Just where are you getting your information?

[Vinayaka]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

 

[Audie]

Wide variety, China Daily China Daily Website - Connecting China Connecting the World
Wall st journal. BBC etc

 

[Rival]

Books and internet, usually YouTube lectures etc.

I trust books more tho.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate.

How silly.

 

[JustGeorge]

It really depends on what the subject is.

For religious information, I read a lot. If possible, I'll find someone more knowledgeable than myself to answer questions. If applicable, I may pray or meditate.

If I'm wanting to learn about cuisines, I'm stuck with the internet. Sometime cookbooks are helpful, but they're not always affordable.

For health, either human or animal, I always consult a doctor. I never use internet sources, because its usually over dramatic and full of crap, and leaves you feeling like you're dying.

For everything else, I prefer to ask people that know more. I'm the obnoxious turd who gets people saying "you can google that". Of course I can. But I'd rather ask you!

 

[Twilight Hue]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

I like independent sources with few exceptions.

I tend to think independent sources are more genuine and honest in light major sources seems to get corrupted over time.

 

[Nakosis]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

Mostly here, from RF. People post links and I'll do an internet search to check additional sources. Just have to be careful though as I often find many sources leading back to the same single source. Only to find a few days later, that single source was biased.
I suspect most sources are biased anyway, so hard to put complete trust in anything you find. It's an odd world were the masses are manipulated by the media.
A few professionals I've found I've been able to trust so far.

 

[JustGeorge]

Mostly here, from RF. People post links and I'll do an internet search to check additional sources. Just have to be careful though as I often find many sources leading back to the same single source. Only to find a few days later, that single source was biased.
I suspect most sources are biased anyway, so hard to put complete trust in anything you find. It's an odd world were the masses are manipulated by the media.
A few professionals I've found I've been able to trust so far.

I get a lot of my news from here, too. It can be interesting to compare the differing outlooks on an event; its adds some balance, I feel.

 

[Vinayaka]

I get a lot of my news from here, too. It can be interesting to compare the differing outlooks on an event; its adds some balance, I feel.

For international news I like BBC, our own CBC, and will also look at Al Jazeera. It was interesting living somewhere else where the news isn't so dominated by you guys, our neighbour to the south. So you're right ... important to get differing POVs. As to religion, I've often found ex-________ forums to be full of 'the other side of the story'.

 

[Dao Hao Now]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

The “not accepting written words as facts” is interesting.

rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line,

In what form are the “variety of sources”?
Does it become more credible if it’s in a more easily edited or manipulated electronic medium than if it is written on paper?
Do you trust video over text?

It’s true, the fact something is written does not guarantee it’s veracity.
It simply makes it more easily examinable and traceable and more difficult to deny at a later date.

Seeking out a variety of sources of “news” or things of the like which may be filtered through a possibly biased lens is a wise thing to do.

If we’re talking about a study or something along those lines, you’re better of going to the original source, to prevent as much misunderstanding that often is included and exasperated the further one gets from the original source material.

So, whenever possible, seek out the original source.

If the original source is unavailable, consider as many credible varying sources as close to the original as possible.

One does require critical thinking skills to help determine what may be a “credible source”.

Always seek out objectivity over subjectivity, in order to remove as much bias as possible.

 

[Vinayaka]

The “not accepting written words as facts” is interesting.

In what form are the “variety of sources”?
Does it become more credible if it’s in a more easily edited or manipulated electronic medium than if it is written on paper?
Do you trust video over text?

It’s true, the fact something is written does not guarantee it’s veracity.
It simply makes it more easily examinable and traceable and more difficult to deny at a later date.

Seeking out a variety of sources of “news” or things of the like which may be filtered through a possibly biased lens is a wise thing to do.

If we’re talking about a study or something along those lines, you’re better of going to the original source, to prevent as much misunderstanding that often is included and exasperated the further one gets from the original source material.

So, whenever possible, seek out the original source.

If the original source is unavailable, consider as many credible varying sources as close to the original as possible.

One does require critical thinking skills to help determine what may be a “credible source”.

Always seek out objectivity over subjectivity, in order to remove as much bias as possible.

Excellent point ... to try to find the original source. In many cases it's impossible. War news, for example, is almost always filtered through the eyes of an individual reporter, and the news corporation that publishes it. I recall being interested in the Sri Lankan war back when it happened. The Sinhalese media and the Tamil media had vastly different takes, and the truth was probably somewhere in between. That was an eye-opener for me, in regards to looking closer. What I look at depends somewhat on topic. You don't get a whole lot of religious discussion TV, for example. But for world news, you have internet, TV, newspapers, and several of them.

In Hinduism, in a much higher user forum, a guy will ask some innocent question, and there will be 100 different answers. So yes it's tricky, and takes some critical thinking skills, as you wisely pointed out. Sadly, not everyone has those. Maybe I'm one of them.

 

[syo]

I ask my husband.

 

[SalixIncendium]

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

When I need information, I go to the debates section in RF.

 

[an anarchist]

In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

For political thought, I go to www.corbettreport.com
People on this site call it no good because it reports on "conspiracy theories". In all actuality it's an anarchist open news source that sources all of the information that is available. The readily available shownotes linking to all the sources have been very beneficial for me. It's been a couple of years since I've browsed it regularly. Made me fear and hate the government with a passion, needed a break from all that energy.
He has good documentaries on the origins of the banking system, oil industry, 9/11, WW1, amongst other things.

 

[Twilight Hue]

When I need information, I go to the debates section in RF.

I found a secret link from archived debate threads that goes directly to the Onion and Landover Baptist.

The pinnacle of fine outstanding journalism!

 

[lewisnotmiller]

I found a secret link from archived debate threads that goes directly to the Onion and Landover Baptist.

The pinnacle of fine outstanding journalism!

The real headlines and the Onion headlines aren't so different these days.
In general terms, I use a wide variety of sources, and try to limit comment until I've had a chance to check multiple.

A couple I find really useful that people might not be too aware of (and I've linked to here before);

Home - Lost Debate
I particularly like listening to their podcast whilst driving when there are US issues I'm interested in. Plays pretty centrist, as they deliberately put people with different political views on their panel.

The Conversation: In-depth analysis, research, news and ideas from leading academics and researchers.
There are subsites for various regions, including the US, UK, Canada and France amongst others. More independent authorship, so individual stories can be more left or right biased, but the overall site avoids consistent editorial bias, and has good accuracy, and diverse topics.

 

[Daemon Sophic]

Online info almost entirely. For basic news I often come here to the RF to see what’s “hot” for the day. Then I check to see what I can find, since often certain forum members here utilize……questionable ……sources.

For basic news coverage, I will go to ABC News, CNN, AP News, and sometimes the BBC or MSNBC (these last 2 usually balance out their respective biases). I was surprised to find a money paper like Forbes is decent, and although whiners gotta whine, I use Politico and Snopes to start investigations of outrageous claims that I might see here. I also always check “scientific” claims with the likes of Pubmed, and Google Scholar to find original articles.

 

[Aupmanyav]

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

Wikipedia, Googl Search, Quora. Check as many links as possible.
For news, we have many channels on TV. I check at least 10, also Google News. For pro-Modi - R-Bharat, for anti-Modi - NDTV, for sensationalism, NewsNation, about how Russia will destroy Ukraine and USA will destroy China. The channels have international news as well, but Al Jazira is very good if the news are of interest to me. Wish CNN and BBC also were as good.

 

[Mock Turtle]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

It mostly depends upon what information I require or required. Before the internet for example I would obtain books from the local library, and often having to request items that they didn't hold in stock if cited in some relevant bibliography. As to general information - in the news and such - it mainly came from respected outlets like the BBC or the more impartial and more sensible newspapers, and often from scientific publications like New Scientist or Scientific American or other such journals.

With the advent of the internet, the news sources have hardly changed, and perhaps widened by accepting some of the news from other sites and from other countries. It all depends as to how important I feel the need to have accurate information, given that I do realise that we often can't have such all the time or even much of the time. So hopefully I try to read the results rather than the pronouncements as to where any truth might lie. I still read books quite a bit and hopefully will get through the backlog one day.

Although I do look at much of the popular news media, I will hopefully get some decent corroboration before simply accepting what is written in so many of these. The best aim, as far as I can see, is to get information from the most authoritative and accurate source where possible and accept that anything else has limitations - and even the most authoritative sources will usually have such too.

 

[gnomon]

I'm a questioner, and rarely accept any written word as fact, or even close to being accurate. So, when in doubt, I tend to look at a variety of sources for information, mostly on-line, unless I know somebody in real life that I trust. For example, I might ask my dentist something about my teeth, or the temple priest about some ritual he does. Otherwise it's mainly the internet, and of course personal observation, and experience.

With religion, I acknowledge a personal bias, but that has happened over 40 plus years. In politics, watching or reading ideas, I see a general cherry picking attitude.

What is your 'go to' for information? What do you do to find out stuff? Do you use one source mainly? Thoughts?

The toilet. At my age and health it's a very important source of information. I would recommend it to everyone. The amazing thing is that what you feed it is what you expect to get out of it. Information....that is.