For the people who complain that Irregular Times is biased:
Yes, Irregular Times is biased. We declare this openly and without apology.
In statistics, bias results when one makes a measurement in such a way that the mean of one’s observed results do not match what would otherwise be the mean result for the population. This is not a statistical website, but the metaphor applies qualitatively. Irregular Times measures the world driven by a world model that implies a set of questions and methods for assessing those questions which lead to answers that are atypical and not average. These questions are driven by a set of principles you will see articulated here openly and above board again and again and again. Most are not mainstream principles. Most are not principles respected by the majority of the population. Therefore, the answers we arrive at here are skewed. Atypical. Bent in a particular direction. This is intentional.
You are also biased. You measure the world through a distinct set of questions leading to answers that are typical if your biases are typical and atypical if your biases are atypical. Your questions are driven by a set of principles you may or may not be aware of. If the principles you are driven by do not match the principles we are driven by, you will find yourself asking questions that are different from the set of questions we ask and arriving at a set of answers that are different from the set of answers we arrive at.
Many of the pieces of writing here appeal to those who hold a bias in common with us (for example, a disdain for theocracy). Some other pieces of writing here explain our reasons for holding the biases we do hold. You do not need to subscribe to our biases into fruitfully read Irregular Times. You may consider it to be useful or enjoyable, in the way that some people enjoy trips to foreign countries.
However, if it is important to you want to read writing that is not biased, you probably should stop reading Irregular Times (you probably should stop reading, period). Complaining that we are biased is a waste of your time, because we know we are biased and we have no intention of changing that. Our biases have reasons that are grounded in the sort of world we value, and unless our values change our biases are unlikely to change. If your biases are different from our biases, and if you want to only encounter writing that is biased in the way that your thinking is biased, you will find yourself frustrated here. You will find your knickers twisted. You will pound your keyboard.
Irregular Times is unrepentantly biased by the principles it subscribes to in the way that it asks questions and finds answers regarding the world. It is not our responsibility to mirror your biases. It is your responsibility to decide whether you want to read this website. If you consider exposure to our biases to be poisonous, then you probably should stop reading right now, go take some ipecac, and retire to your fainting chair for a prolonged recovery.
There’s another definition of bias, used in machine learning. (*) When you run a learning algorithm, you get out a hypothesis. The bias of the learning algorithm is a statement that must be assumed in order to prove the hypothesis correct.
I think you could apply this definition to a news source, too. Any news source, from Irregular Times to Fox Lies, is directed by people who have certain assumptions in mind; those assumptions let them believe in what they say. If the reader’s assumptions match those of the news source, then the reader agrees; if they don’t, then the reader concludes that the news source is biased. What they really mean is “biased in a different way from me”.
(*) Machine learning is a bunch of techniques which would have been categorized under artificial intelligence 20 years ago. But AI is out of favor, so anybody who has a technique that works gives it a new name. (Bias again: in this case, the assumption is “AI doesn’t work.”.)
Well, maybe I agree with you there and maybe not, depending on what you mean. If the bias of a learning algorithm is a factual statement about observable reality, then that can be assessed, and the bias could be evaluated. But if the bias were at base a statement of value, then it couldn’t be.
The truth of factual claims can be assessed. You can’t really argue with someone who says, “I like chocolate better than vanilla.” Then there’s a mix: you can argue with someone who says “I like chocolate better than vanilla because vanilla was invented by the Illuminati.”
Then there’s just plain faulty reasoning, which you can argue with even if you don’t agree with the bias of the person doing the arguing.
Oh, and then there’s the bit about “those assumptions let them believe in what they say.” That’s an interesting phrase. Some people I hear talk their belief in God this way: “I am a Christian, because if there were no Redeemer, no Judge, no ultimate meaning, I just couldn’t sleep at night.” That’s making assumptions about the supernatural so that one can continue to characterize the universe in some way. It’s different from an argument that starts with an assumption and explores the assumption to see what it makes sense to say if that assumption is true.
I admit it. I am biased in favor of keeping the Bill of Rights intact. I am also biased against sending hundreds of thousands of Americans over to other countries to shoot and bomb people there.
Don’t like my bias, readers? Then explain to me why that bias is wrong. Don’t just call me biased, as if that’s the problem.
Well, yeah, that’s the point. Everybody is biased by their values. Irregular Times is biased by progressive values; Fox News is biased by Rupert Murdoch’s values. I mostly accept progressive values, so I find Irregular Times worthwhile. But getting someone else to accept your values is hard. Usually, the best you can manage is find a reason that your values actually support their values—for example, pointing out to a fiscal conservative just how much money is going down the drain in Iraq.
I mainly meant that, if you recognize someone’s biases, and where they come from, you can acknowledge that they aren’t necessarily being dishonest; they believe what they say because they have different values.
Gotcha. Thanks, John.
Then there are partisan biases. Jim has stated that Irregular Times is “non-partisan”. While most of the main writers/bloggers on Irregular Times maintain non-partisanship, there is one notable exceptions that is clearly DNC biased. And we all know who that is.
Other than that, Irregular Times has no unique bias. Occasionally authors jump to conclusions that may not be supported by fact, but there is always healthy discussion about such jumps. As stated, all media is biased.
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