Abraham Lincoln famously said:
"If you've read it on the Internet, it must be true." A quote that most YouTube list channels seem
to have taken to heart. But it is often difficult to know if the things
that you read and view online are true or not. Which makes it especially difficult for me
as it's part of my job description. The last thing I want is to be the source
of misinformation. So in today's video, I'd like to demonstrate
how truly difficult it can be and how a single inaccurate citation can lead to an ocean of
misinformation. Okay, so a few weeks ago I stumbled upon a
supposed "fact". It goes like this: The average person annually swallows eight
spiders in their sleep. I've seen variations of this claim many times
before and it's quite easily dismissable. For example, most household spiders are not
exactly fond of wet and windy regions which is a perfect description of the human mouth. Furthermore, spiders are very sensitive to
vibrations and while asleep we tend to move around, breath, snore, etc. which causes the
spider equivalent of an earthquake. A humanquake? Nevertheless, experts in both
human and spider biology can attest to why spider munching
in our sleep is highly improbable. But it did make me wonder: If the claim is
so easily dismissable, how did it begin? And holy Community Guidelines did I discovered a rabbit
hole deeper than your favorite inspirational quote. A quick search lead me to an article on a
website known as Snopes.com. Snopes is a website specializing in debunking
urban legends and most people seem to agree that it is a quite reputable source. In the article they claim that the myth gained popularity
in 1993 when a columnist by the name of "Lisa Birgit Holst" wrote an article titled "Reading Is Believing" in a magazine known as "PC Professional". She supposedly wrote the article, which included
the eight-spiders-myth, to demonstrate how people will believe anything they read online. They further claim that she took this myth from a book
released in 1954 titled "Insect Fact and Folklore". So if Snopes is to be believed, the myth began
with a book released in 1954. And to solidify this claim even
further you can find hundreds of articles and
books telling the exact same story. Simple enough. Quite an interesting piece of trivia. Case closed. If it wasn't for the fact that I bought the book. And it does not include any mention of swallowing
spiders in your sleep. In fact, it would be a bit strange if it did
as spiders are not insects, they are arthropods. Which is, a bit ironically, the only thing
you will learn about spiders while reading this book. So I went back to Snopes article and went through
the rest of their citations. Two are unrelated to the origins of the myth. Then they cite an article in a 1997 issue
of the newspaper Chicago Sun-Times. I was able to read the article, thanks to
some incredibly kind people over at the Chicago subreddit who provided me with a copy. Unfortunately it does not shed any light on
the origins of the myth as the article only consists of a reader asking if this urban
legend is true or not followed by an entomologist
claiming that it is unlikely. That leaves us with citation number three. And this, my friends, is where
we go off the deep end. A quick search reveals that I'm not the first
to investigate this source as most of the top results are that of other people looking
for the exact same thing. As it turns out, no one has been able to find
a columnist by the name of Lisa Birgit Holst nor has anyone been able to locate a computer
magazine by the title of PC Professional. At least not in the United States. So perhaps the magazine was
published in another country. The name Lisa Birgit Holst does sound quite
European and sure enough the given-, middle-, and surname
is of European origins. Using various online archives, catalogs, and
indexes I was able to locate five different magazines with either a similar title or with the exact
same title published in a language other than English. There's a magazine from the UK with the title
PC Pro. But the first issue was published in November
of 1994. I also found a magazine with the exact title
of PC Professional but it was unfortunately written in an unsophisticated and [un]intelligible
language known as Danish. The first issue was also published in 1997. A Swedish magazine, also with the exact title
of PC Professional, published a grand total of what appears to be two issues. One in 1992 and one in 1993. The thing is, if we are searching for an article
responsible for a widespread global misconception, I fail to see how an obscure and short-lived
magazine from Sweden with a readership of a few thousand at most could possibly have
served as the catalyst. Not to speak of the tremendous improbability
of this local magazine then ending up in the hands of an American couple who happens to
run a website specializing in debunking urban legends who then also translated the magazine
from Swedish to English, yet failed to mention any of this in the very article they wrote
about the topic. So lets put it in the maybe pile for now. The last two publications, one from Italy and one from
Germany, seem to be the most likely candidates. Both magazines are titled PC Professional
in their respective language, had a readership in the hundreds of thousands, and has released
monthly issues since 1991. At this point there was no doubt in my mind
that the German magazine must contain the article
for two main reasons. First; The surname Holst is
Danish and German in origin and thus a really common
surname in Germany to this very day. As a comparison, I was only able to track down a single
person in all of Italy with the surname Holst. Second; The magazine is the official German
version of PC Magazine which is one of the most popular PC-oriented
magazines in the United States. In fact, PC Mag has mention its German sister
publication on numerous occasions. This had to be it! And if I wanted to know the truth, there was
only one thing left for me to do. I packed my bags, jumped on a
plane, and traveled to Germany. On second though, maybe I should see if I
can find it online first. I eventually found a German library that,
for a small fee, could send me a scanned copy of page 71 from the 1993, January issue of
PC Professional. And here it is. Unfortunately, the library who provided me
with this scanned copy had some serious copyright restrictions so I hired a translator to replace
the German text with English and then recreated
the page in Photoshop. But it doesn't matter because it does not contain
anything even remotely relevant to this mystery. No Lisa Holst, no spidery misconceptions,
no nothing. And if this is not it, I highly doubt this
article exists. I mean I even clicked page two on Google search
so you know I've been thorough. After pacing back and forth and questioning
my own sanity for the better part of the week I began to wonder if Snopes had, for whatever
reason, intentionally provided incorrect information. I then quickly found a Reddit post demonstrating
how the name "Lisa Birgit Holst" is an anagram for "This Is A Big Troll". *sigh* Unless we are to believe that this perfect
anagram is just a random coincidence, it would mean that Snopes has written a meta article
about a made-up columnist who once wrote a made-up article about people's
willingness to accept false claims as the truth in order to expose people's willingness
to accept false claims as the truth. A bit convoluted? Sure. But oh did they succeed. Almost every mention of this urban legend
since has been accompanied by this supposed origin story which is of course presented
as the truth. When in actuality it may be as mythical as
the myth it is attempting to dispel. All of these hundreds or even thousands of
authors has fallen for the exact same trap as none of them could be bothered to validate
a simple citation and gladly lifted information they assumed to be accurate. And it's easy to see why they would make that
assumption because if you search for this urban legend today, this is
what you will find. Page after page of articles
proudly and unknowingly presenting a fake story
in order to disprove a fake story. I should also mention that I contacted Snopes
on multiple occasions in the hopes that they could shed some light on the whole situation
but like everyone else before me, I received nothing but an automated reply. But even if this god forsaken article exist
and the anagram is just a random coincidence, the endless retelling of this story has been
told under the pretense that the Lisa Holst article exists and not due to any prior knowledge
of its existence. Because the fact still stands, no one has
been able to find it. Yet everyone writes as if they have. It's the most perfect example of circular
reporting I've ever come across.
sitting here wondering if i should believe any of this
I heard of the 8 spider myth well before the internet. The internet has not made people more gullible, it's just given gullible people more access to things gullible people will believe.
Anyone ever hear that conspiracy about AIDS being a Pentagon bio-weapon that was accidentally spread through testing on African Americans? Ended up reaching national news in the US and is still believed by many people.
It was started by a KGB agent in India writing in an obscure regional newspaper.
A completely insane and bizarre little column in a far away tiny paper managed to have an impact leading to President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev having to make a public announcement to discredit the accusations.
I think he just inadvertently shit all over snopes lol
One story in regards to this that I will always bring up is the spread of lies and misinformation about Puerto Rico after Maria.
As I was desperately trying to find any sources of info on my family on the island I noticed some videos being spread around. They weren’t showing much in specific, they had no sound, no commentary directly in the video, but they had some disparaging and false bits of information in the poster’s comments.
They also happened to be the same 5 or so videos with a poster pretending to be a “teamster”, or a volunteer down on the island working with the recovery efforts - sharing a cellphone video “I took just yesterday”. Keep in mind at this point nearly all communication was extremely limited throughout the island, yet somehow these people could use and update Facebook freely...
These were posted again and again on accounts that had just been started after Maria - and not only that they all had a small group of friends, about 10-50. All those profiles were fake too, similarly starter after Maria.
These fake accounts would take these videos, claim them as their own, add their own story “they’re refusing to deliver goods!” Or something to that effect, and would offer no further or verifying information. Somehow, they all had thousands, if not tens of thousands of shares.
Nobody fact checked, nobody looked into it, and anybody who called them out got ganged up on by real people - and called liars (lmao).
One person even posted their profile picture of them in a WINTER COAT smiling claiming they were in Puerto Rico for the recovery efforts.
Same here on Reddit - a lot of people with baseless claims of them being on the island saying everything was fine, or other misleading information. One guy said that they were partying and shopping at stores in Vieques - and that “life seemed no different”. They couldn’t verify their claims - they refused to offer ANY proof of their claims, and would label you as “anti-Trump” if you spoke up against it - somehow all of these people tended to be active supporters of Trump.
Meanwhile the information from reliable sources on the island with VERIFIABLE proof of their presence was dismissed and ignored.
Many of these claims made by these fake accounts and spread by people are still echoed anytime Puerto Rico and Maria comes up even today.
Lemmino makes some of the best content on youtube. Check out more of his stuff.
Well, dont forget about Spiders Georg throwing the average off
Entertaining detective work nicely conveyed. Scary and depressing (unless you like spiders) :-)
relevant xkcd