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Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

I recommend reading Sunstein's Infotopia if you haven't already. He cites several studies showing that the tendency of groups that start out agreeing on the ideology (i.e. Rush and his listeners) become more extreme in their views as a result of their discussion. If we are all able to access media that we agree with (which is what most of do when possible), it just creates more polarized groups, leading to a more polarized political environment. So the growth of ideological sources (TV, blogs, talk radio, etc.) can lead to some bad consequences, even if you like the ideologies of the groups themselves.

For anyone who is also a history buff, this is the opposite of what Jefferson and Madison had in mind when they wrote the Constitution.

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Robin Hanson's avatar

David, I agree that it can be unbiased to approve of some kinds of persuasion and disapprove of others.

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