Knowledge & Spin 2 - Falsehood Flies

Starter: “Falsehood flies, and the truth comes limping after it” (Jonathan Swift, 1710)

What do you think Swift meant?

Do falsehoods always have to be lies? Think about the Blake quote from our last lesson.

2. Look at the four articles / headlines - how vulnerable did you say you were to stories and posts on social media?

How do the following factors affect your willingness to believe a story:

• Provenance (who you hear the rumour from)

• Mode of communication (how the rumour represented)

• Resonance (how emotionally impactful the rumour is)

• Credibility (how (in)credible the rumour is).

3. What the experts say: read these two sources - Guardian and Wired, and use them to help you create a display about online stories. Use the title: “Falsehood flies, and the truth comes limping after it”. Include the following details on your display:

Details of the fake news research (brief).

• Results of the research.

• The hypothesis advanced to explain the results - try to link this to one of our four factors.

• Your analysis of the hypothesis - would you add anything to their explanation?

• What you think the implications are of this in terms of the way we seek to understand the world?