#Bigfoot (also known as Chewbacca Sasquatch) is a mythical creature alleged by some to live in remote North American forests in the Pacific Northwest. As there is zero real evidence for the existence of Bigfoot, the study of the "beast" is considered to be a #pseudoscience. Bigfoot is also one of the more famous examples of #cryptozoology.
Bigfoot is sometimes described as a large, hairy, bipedal hominid creature, and many believe that this animal, or its close relatives, may be found around the world under different regional names, such as the #Yeti of Tibet and Nepal.
The most famous sighting is the 1967 Patterson-Gimlin film, which shows a hairy bipedal figure walking away from the camera.
The Bates eye method is an alternative therapy that purports to "cure" defective #eyesight and diseases of the #eye by means of specific exercises. It is based on the work and theories of William Horatio Bates, a medical doctor and eye specialist practicing in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Although rejected and later soundly debunked by his peers, Bates's method was readily adopted into the alternative medicine and health freedom scenes, where it became interwoven with nutritional and other pseudoscience in the hands of early "health fad" figureheads such as Bernarr Macfadden and Gayelord Hauser.
In my teens, I heard vaguely about "eye exercises" and (as a very myopic kid) wanted to try them. I found a Bates book in my local library, but even as a junior high student, I knew that the anatomy of the human eye didn't line up with Bates's description. Turned out, he was working from fish eyes (which have crystalline, inflexible lenses).
#Ballotpedia is a website that provides information on #US#elections and candidates for voters. It started out as a community-contributed site, but is now only edited by paid staff. It has information related to both US Federal government and US state governments, with a database of information on US state executives, legislators, districts, candidates for such positions & ballot measures.
The website claims to be #neutral & accurate. Due to the nature of the site, it does sometimes show decidedly non-factual quotes from other sources (such as public figures). Despite this, the site was founded by the Citizens In Charge Foundation, a #libertarian activist organisation. The site is currently run by a remarkably well-fed nonprofit called the Lucy Burns Institute, which is substantially funded by #Koch Industries money, funnelled in via various corporate shells.
The balance #fallacy is an informal logical fallacy that occurs when two sides of an argument are assumed to have equal or comparable value regardless of their respective merits, which (in turn) can lead to the conclusion that the answer to a problem is always to be found between two extremes. The latter is effectively an inverse false dilemma, discarding the two extremes rather than the middle.
While the rational position on a topic is often between two extremes, this cannot be assumed without actually considering the evidence. Sometimes the extreme position is actually the correct one, and sometimes the entire spectrum of belief is wrong, and truth exists in an orthogonal direction that hasn't yet been considered. Furthermore, oftentimes the two sides being compared aren't equally extreme, so a conclusion drawn from this fallacy will end up benefitting the more extreme side.
Austrian economics (or the Austrian school of economics) is #libertarian#philosophy masquerading as a school of economic thought. This school is notable for its lack of formal mathematical modeling and empirical testing. Among its more unusual traits, the Austrian school draws its conclusions based on deduction and thought experiments, rather than data. In place of the conventional tools of science, the Austrian School favors a narrative approach called "praxeology". Despite its shortcomings, some less nutty features of the Austrian School have leaked into mainstream economics while the more nutty have found a home at libertarian think tanks (Cato Institute and Ludwig von Mises Institute).
@RationalWiki I wasn't aware it was "rational" to criticize a school of thought for it's lack of formal mathematical modeling and empirical testing, then turn around and divide its features into categories of "less nutty" and "more nutty".
@zdl@RationalWiki It's pretty common to attack people for pointing things like this out. I took a long, long hiatus from social media; I wish I was surprised at how common this sort of thing still is.
Libs of TikTok is a far-right anti-LGBT Twitter account run by Chaya Raichik. The account has become highly influential in conservative circles, and it has over 1.8 million followers as of January 2023. The central narrative pushed by the account is "grooming", the lie claiming that LGBT people are pedophiles manipulating children into sexual deviancy. The concept went mainstream after Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed a law banning classroom instruction on gender identity or sexual orientation in grades K-3 in Florida public schools, with his press secretary accusing the bill's opponents of being "groomers".
Raichik's posts on Twitter have been directly linked to transphobic and homophobic threats, violence, and attempted terrorist attacks. Incidents include bomb threats against a school in Wisconsin, a near-riot at Idaho Pride, and threats against a Jewish summer camp.
The Appeal to ancient wisdom is a naturalistic fallacy and thus an informal fallacy. It is the unholy love-child of the appeal to tradition and of the appeal to authority. In this sense, the appeal to ancient wisdom can be understood as being the appeal to traditional authority.
The appeal to ancient wisdom is most commonly used by woomongers of the New Age, some indigenous science advocates, and/or alternative medicine varieties.
#Objectivism is a peculiar #philosophy formulated by novelist Ayn Rand. It sports a range of convoluted tenets, but is most infamous for redefining #greed as the prime moral virtue — and, to take things even further, literally redefining altruism as evil. The name "objectivism" was chosen because, as Rand was the single smartest person in the history of the world, anything she said had to be "objective".
As one might imagine, objectivism is very popular amongst those who already hold a rather egocentric view of the world. It lets them say, "Hey, I'm not being a selfish jerk, I'm following a philosophy!". Of course, this incredibly short-sighted and narrow outlook — only seeking short-term gains no matter the cost to everyone else — will not even maximize long-term individual gains (let alone short- or long-term societal gain).