Snopes Beclowns Itself

[ServiceSoon]

This.

True: Proven to be true beyond reasonable doubt.
False: Proven not to be true beyond reasonable doubt.
Unproven: Failed to make the case that it happened, but we can't prove it didn't. In other words, there's no evidence for this.

Agreed. The Flying Spaghetti Monster is also unproven.

Russell's teapot...falsifiable..and all that.

Wouldn't invoking the burden of proof in this instance cause this story to be labeled false, without prejudice? They attempted to use the justification that, somebody somewhere stole a receipt, so this story could be true. That seems desperate to me.

I don't solely rely on snopes because I've found it to be slightly biased/slanted.

 

[Butter!]

My apologies.






Perhaps I misread your intent, but it felt like a "both sides do it" kind of argument, when it was clear that one side does it far more often than the other.

Nah, looks like you misread my intent (not surprising, as I was kind of rambling). I have run into these kinds of complaints about Snopes verdicts before. I think quibbling with the verdict when all the supporting evidence is right there is a lame smear tactic. Snopes isn't hiding anything, and the only way a person could be misled by a verdict is if he/she also refused to read the full article where they explain their reaosning and the evidence they've gathered to support it.

 

[blutoski]

No, of course not. Everyone makes mistakes.

However, I feel like the criticisms leveled against Snopes in this thread are more properly aimed at reality’s infamous and well known liberal bias.

Is that actually a thing?

The reason I'm asking is that I was on the skeptic email list with Mikkelson for 20+ years (he withdrew from the list a few years ago), and 'liberal' is not a word I'd use to describe him.

He's literally a card carrying Libertarian, and I've found him to be more fact oriented and unbiased/nonpartisan than most people I've ever met.

 

[kookbreaker]

Is that actually a thing?

The reason I'm asking is that I was on the skeptic email list with Mikkelson for 20+ years (he withdrew from the list a few years ago), and 'liberal' is not a word I'd use to describe him.

He's literally a card carrying Libertarian, and I've found him to be more fact oriented and unbiased/nonpartisan than most people I've ever met.

Upchurch is not referring to Mikkelson so much as reality, which stems from the old Colbert joke about "Reality has a known Liberal bias".

But yeah, a lot of folks really assume that Mikkelson is some card-carrying socialist because he debunks that meme grandma forwarded about Antifa conquering all of Brooklyn.

 

[blutoski]

Recipes are often protected trade secrets. As such they can be stolen, bought, sold, and much litigation money can be made from them. See: Coca-Cola.

This is my understanding as well. Recipes qualify as trade secrets (Coke being a famous example, but there are millions of others, my own example follows) - obtaining a trade secret without permission is a crime in the USA. It's covered by the Corporate Espionage Act.

Licensing is another way to steal: I came across this when working for Trader Vic's. The Mai Tai recipe is a trade secret. Licensing pricing was tiered in proportion to sales volumes. If a business licensed 1M sales, but sold 2M units, they were essentially stealing the surplus 1M and would be sued for breach of contract.

SO, with those two scenarios in mind... the urban legend isn't clear as to exactly HOW Sanders would have obtained the recipe, and whether Childress was operating a business with the recipe in the first place. Did she share it in confidence? Did she license it to him? Did she publish it? Did he reverse engineer it?

The pressure cooker technology discussion is a distraction from the actual claim. It doesn't matter whether KFC thrived or failed, he either did or didn't steal the recipe.

To that end, there just isn't enough information, but it's not implausible. I agree with the 'unproven' verdict and believe the historical context is relevant to the analysis.

 

[PhantomWolf]

Wouldn't invoking the burden of proof in this instance cause this story to be labeled false, without prejudice? They attempted to use the justification that, somebody somewhere stole a receipt, so this story could be true. That seems desperate to me.

Did you bother to read the thread, this has only be explained four times so far.

 

[Information Analyst]

You, and others here, seem to be forgetting that the Category "False" is for claims that can be categorically proven to be False.

On the contrary, I believe use of the fake image, the lack of any evidence that "Childress" even existed, and the actual timeline of Sanders's business is enough to show that the claim is false. No element of the claim can be proved to be true. We are clearly in the territory of someone somewhere simply making something up, so Snopes saying, "we can't disprove it," makes them look like fools. Saying, "Hey, Sanders could have obtained the recipe from some unknown black women," is a cop-out for not properly condemning an obvious fabrication.

Whatever next? Snopes declares the plot of The Eagle Has Landed "unproven," because they can't find any evidence that it didn't happen?

 

[Upchurch]

Upchurch is not referring to Mikkelson so much as reality, which stems from the old Colbert joke about "Reality has a known Liberal bias".

Which, itself, is based on a swath of conservative positions that are counter to reality.

• Intelligent design is a thing
• Global climate change isn’t a thing
• War on Christmas
• Trickle-down economics

 

[PhantomWolf]

On the contrary, I believe use of the fake image, the lack of any evidence that "Childress" even existed, and the actual timeline of Sanders's business is enough to show that the claim is false.

Except that none of these things conclusively prove it is false, they merely are evidence that it could be. A fake image means nothing other than that no image exists or if one does, that no one had access to it. The lack of evidence for a person's existence is not proof that they didn't exist, only that they lived an unremarkable life that was not noteworthy enough to leave a record. As for the timeline, he had 38 years to get the recipe between learning to cook and introducing it in his cafe. Again it doesn't disprove that he got the combination of herbs and spices from someone else.

No element of the claim can be proved to be true.

You still seem to be having a problem between "unable to be proven true", and "unable to be proven false".

Just because something cannot be proven to be true, doesn't make it false. Consider trying to prove what you ate for Breakfast last Friday. Unless you were lucky enough to go out and keep the receipt or happened to film yourself eating it, how exactly would you go about proving the truth of it?

We are clearly in the territory of someone somewhere simply making something up, so Snopes saying, "we can't disprove it," makes them look like fools.

I disagree, they make it clear that they have been unable to prove any of it as true, but also they can't provide evidence that totally disproves the claim either. The correct stance is at that point to say it is Unproven.

Saying, "Hey, Sanders could have obtained the recipe from some unknown black women," is a cop-out for not properly condemning an obvious fabrication.

No, your claim of it being "an obvious fabrication" is jumping to a conclusion that the evidence does not support. You are making an assumption based on your views on the evidence, not based on what the evidence itself is. Snopes does its best not to jump to a conclusion it is unable to fully support. Blasting someone for refusing to make the same jumps, and weighing the evidence the same way that you did is very poor skepticism.

 

[DuvalHMFIC]

This is getting a little pedantic, isn't it? There's no proof that I didn't travel back in time and sell the recipe to Col. Sanders myself, either. Does that mean snopes should list this claim as unverified? I thought we as skeptics say the burden of proof is on the claimant? If there's no proof of the claim, that should be good enough to consider it false unless and until some such proof comes to light.

 

[Matthew Best]

There's no proof that I didn't travel back in time and sell the recipe to Col. Sanders myself, either.

I'd say that claim is unproven, and you need to go away and come back with some better evidence before I say it is true.

Do you see anything wrong with that?

 

[PhantomWolf]

This is getting a little pedantic, isn't it? There's no proof that I didn't travel back in time and sell the recipe to Col. Sanders myself, either. Does that mean snopes should list this claim as unverified? I thought we as skeptics say the burden of proof is on the claimant? If there's no proof of the claim, that should be good enough to consider it false unless and until some such proof comes to light.

Actually no, a claim shouldn't be considered False unless that there is clear evidence that it is, it shown be considered unproven and demands for more prove be made before concluding one way or the other.

For instance, let's take your claim. While I suspect that you don't have access to either the recipe, or time travel, I can't know beyond a doubt that you don't have such access. Thus I can't declare that your statement is False, even if I don't believe it and think it is likely to be false.

What I can do is say that your claim is unproven and demand that you provide evidence that you have access to both the recipe and time travel, and should you refuse to do so, then I can dismiss your claim as unproven.

I still can't call it False without either conclusive proof that you don't have access to the recipe or time travel, or conclusive proof that time travel is impossible.

 

[DuvalHMFIC]

I certainly see your point, and I have no real issue with Snopes. I'm just having a slow day at work. That being said, in the spirit of continuing the discussion, how can this article about AG Barr visiting Epstein's prison be considered "false" rather than unproven if it's the prison themselves saying he did not visit? That doesn't seem any different than KFC saying the Col. did in fact come up with the recipe himself. The only other evidence they offer that I can see is that Barr has 24/7 FBI detail. It does NOT say anything about members of his FBI detail saying he didn't visit the prison.

FWIW I only picked this story because it was the only one fitting the narrative. Most of the false claims seem to have rock-solid evidence of them actually being false (such as a photoshopped picture). I do not think Barr visited the prison and I'm not looking for a derail.

http://www.snopes.com/fact-check/epstein-barr-visit/

 

[Wudang]

http://www.snopes.com/fact-check/epstein-barr-visit/[/url]

Don't prisons usually keep a record of who visitted whom?

 

[Information Analyst]

Except that none of these things conclusively prove it is false, they merely are evidence that it could be. A fake image means nothing other than that no image exists or if one does, that no one had access to it. The lack of evidence for a person's existence is not proof that they didn't exist, only that they lived an unremarkable life that was not noteworthy enough to leave a record. As for the timeline, he had 38 years to get the recipe between learning to cook and introducing it in his cafe. Again it doesn't disprove that he got the combination of herbs and spices from someone else.

You still seem to be having a problem between "unable to be proven true", and "unable to be proven false".

Just because something cannot be proven to be true, doesn't make it false. Consider trying to prove what you ate for Breakfast last Friday. Unless you were lucky enough to go out and keep the receipt or happened to film yourself eating it, how exactly would you go about proving the truth of it?

I disagree, they make it clear that they have been unable to prove any of it as true, but also they can't provide evidence that totally disproves the claim either. The correct stance is at that point to say it is Unproven.

No, your claim of it being "an obvious fabrication" is jumping to a conclusion that the evidence does not support. You are making an assumption based on your views on the evidence, not based on what the evidence itself is. Snopes does its best not to jump to a conclusion it is unable to fully support. Blasting someone for refusing to make the same jumps, and weighing the evidence the same way that you did is very poor skepticism.

The bottom line:

"Mrs/Miss Childress" - no evidence she existed
Image - fake, from unconnected advertisement
Sanders "stole" (or bought) recipe <=1930 - no evidence

Literally no element of the fake story is supportable, therefore the whole thing is a fabrication, pure and simple.

 

[DuvalHMFIC]

Don't prisons usually keep a record of who visitted whom?

But that goes back to my point-why is it okay to take the prison's word for it, but not KFC's? Aren't both a conflict of interest, as they both directly "benefited" from telling a lie? (Again, not saying KFC OR the prison are lying.)

 

[ponderingturtle]

Agreed. The Flying Spaghetti Monster is also unproven.

Russell's teapot...falsifiable..and all that.

Wouldn't invoking the burden of proof in this instance cause this story to be labeled false, without prejudice? They attempted to use the justification that, somebody somewhere stole a receipt, so this story could be true. That seems desperate to me.

Do they call any other claims for which there is absolutely no evidence either way false? If they treat all such claims the same what is your complaint?

 

[jadebox]

The Barr story, if true, would be hard to hide. So we would expect some evidence of it actually happening if it were true. Since there isn't any, it is safe to conclude that story is false.

If it were true that Colonel Sanders "stole" the recipe from a black woman (the gist of the story) it is not as likely that we would be able to find good evidence of it happening. So the lack of good evidence is not enough to label the story as false. Therefore, labelling it as "Unproven" makes sense.

 

[ponderingturtle]

I certainly see your point, and I have no real issue with Snopes. I'm just having a slow day at work. That being said, in the spirit of continuing the discussion, how can this article about AG Barr visiting Epstein's prison be considered "false" rather than unproven if it's the prison themselves saying he did not visit? That doesn't seem any different than KFC saying the Col. did in fact come up with the recipe himself. The only other evidence they offer that I can see is that Barr has 24/7 FBI detail. It does NOT say anything about members of his FBI detail saying he didn't visit the prison.

FWIW I only picked this story because it was the only one fitting the narrative. Most of the false claims seem to have rock-solid evidence of them actually being false (such as a photoshopped picture). I do not think Barr visited the prison and I'm not looking for a derail.

http://www.snopes.com/fact-check/epstein-barr-visit/

The AG visiting a prison under his authority wouldn't generate any kind of record, paper trail or selfies with the boss? Also it is likely not too hard to build a timeline of his events during that time period.

This is something that if it happened would leave a record and so the absence of the record is meaningful. No lets look at someone putting a "washington slept here" sign up, if the building is old enough how are you to prove one way of the other that it didn't happen if it was known he was in the area for a period of time? Disproving that would be very hard, though proving it though say washington's correspondence would be trivial. In the absence of either how do you evaluate the claim?

Is it being true or false without evidence liberal or conservative?

 

[Dr. Keith]

The bottom line:

"Mrs/Miss Childress" - no evidence she existed
Image - fake, from unconnected advertisement
Sanders "stole" (or bought) recipe <=1930 - no evidence

Literally no element of the fake story is supportable, therefore the whole thing is a fabrication, pure and simple.

To me the difference between "False" and "Unproven" is whether additional information would change the determination. If a family showed up with a receipt and a letter from Col Sanders that was authenticated and largely confirmed their story, that would change things.

That is not true for fake photos that are labeled as False where they have actually identified at least one of the source photos. There is no possibility of additional information changing the determination. Even if someone sent in negatives and sworn statements it would not be enough to prove the authenticity of the photo. Even if they sent in similar photos it would not change the verdict on that particular photo. They have proven it false.