Fact-checking is currently being put to the test with the covid-19 pandemic. Unlike many of the topics discussed in this paper, covid-19 is generating a wealth of scientific information, including detailed structure analysis of the virus and evaluations of initial treatments, prior to the development of a vaccine. Nevertheless, fake news is rampant and spreads easily through social networks. Added to this is the difficulty of analysing public data on mortality rates, which is highly dependent on the method used to measure cases of infection, and the complexity of mathematical models of the exponential spread of the virus and the comparative impacts of masks, tests and confinement. This leads to judgements overriding public policies in France, which are ultimately quite similar from one country to another, particularly in Europe.
Here are a few leads that may induce doubt:
Who publishes and disseminates information: This is a key indicator of the veracity of information.
The esoteric and vague jargon used: the more vague and unusual, the more suspicious.
Scientific tests with questionable methods: the devil is in the details with reduced sample sizes, protocols and methods.
Ancestral medicines brought up to date: ancestral does not mean that it works better than the placebo method.
The amalgamation of several techniques: where one train can hide another.
Ambiguity about the effects: with techniques that work in a particular case but not in the one advertised.
The violation of the great laws of physics: as the second principle of thermodynamics in miracle sources of energy.
The questioning of "official" science: where conspiracy theory is used as an authoritative argument.
The exaggerations: where nothing is necessarily false, but not necessarily true either.
And I'm well aware of the law of the square of the bullshit. It says that in order to counteract a given bullshit, one must expend an energy proportional to the square of the bullshit in question. This is true in politics and even more so in science. It's even closer to a cube than a square! Don't ask yourself about the homothety of the units used to calculate energy, it's just a picture! In short, all this may be a waste of time. But that doesn't stop you from trying!