Although section C is only a few pages long, it gives the most important advice anyone could ever tell you: don't ever trust the internet unless you have a legitimate reason to. With sites like Wikipedia, personal blogs, and citizen created web domains, absolutely everyone and their grandmothers can post information on the internet. With programs such as Photoshop available on the mass market, individuals are able to create ridiculous images or falsified emails, reports, and comments that they can post on any site anywhere. As the book used for an example, a made-up institution website published a copy of the "study" of politician IQ's and several newspapers actually took it as a fact. Always browse the internet with the presumption that anything ridiculous you see is probably fake, unless you have proof or good reason to believe something is true.
In regards to the advertisement section, I chose the following ad:
I'm sure all of us have seen Axe, Old Spice, and Tag body spray commercials. They all focus on the same concept of the usually outright stated argument that if you use any of these specific body sprays, you'll attract the ladies. According to section A of Chapter 5, we can either 1) Accept the claims as true, 2) Reject the claims as false, or 3) Suspend judgement.
We can use section B to logically look at the ad and determine if we we accept these claims or not. It's not really a reliable source to simply trust the ad that it'll work, as each company is biased and trying to make you purchase their product. Personal experience is really the only way to judge claims like these. If someone noted that you "smelled nice" or something to that effect, you'd be more likely to accept the claims as true, even though the body spray isn't the only factor in attraction. If odor was the only factor in "attracting the ladies", this argument would be much better. However, smelling nice is only really a bonus. Much more goes into attraction, so the claim is misguided.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI have seen advertisements of body sprays such as the one you discussed in your post. And every time I see a body spray advertisement about guys who use axe will attract girls in public instantly after sprayed on, I cannot help but doubt that would actually happen. In fact, a guy friend of mine only uses Axe Spray because this is what he has told me and he also collects the bottles that run out of body spray. Although he is a devotee to Axe body spray products, I have not seen one girl publicly, including myself, having the urge to be all over his body. So, through personal experience, it is safe to say that what the advertisement conveys about how guys who use axe can gain sudden attraction from girls is not as honest as it claims.