On: Consumer prices rose 8.5% in March – highest since 1981

[dragonwriter]

> Reputability is not equally subjective

Reputability is the aggregate of individual opinion, which is the definition of subjectivity.

[TameAntelope → dragonwriter]

Aggregating individual opinion (sometimes) has a washing-out effect on bias, which makes it valuable as a tool to push towards objectivity. [0]

This is why I much prefer to follow guidance from institutions over individuals. There's also a "stewardship" in institutions that seems effective in countering other forms of bias (but not all).

Of course there's a whole lot of bias left over that doesn't make this a fire-and-forget strategy, but comparatively it seems closer to objectivity than to just trust one's eyes alone, which has effectively zero systemic corrections for bias.

[0] - You may know about this already, but I think of it like crowds singing, and if you'll afford me a bit of metaphorical license, here's a better explanation of how that works than what I could write: https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/382429/in-concer...

[SideQuark → dragonwriter]

By that argument, all knowledge and belief and fact is the aggregate of individual opinion, so nothing would be objective.

More likely there is a continuum, and more reputable places have more objective (and hence less subjective) output than less reputable places.

[aww_dang → SideQuark]

Consider the contrast between these statements:

"The Bureau of Labor Statistics is a reputable institution"

"A triangle has three sides"

"Governments, politicians and their bureaucrats are trustworthy"

"Two parallel lines will never meet"

http://steve-patterson.com/deduction-induction-and-axioms/