking for a side project?

------
balozi
One likely outcome from this is that Google Search and News will be now be
perceived as partisan by the Hoi polloi. Same reason why the old media
gatekeeper fell by the wayside.

------
ronjouch
> [https://blog.google/products/search/fact-check-now-
> available...](https://blog.google/products/search/fact-check-now-available-
> google-search-and-news-around-world/)

Didn't know Google has its own top-level domain oÔ. Previous HN discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12609551](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12609551)

------
pklausler
I really wish that major legitimate institutions of journalism (i.e., the ones
that require multiple independent sources, publish corrections and
retractions, &c.) would just stop pussyfooting around with nice simple
accurate words like "lies" when they're reporting on somebody who's blatantly
lying. False equivalency and cowardice is going to get us all killed.

~~~
dragonwriter
> I really wish that major legitimate institutions of journalism (i.e., the
> ones that require multiple independent sources, publish corrections and
> retractions, &c.) would just stop pussyfooting around with nice simple
> accurate words like "lies" when they're reporting on somebody who's
> blatantly lying.

I'd prefer false statements be characterized as such rather than lies (which
involves not just false statement but also a particular mental state by the
one making the statement) by the media, unless there is overwhelming evidence
that the statement is a knowing falsehood.

Obviously, information that suggests that the originator knew, or reasonably
should have known, the statement to be false should be presented as well,
where available.

~~~
exclusiv
Agreed. It's more disturbing that people seem so comfortable calling others
liars without evidence. Or racist, homophobic, xenophobic, etc. I heard Chris
Matthews push that yesterday - saying things like "maybe they're challenging
her like they are because she's a woman... I don't know". If you don't know,
don't suggest it.

------
MrZongle2
So what takes place when the inevitable happens, and an employee decides that
an existing "fact check" (conducted by a third party, Google hastens to add)
is philosophically inconvenient and thus removes it?

Also, FTA: _" Only publishers that are algorithmically determined to be an
authoritative source of information will qualify for inclusion."_

What's the algorithm? Who wrote it?

~~~
snowpanda
This happens already, especially with politifact and snopes, glad I'm not the
only one on HN who sees it.

------
pcl
The blog title is "Fact Check now available in Google Search and News around
the world". I think that the extra bit at the end is worthy of inclusion, as I
expect this to become a point of contention over the years.

I would not be surprised if different governments take issue with Google
adding any sort of editorial commentary, even if it's algorithmically
determined etc.

------
return0
It's a witch hunt. Science (rather, life sciences) has a similar problem.
There are just enough (statistically significant) facts to push many agendas.
Peer review weeds out some stuff, but that doesn't stop a lot of wrong
conclusions being pushed to the public.

Maybe a better solution is adversarial opinionated journalism, rather than
this proposed fact-ism.

------
dragonwriter
Original title is "Fact Check now in Google Search and News"; the different
capitalization vs the current HN headline ("Fact Check Now...") is
significant, the new feature "Fact Check" is now available in Google Search
and News, rather than a feature "Fact Check Now" being discussed in those
services.

------
losteverything
Billy Jack was rated M.

This is just another new rating system.

As long as they don't prevent me from reading false things, I can live with
it.

Keep it my choice.

~~~
retox
I may be naive but I sincerely think this is the first step in a larger
sequence of events. Next 'fake' articles/sources will get a lower ranking in
searches, then they'll be replaced with a button "this result is fake news,
click here to read anyway". The final step will be complete removal of sources
all together.

And what happens when Google is the subject of a hostile take over and those
tools are in the hands of someone else? Slippery slope fallacy, you might cry
but we'll see.

~~~
losteverything
Your post made me think of the Google search as "pure" \- yeah algorithms spat
out stuff, but a keyword change here or there got different stuff. Now it
isn't pure.

We need a Pure search engine.

------
takeda
I know a person who eats those "alternative facts" like candy. When I tried to
prove one of them wrong, I pulled out a website to do a fact check and his
response was: "you trust Snopes?" so I have doubts this will help much, but I
would like to be wrong.

------
mark_l_watson
I don't like this, at all. People need to rely on their own reasoning skills
and critical judgement and not let centralized authorities have a large effect
on what people can read. I like systems to be decentralized and this seems to
be the opposite.

------
coryfklein
Pretty neat! Unfortunately doesn't help when searching for "obama wiretap
trump tower".

[https://www.google.com/search?q=obama+wiretap+trump+tower](https://www.google.com/search?q=obama+wiretap+trump+tower)

------
Mithaldu
Like very often when google says "everywhere" they don't remotely mean
everywhere and should instead be saying "in the usa". My country's edition of
google news has no fact check at all.

------
westurner
So, publishers can voluntarily add
[https://schema.org/ClaimReview](https://schema.org/ClaimReview) markup as
RDFa, JSON-LD, or Microdata.

------
ArchReaper
Anyone have an alt link? 'blog.google' does not resolve for me.

~~~
cbhl
Is it an option for you to use Google Public DNS so that you can resolve the
new .google gTLD?

[https://developers.google.com/speed/public-
dns/](https://developers.google.com/speed/public-dns/)

------
DrScump
It's interesting timing that just today, for the first time in a couple of
weeks, my Facebook feed has fake news clickbait ads again.

Unless both Kevin Spacey and Burt Reynolds are, in fact, dead. Again.

------
thr0waway1239
Factual Unbiased Checks for Knowledge Upkeep by Google.

------
xster
The fact that this came from CFR/Hillary's State Department's Jigsaw is very
troubling.

------
sova
Hurrah for Google! Now if only Facebook and SocialNetworkGiants(tm) would
follow suit!

------
codydh
I tried a slew of recent statements that are objectively false but that a
certain politician in the United States has tried to say are true. Google
returned fact checks for exactly 0 of the queries I tried.

~~~
civilian
So I mean, this is just google supporting a new kind of metadata on pages.
They aren't validating anything.

------
retox
I don't trust Google to tell me the sky is blue.

~~~
Safety1stClyde
What does that statement mean?

------
keebEz
A fact has no truth value. Truth only comes from reason, and reason only
exists in each person's head. This is reducing the demand for reason, and thus
destroying truth.

~~~
pierrepoutine
Five Pinocchios ("pants on fire"!)

------
ffef
A great start in the right direction and a kudos for using Schema to help
battle "'fake news'"

------
gokusaaaan
who fact checks the facts checkers?

------
SJacPhoto
And Who controls the fact-check facts?

------
isaac_is_goat
Snopes and Politifact? Really? smh

------
huula
Goodgirl!

------
snowpanda
Snopes and Politifact, they can't be serious. Not that I expected them to pick
a neutral source, nor am I surprised that Silicon Valley's Google picked 2
leftist "fact" sources. This is a stupid idea, everyone has a bias. This isn't
to help people, this is to influence how people see things.

~~~
fiatjaf
Who will fact-check the fact-checkers?

