About firstfactcheck.
This is FirstFactCheck, a newsletter about Checking Facts First, Logically, Rationally, without bias…
Before we make value judgements, we should know the facts. It seems that it is more and more common in the internet age to only believe facts that agree with our prior value judgements. This is a very dangerous tendency - it is bad reasoning, the sort of reasoning that goes, “All Phoenicians are bad people,” then claims that any reports of good Phoenicians must therefore be fake news. Or the reasoning that goes, “Smallpox vaccines are good,” then claims that any reports of harm caused by the smallpox vaccine must be false (this was very big news in the 19th century, in fact).
Instead, I am suggesting that we should be cautious about making value judgements until we know all the facts. I once heard someone say that the conservative principle is, “Don’t jump until you have to,” which seems to me to be very good advice, particularly where value judgements are concerned.
In my episodes I will be fact checking a claim that has been disputed. To begin with, I will be concentrating on claims that are generally believed for which I think there is very good evidence that the claims are false.
At the bottom of each post I will include an Uncorrected Fact Check Hall of Infamy, and also a Corrected Fact Check Hall of Fame. (*addendum a year later: this seems to have fallen by the wayside; I might start it up again, and the next paragraph too)
As I work I will also be collecting a list of reliable news sites, and eventually I hope to have a page called the Reliable News Hall of Fame, where I list sites that publish carefully researched information that is reliable, with a particular emphasis on those sites that are reliable from the get-go, and also those that publicly correct their own mistakes.
As I am concerned with this being a reliable site, I welcome suggestions, corrections, particularly well-researched, annotated corrections with references, tips, particularly tips to claims that have a hostile witness that confirms the claim, as well as suggestions for claims that I could research.
Kind regards, Andrew P Partington
PS I am a Christian, so I may occasionally be fact checking things people say about what the Bible says, and things people say about the historicity of the Bible as well.
ADDENDUM
After more than a year of fact checking.
I have not always been objective, but I have tried to be as objective as I could.
I have always been truthful (in these posts, I mean, sadly not always in life), but I have not always been right about everything (obviously as I’m only human)
Nonetheless, I have corrected my posts when more accurate facts have been brought to my attention. Please post a comment or message me, if anything I have posted is incorrect, and please include a link to a reliable source.
The change our society needs: changed hearts
I can see more than ever that facts don’t change people: only God can truly change any of us, and His business is metanoia, changed minds, and giving us new hearts, and putting a new spirit into us, and taking away our stony hearts and putting flesh hearts in our bodies in their place.
I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will remove the heart of stone from your body and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekiel 36:26
Nonetheless, we need dependable facts, in this age of great and terrible deception.
In the end, God willing, the truth will come to light.
What does it matter if we are deceived about this or that?
Do you love the truth, or not?
Everyone who is of the truth hears Jesus’ voice:
Pilate therefore said unto Him, “Art thou a king then?” Jesus answered, “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth My voice.” John 18:27
Those who can find no place in their hearts for the truth so as to be saved, will be deceived and are already perishing:
The arrival of the lawless one will be by Satan’s working with all kinds of miracles and signs and false wonders, and with every kind of evil deception directed against those who are perishing, because they found no place in their hearts for the truth so as to be saved. 2 Thessalonians 2:9-10
May God have mercy on us all, for we are all unhealthy, sick people, spiritually speaking, who need the great Physician’s healing.
The year of grace 1654,
Monday, 23 November, feast of St. Clement, pope and martyr, and others in the martyrology.
Vigil of St. Chrysogonus, martyr, and others.
From about half past ten at night until about half past midnight,
FIRE.
GOD of Abraham, GOD of Isaac, GOD of Jacob not of the philosophers and of the learned. Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace. GOD of Jesus Christ. My God and your God. Your GOD will be my God. Forgetfulness of the world and of everything, except GOD. He is only found by the ways taught in the Gospel. Grandeur of the human soul. Righteous Father, the world has not known you, but I have known you. Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy.
I have departed from him: They have forsaken me, the fount of living water. My God, will you leave me? Let me not be separated from him forever. This is eternal life, that they know you, the one true God, and the one that you sent, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ. I left him; I fled him, renounced, crucified. Let me never be separated from him. He is only kept securely by the ways taught in the Gospel: Renunciation, total and sweet. Complete submission to Jesus Christ and to my director. Eternally in joy for a day’s exercise on the earth. May I not forget your words. Amen.