THE TRANSHUMANIST SCRAPBOOK: GOOGLE’S “INTERNET OF ...
Mr. K.H. and a few others of you brought this intriguing development to my attention, and this one is worth pondering very carefully. Google, it seems, wants to reshape the internet into an "internet of facts":
Google wants to rank websites based on facts not links
Consider the hopelessly "party line" approach that New Scientist, and Google, appear to be pushing here:
"THE internet is stuffed with garbage. Anti-vaccination websites make the front page of Google, and fact-free "news" stories spread like wildfire. Google has devised a fix – rank websites according to their truthfulness.
"Google's search engine currently uses the number of incoming links to a web page as a proxy for quality, determining where it appears in search results. So pages that many other sites link to are ranked higher. This system has brought us the search engine as we know it today, but the downside is that websites full of misinformation can rise up the rankings, if enough people link to them.
"A Google research team is adapting that model to measure the trustworthiness of a page, rather than its reputation across the web. Instead of counting incoming links, the system – which is not yet live – counts the number of incorrect facts within a page. "A source that has few false facts is considered to be trustworthy," says the team (arxiv.org/abs/1502.03519v1). The score they compute for each page is its Knowledge-Based Trust score.
"The software works by tapping into the Knowledge Vault, the vast store of facts that Google has pulled off the internet. Facts the web unanimously agrees on are considered a reasonable proxy for truth. Web pages that contain contradictory information are bumped down the rankings."
Of course, the internet is stuffed with garbage. I myself have been a victim of it(see the whole Amit Gotswami affair), and others have been too. But the obvious epistemological and philosophical problems of what Google is proposing are also evident. Whose "facts" are going to be so rated? Is Google trying to position itself, via its proposed search engine modifications, as the new internet magisterium with claims to infallibility ex consensu ecclesiae internetae, tha final arbiter of what is and is not a fact? Where will they come down, for example, on the "fact" that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone and killed President Kennedy? or that James Earl Ray acted alone and killed Dr. Martin Luther King? or that Sirhan Sirhan... well, you get the idea. And 9/11? Is it a "fact" that 19 "Muslim terrorists" highjacked four planes with box cutters and flew then into buildings? Is it a "fact" that GMOs are scientifically proven to be harmless, and that vaccines have no relationship to the rise in autism?
And what about "contradictions"? How does one measure synthesis here, even of the Hegelian sort? Is a website, for example, to be found "in contradiction" if, say, it runs a story one month on the role of the Mafia in the JFK assassination, and then the next about the role of the CIA, or anti-Castro Cubans? Is that a contradiction? Is Google trying to be the Rush Limbaugh of the internet, documented "in almost all cases to be 99% right"?
I suspect that what's really going on here, folks, is that while efforts to regulate the internet continue to flounder, that other options, more "private" and "corporate" ones are being explored. The problem is, no amount of regulation, of the internet, radio, television, or so on, can get around one crucial and obvious thing. People are waking up; they have lost trust in any one news or opinion source, and are making up their own minds on things, thank you very much.
See you on the flip side...
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Hello out there! I have had a post to this thread “awaiting moderation” for nearly a day-and-a-half now. I’ve never known “moderation” to take this long. Might there be a problem with the system? And I already tried the “support ticket” after a full day had passed. Thanks.
The internet’s nemesis, those cyber-rattling bots[cops]on “free” thought patrols/nothing but mickey-mouse operators slapping copyrighted golden handcuffs[bots galore], a free-speech ungodly usury.
I’ve gotten that Martian Modulator Bot[Copyright’s Inc.]
one too many times.
Good Luck!
[crossing my fingers for no golden handcuffs/this post]
Nah, Robert. When I’m logged in I can still see it “awaiting moderation” directly below us on the thread. Weird. There is nothing profane, derogatory, or “infringing” about it. I had merely quibbled with Dr. Farrell’s assertion that people are waking up and stated my evidence, and then asked him to state his own. It is a shame too because we are seeing this belief expressed more and more online that people are waking up, but unlike so many others, Dr. Farrell can make a credible case.
I see the thread too.
I had thought it had something to do with copyright. I too, understand some ways of “saying” something are not in good taste, or purposely hurtful. Those are not to be condoned. When I see “awaiting moderation”, I assume it’s something under a “copyright” umbrella. Perhaps policing the “civility” of comments is the primary reason for the moderation’s appearance. [I vehemently despise the copyright bogeyman, and see him under every unturned rock.]
Robert, I’m sure it is just a keyword filter (i.e. include one of the keywords and your post is flagged for moderation/human evaluation). We already know that Dr. Farrell does not like profanity, and, under its default settings, the program probably includes racial epithets and quite possibly anything un-PC today.
As far as I can tell, the only term I used which might conceivably get caught in a PC keyword flagger is a particular type of tale read to children which doubles as a derogatory term for a sexually confused male. I described the government’s official version of 9/11 as just such a tale. Unfortunately it would appear that Daniel has not been around the past couple of days, so the post is still in the keyword trap awaiting moderation.
“People are waking up; they have lost trust in any one news or opinion source, and are making up their own minds on things, thank you very much.”
Dr. Farrell, what evidence have you seen of this?
When I go to work or elsewhere out in the world, I see people behaving pretty much exactly as they have for the past 15 years, if not always. Most everybody is still glued to that idiot box and, consequently, still no one is really questioning the official fairy tale concerning 9/11, or displaying an ardent desire that those in the Bush administration and CIA who were complicit with the Mossad in committing that horrendously psychopathic act be brought to justice. If some do display possible disbelief concerning more recent false flags, they invariably only do so to attack the empty suit Obama, but conspicuously do not mention any false flag from the preceding Bush administration. This is just the standard mind pollution from Limbaugh, Hannity, etc. which is all part and parcel of the “divide and conquer” mentality which rules the mainstream media as it is essential to the PTB maintaining their control.
So, no, I see no *reliable* evidence that anything has changed with the great mass of cowards masquerading as morons over the past 15 years. However I would love to know where you see it.
Virtually everyone I come into contact with is fed up and know something is rotten
I find those at the bottom of the economic scale tend to be “in-the-know”, and will express it openly.
But as one climbs higher up the scale, there is a “reluctance” “to know”, or at lest “express it” openly[if, indeed they do, in fact, …”know”].
Thanks, Dr. Farrell. I wish that you would dedicate a blog entry, or perhaps a “News and Views,” to this topic. At least I would really love to be convinced to believe this.
But right now I only see Republican Kool-Aid drinkers who have been stirred up by the likes of Limbaugh, Hannity, FauxNews, etc. to blame Obama for everything, specifically not attributing responsibility for anything to anybody in office prior to 2009. And so long as people continue to sanction the false dichotomy of our two major political parties, they are still fully part of the problem, specifically enabling the PTB responsible for all this garbage in the first place.
Remember Julia was more politically aware than Wilson Smith in the novel 1984. And I suspect the proles were playing dumb to evade the thought police in that book.
Well, exactly. They know full well that something has been seriously wrong since 9/11 (and arguably since the 2000 election). They KNOW full well, but their cowardice prevents them from separating themselves from pack, standing apart from the herd, and so they, out of weakness of character, continue to cast aspersions at those who do while repeating the standard media propaganda line no matter what the subject. They know, but they are ruled by fear over which they feign ignorance out of shame. That is why they are a great mass of cowards masquerading as morons.
If Dr. Farrell is correct, then increasing numbers from this great mass of cowards masquerading as morons are now standing apart from the pack. Presumably they have stopped watching the intelligence-insulting mainstream media as well. I just do not see it, but I would love for Dr. Farrell to dedicate a News and Views to this.
On the other hand, if we are talking about Europe or other places, well sure. The US is under a truth quarantine like no place else. So the only question is whether more and more individual Americans are finding their cojones, standing apart from the pack, and turning off the idiot box. Again I do not see it, but I would love to be convinced that they are.
Under governance of the printing press writing created a medium that was conducive to generally coherent, serious, and rational. Even Deep Thought[as writing freezes speech]. Then came the boob tube with her 16 mm celluloid sidekick, and the discourse became idiotic, absurd, and mickey mouse. The internet then led to speed, filter bubbles & information overload effecting the art of remembering and thinking.
When man went from oral to writing; that was a HUGE change. Remember Decalogue, the second commandment of making concrete images of anything? The Word[read God] was to exist in The Word[requiring the highest order of abstract thinking]. The media of communication available to a culture is the dominant influence on the formation of the culture’s intellectual and social preoccupations. Also remember the Egyptian God Thoth? Alleged to have brought writing to the King Thamus. Thoth just happens to also be the God of Magic[a conversation with no one and yet with everyone].
So now “screens” tell you not only what is really out there but what the government, Google, or Facebook thinks you should see. If an event is not listed in Google, it never happened. Conversely, if it does appear in Google, it still might not of happened. Welcome to the world of digital trickery, a virtual hall of mirrors represented as screens where all is magically possible.
Google captures no more than 16% of the surface Web and misses all of the Deep Web. While the Deep Web contains 7500hundred terabytes of information, the Google universe contains a paltry 19 terabytes. When you search Google[before it becomes the Ministry of Truth], you are only seeing 0.03 percent9one in three thousand pages. It misses 99% of the World Wide Web Data. Thus, the Deep Web is a massive 500 times larger than the surface web you use and search every day.
[The Dark Net uses encryption and peer-to-peer Internet relay channels specifically designed to hide IP addresses of its users, thereby providing an anonymous, untraceable, and secure platform.]
This is what you et when governments/Big Business go Hollywood-Control-Freaking through & through “they’re” internet.
Yep Goggle knows what’s right and what’s wrong, and the facts speak for themselves, well goooooollllleeee. The internet has a sting in it’s tail, and the elites don’t like it, well the elites can go and take a flying “F”, the damage has been done, and the elites shirt tails are showing, and the world has seen the rear end of what these morons have been doing for millennia. The jig is up, Pandora’ box has been sprung open, so now it’s time for the truth, I can’t wait.
All this reminds me of a statement that Mark Passio made .. When he left the Church of Satan and began to sing (so to speak) he was concerned that he would get “the” knock on the door but to his surprise “they” contacted him and basically said “Tell them what ever you like because if we told them ourselves .. they wouldn’t believe us” .. and he was probably correct .. If Google allowed access to EVERYTHING .. most people wouldn’t get it anyways .. its all too confronting, uncomfortable and requires WAY too much thought .. as long as their diet of info is coming from the black monoliths .. (turned 45 degrees) that reside, like shrines in their lounge rooms .. they are more than happy with that ..
Truth is very important and free will and perception is like beauty in the eye of the beholder. Truth seekers will filter through all the garbage to find that which stands up as truth but we should also stand up for the idiots who write what they think even if it is wrong as that is part of who the human race is success comes after having failed so many times as then it has value. Go out find the truth but do not let others make your judgments for you make mistakes but change your mind if you find out it was made in error given faulty data that is the point ego on the other hand is never admitting to making mistakes as that is stupid we knew that right. Lies on the other hand and people without faces lying to control the information well what can i say just not right and if pushed what happens next after the domino falls is predictable people shall see this for what it is even if they took no notice before. When Charlie Chaplin came only third in a competition in Monaco for a look alike show he said even if the truth is right in front of you it is our own perception that deceives us. Never give up keeping seaching.
Given that Google was funded by the CIA originally (their “venture capital” arm),it is not surprising to see them taking on the role of Big Brother.
Government has too many legal restraints, so they outsourced “fascist overlord” to Google. If you follow their history, they are the epitome of “slow boiling the frog” – gradully getting more and more totalitarian while they addict people to using their “free services.”
I don’t trust them as far as I can spit.
The truth isn’t spelled out. As D. Bohm said, “Our thinking process is an extension of our perception.” So, imagine getting only 40 bits of filtered information into our brain, out of 10 million. But you know there’s a good verse in the old Book that haunts me (quite literally). Also, truth has a numerical form. and a letter?
The Ministry of Truth is doing it’s very best to protect the “Dumb-Down” policies. As google in the information “business”[Big Clue as to it’s integrity]; and information is the driving force of all intelligence agencies; and governments of all sizes are targeting big data with a vengeance, is this move surprising?{by the way most countries , on today’s world do not build surveillance systems, but rather buy them from companies based in other nations[there’s tour integrity being bought, sold, signed, sealed & delivered].
This is a good sign. It significes the Red Pill crowd is reaching critical mass. Where the PTB use our money to keep a stranglehold on control. They have spent an untold fortune designing their own Web Bot apps, mind control / entrainment tech and practice occult divination with a Mayan obsession for astrology.. I would not be surprised if they’ve attempted messing with the time line. The more they freak out, the better I like it.
The real question is, will the red pill crowd be able to tear down the matrix before Agent Smith comes a knockin?
Nailed it .. Guygrr .. my point exactly ..
It’s like the Dark Ages, only with wifi!
The average human is about as free as a goldfish in a bowl.
The Control freaks have really gone on overdrive. This is like the opening of the Outer Limits. We control the vertical we control the horizontal we can take the image from a soft blur to crystal clarity. Don’t think we know everything trust our knowledge yea the Moon made of green cheese cows can jump over the Moon. And what ever wackadoodle serves the interest of our elites is the truth zombieism is the new sacrament let us all kowtow before GOOGLE the lords of enlightenment.
Google knows things it should not. Case closed.
Google is providing reasons to use other search engines, and to make sure to use limited terms and quotation marks. Bing and Yahoo are excellent search engines, as are search aggregaters like Ixquick.
As is true of reading an encyclopedia in say 1975, sometimes the results of websearches can be really useful sometimes not.
Not even J. Christ was able to define the “truth” but Google CEO Larry Page seems to know better!