Members in the Media
From: Slate

The Science of Truthiness

Slate:

A bumper sticker was popular in the city where I went to college. It was yellow, with large black print that read: “Mopeds are dangerous.” Beneath the text was the blocky silhouette of a moped and nothing else. The sticker didn’t illustrate the claim that mopeds were dangerous—it didn’t show a moped crumpled against a tree or running someone over—but it was eye-catching, the yellow contrasting sharply with the black, and on message. I believed that bumper sticker, and still do, for all that I’ve rarely encountered a moped or read about a moped accident or even really grasped the difference between a moped and a Segway.

Truthiness is the word Stephen Colbert coined to describe the intuitive, not always rational feeling we get that something is just right. Are mopeds dangerous? Sure, if by dangerous you mean significantly riskier than cars but slightly less direful than motorcycles. They are not dangerous compared to smoking a lot of cigarettes or owning a gun. The point is that, while nothing about the bumper sticker backed up its ominous claim, I automatically accepted it.

Truthiness is “truth that comes from the gut, not books,” Colbert said in 2005. The word became a lexical prize jewel for Frank Rich, who alluded to it in multiple columns, including one in which he accused John McCain’s 2008 campaign of trying to “envelop the entire presidential race in a thick fog of truthiness.” Scientists who study the phenomenon now also use the term. It humorously captures how, as cognitive psychologist Eryn Newman put it, “smart, sophisticated people” can go awry on questions of fact.

Read the whole story: Slate

More of our Members in the Media >


APS regularly opens certain online articles for discussion on our website. Effective February 2021, you must be a logged-in APS member to post comments. By posting a comment, you agree to our Community Guidelines and the display of your profile information, including your name and affiliation. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations present in article comments are those of the writers and do not necessarily reflect the views of APS or the article’s author. For more information, please see our Community Guidelines.

Please login with your APS account to comment.