Trudeau's Truth

 

In this clip, Justin Trudeau shows a notable lack of intelligence. To put the most charitable interpretation on it.

He begins by boasting that he goes by the dictionary definition of words. Then he gets the meaning of the words “misinformation” and “disinformation” confused. He thinks “misinformation” is deliberate, and “disinformation” unintentional.

Here are the definitions from the Oxford English Dictionary:

Disinformation: “The dissemination of deliberately false information, esp. when supplied by a government or its agent to a foreign power or to the media.”

Misinformation: “Wrong or misleading information.”

He then proceeds to a logical fallacy. He poses the question, “Who decides what is misinformation or disinformation?” And he responds, “There has to be an acceptance that there are experts out there who create a basis of fact.”

This is the “argumentum ab auctoritate,” or argument from authority. It is really an evasion of the question.

To begin with, what if authorities disagree—as, of course, they always do? By what authority do you choose one authority over another?

Are you going to take the “consensus of experts”? Now you have committed the ad populum fallacy as well, that truth can be arrived at by popular vote. If everyone on Earth voted that the moon was made of green cheese, this could not make the moon green cheese. If nearly everyone thought that the sun goes around the earth—as almost everyone once did—this does not make it true that the sun goes around the earth.

Is a majority more likely to be right than a minority? No. After all, the smartest people are necessarily going to be an absolute minority of the general population.

Second, how do you know that person A is an authority on the matter? What authority vouches for him being an authority? And who vouches for that authority? You are into an infinite regression; an infinite regression of unknown quantities remains an unknown quantity.

Third, authorities, even if genuine, can lie. They will have their own vested interests. To call yourself an authority is to say “just trust me.” One ought to automatically suspect a con.

Fourth, to uncritically accept the word of existing authority brings all science, all human thought and human progress to a halt. If authority is always right, then Galileo was spreading misinformation, as was Newton, or Einstein, or Columbus, or the Wright Brothers, or for that matter Martin Luther King, Thomas Jefferson, Socrates, or Jesus Christ.

In practice, who would inevitably decide what is and is not disinformation? Trudeau’s bottom line must be government—actually the usual source of disinformation. It must, in short, be him. Government is authority, and therefore gets to decide and declare the experts. Which means by definition the end of democracy and an increasingly authoritarian regime. 

It is terrifying that this man is in any position of power.