Studies don’t count. We have established that already.
Regards,
Shodan
I think that, as implied by the four points near the end of your post #476, there are multiple factors at work. Fox tends to attract uninformed dolts, even if this isn’t the universal profile, and then reinforces their biases and sure as hell doesn’t do anything to educate them. I refer you back to your own wonderful post about their commentary on the recent discovery of gravity waves from the Big Bang – remember, a “gas explosion” can’t create solid matter (who do those “scientists” think they’re kidding?)! 
It’s a little like asking why the graduates of a top-tier university tend to be bright and accomplished – is it the school’s selection bias, or is it because it gave them a great education?
Likewise, down in the sordid echelons of Fox News, if we’re reduced to arguing about the cause and effect of the uninformed doltishness that plagues Fox viewers, we can at least categorically say that Fox News is a pretty crappy excuse for a news channel! Worse, to the extent that democracy depends on an informed populace, Fox News is a disservice to democracy. I don’t care if someone is conservative or liberal or anything in between, as long as they’re making informed choices and not being manipulated by a propaganda machine.
Sorry, but I see no usable facts after your cite says “Consider the facts.” Nobody claimed that there are no smart people, or educated people, or young people in Fox’s audience — there’s something analogous to the Young Republicans Club on every college campus. But since the cite only said they were present, but didn’t give any numbers, it adds exactly nothing to our knowledge of Fox’s audience.
It gives numbers for the comparative audience of various networks, but that says nothing about the composition of Fox’s audience. The closest it came to something useful is saying that the “average” Fox viewer is between 40 and 60, but since there are almost twice as many people that age as over 60, it again tells us nothing useful.
Yes, because Soon & Balilunas is not a valid source means that we can throw out all of climatology. :rolleyes: Look, Deeg posted two studies as evidence, and then numerous posters pointed out flaws in the methodology (not rejected them out of hand, but showed why they were flawed) that makes the conclusions drawn from that study worthless. That doesn’t mean “studies don’t count”. It meant those studies are not good sources.
That’s another very confounding factor. I don’t know that it necessarily works in their favor, though; after all, when comparing Weekly World News and the NYT, we don’t hold it against the NYT that their readership is made up of a more-informed demographic; we consider it a large part of the reason why WWN is the way it is.
I’ve been watching a lot of Fox news lately while I’m at physical therapy (it’s what’s on the TV), and here’s my take on it- Fox news is very strongly trying to position themselves as the news source for old geezers.
I say this because the advertising is all about things like catheters, investing in gold & silver, scooter ads and the like.
With that in mind, I think their news coverage is slanted toward that crowd- what do you think an average white 65+ year old wants to hear about? The ways that social media is helping expose corruption in developing countries? Not likely.
No… they want to hear about breaking news and closer to home political things, and more likely with a more conservative slant. It’s what keeps them coming back.
I don’t know if the chicken or the egg came first (i.e. was Fox conservative from the get-go?), but it sure is now, and it’s part of what keeps their audience.
That said, their actual news coverage isn’t bad. What makes it hard is that they intersperse segments of real news with opinion panels. Which isn’t in itself bad, but what makes it bad is when the news anchors are consistently picking the conservative side. THAT’s where the bias comes in strongest, from what I’ve seen in the past few months.
Once you understand the way Newscorp and Richard Murdoch operate, the answer to this becomes a clear “yes, from the get-go”.
I’m by no means a fan of Fox, but I am also not a fan of this study. Studies of knowledge divided by politics, basically find that people of all political persuasions, will when presented with a poll, answer the result that best fits their political view of the world regardless of the facts and their education. I remember Bricker presented a study that showed that this could be ameliorated by rewarding correct answers with money, indicating that even if they knew the right answer, left to their own devices with nothing at stake they would rather answer the one that fit their ideology. This is how you get those polls that say that 40% of Republicans think Obama was born in Kenya.
It is very difficult to create an entirely unbiased list of political facts to test knowledge, and so the results of such a study are more likely to depend on which questions are selected than it will on the knowledge of the participants. Conservatives have at various times dragged out a similar study showing that liberals know less about economics that conservatives, which has been widely criticized to the point that even the authors admit it was heavily flawed.
That’s… really depressing. 
No. When the studies are clearly biased, note that the studies are clearly biased. When the studies are worthless, note that. Just because you find comfort in a “study” does not mean that the “study” meant anything.
I have seen no evidence from you of false reporting by other networks on a scale to match that of Fox.
What is “independent” about those studies?
What is “meaningful” about those studies. A study undertaken in January 2002 would have shown far more negative reporting about al Qaida than about the Bush Administration. Would that indicate bias in the media against al Qaida? Simply saying that there were more “negative” reports about one candidate or another without indicating the basis of that reporting or the facts underlying the reports does not indicate bias, it simply summarizes a list of negative stories. There are more “negative” stories about the brothers Tsarnaev than about Pope Francis. Is that an indication of bias in the media?
So, where are the reports showing that other networks actually lie on a scale similar to Fox?
Simply note the factual history of lies. How is that a problem? (Your focus on “studies” of “bias,” however, does not support your claim of impartiality.)
You said in general that a better method to determine bias is to look at actual actions and their results, that this was better than studies. You want anecdotes instead of data.
That’s because you reject studies in favor of anecdotes, and then reject anecdotes in favor of denial.
Regards,
Shodan
Pot, kettle, black.
Bullshit.
Based on your “interpretation” of my remarks, we should look at polls rather than actions regarding the behavior of Nazis because looking at actual behavior is merely anecdotes.
I did not simply say that we should look at anecdotes; I said we should look at behavior. Finding a quote from Roger Ailes supporting a Republican over a Democrat or even saying something nasty about a a Democrat is an anecdote. Examining actual behavior is examining facts.
Multiple occasions have been presented where Fox has been caught broadcasting false information that no first year media student would get wrong. Those who wish to rely on badly conducted or misrepresented polls have not presented any similar phenomenon on the part of other networks, (including MSNBC that most will acknowledge is also biased).
Polls are more comfortable because, relying on (baseless) statistics, they can be manipulated to “mean” whatever one wishes. Try finding a fact.
Dowsers say the same thing.
I would say your dismissal of independent studies in favor of anecdotes shows that your opinions in this matter are biased.
And they’re wrong.
Except he didn’t dismiss anything. He rejected the studies. There’s a difference.
That you would consider any of the “studies” referenced “independent” displays your bias.
Referring to facts as “anecdotes” further demonstrates a lack of the disinterest that you claimed.
I have not claimed to be neutral on the topic; I have just noted more facts than you have.
And until you can offer better evidence than your anecdotes I will consider you just as wrong.
Dowsers believe their rejection of studies is equally justified.
I have never claimed that your (or any other’s) anecdotes to not be fact. However you know the mantra as well as I do: anecdotes are not data.
Any conclusion based on anecdotes is potentially a victim of confirmation bias. What evidence can you offer that your opinion regarding Fox is not falling prey to confirmation bias?
Deeg, you are using the word “anecdote” in a way that has no bearing on reality or facts.
As I noted, finding an undocumented story from some associate about Ailes being rude regarding Democrats is an anecdote.
Repeated references to deliberate lies broadcast by Fox are, indeed, data.
The lack of any corresponding lies broadcast by other news outlets is further data.
Pretending that Fox has not broadcast lies or referring to documented lies as “anecdotes” is silly. These are not simply stories (anecdotes) told by old reporters and editors at some bar with no provenance. They are the actual broadcasts by Fox. Why you would pretend that they are mere anecdotes, I have no idea, but such claims make your argument look silly.
Except that we don’t need “better” evidence if your evidence is worthless. This is what you’re not getting. Your studies aren’t “not strong evidence” because of their methodological errors, they’re not evidence at all.
Yes, and Anti-GMO advocates think they are equally justified in rejecting large-scale metareviews as the mainstream science is rejecting Seralini’s paper. It doesn’t make them right. You keep pulling this analogy, but it doesn’t even try to make sense. The fact is that we looked at the methodology of your studies and pointed out exactly why we found them lacking and exactly what it means for the paper. It measured something we did not consider indicative of bias whatsoever and explained why we did not consider it indicative of bias. To my understanding, you never spent much time arguing that it was indicative or why you think that; you’ve simply asserted that because we don’t accept these highly dubious studies, we’re exactly the same as the peddlers of pseudoscience. I’m sorry, but that’s complete bullshit. Your studies measure one thing objectively and try to call it “bias”. But it isn’t bias, and we are perfectly justified in rejecting them as a measure of bias.
Please quote me pretending that Fox does not lie. You won’t because I didn’t. At this point you are playing semantic games about what is or is not an anecdote.
Let me ask you again: what evidence can you offer that your opinion is not falling prey to confirmation bias?
I’m getting it quite fine. You’re attempting to say that independent studies are worthless if they do not agree with established opinion. I believe otherwise.