Presidential candidates can no longer make a statement during a speech, debate or TV ad without hundreds of fact checkers immediately descending to determine whether that statement is true or false.
The fast and furious fact-checking accompanying this year’s election is something new and has led to questions such as whether the candidates actually make factual assertions that can be checked for truth or falsehood, which leads to other questions regarding the nature of truth in our scripted, media-driven political age.
But before deciding that we are entering unknown territory with regard to the role factual information plays in our thinking, it might be best to take a look at the subjects covered during this series such as bias, argumentation and rhetoric to see if they might shed light on the role facts can and should play in our decision making.
To round out the discussion of this important topic, we are joined by Kamy Akhavan, President and Managing Editor of ProCon.org, a site dedicated to providing an accurate and balanced presentations of facts behind both sides of important issues.
Whatever role facts might play in our thinking and deliberation over whom to vote for, the millions of people who have visited ProCon this election year to find out where the candidates really stand on the important issues of the day demonstrates the desire to obtain the highest quality background knowledge available to support our arguments and beliefs.
This week’s resources include:
Critical Voter – Facts – Lesson Plan
New York Times Stone column on whether the candidates are making verifiable factual statements
New York Times Stone column on why fact checkers should be logic checking as well
The post Critical Voter – Podcast 13 – Facts and Interview with ProCon President Kamy Akhavan appeared first on Critical Voter.