Legendary Hoax from the Museum of Hoaxes Order Instructions: Explore a legendary hoax from the Museum of Hoaxes. Describe the elements and details of the hoax.
Applying what you know about how to evaluate arguments, pretend you were presented with this hoax and outline the steps you would take to evaluate it. How does this hoax encourage critically evaluating sources of information? Explain three methods by which you can prevent yourself from being fooled by hoaxes or other sources of misinformation.
Legendary Hoax from the Museum of Hoaxes Sample Answer
Legendary Hoax
Museum of Hoaxes provides a collection of various hoaxes during the 19th century. One of the legendary hoaxes was that of “Composite Princetonian”. This hoax appeared in the front page of one of the dailies – The Daily Princetonian. The photo was alluded to have been created after analysis of 2100 students of Princeton, out of which 12 were selected and combined to come up with the composite photo. This hoax was revealed later that the doctored photo was that of Errol Flynn but it did not include his mustache (Hoaxes. org. 2014). The haircut was interferedwith a little bit.
In case the hoax was presented to me, I would have taken various steps to evaluate it to determine indeed whether the allegations are true or not. The first step is to find out the person responsible for its publication. I will evaluate the credential and the affiliation of the organization presenting the information. This will aim to determine their level of authority and reliability of the publishers (SDSU.edu. 2010). Then I will analyze the content as well try to check if other source of information has such information. Will as well ponder on whether the publisher tempered with the information.
The hoax provided require one to critically evaluate the source of information because the information provided is questionable. It elicits doubts in the mind of an individual on how photos of different people can be fused into one. This is something that would have attracted different media attention and therefore, there was no way only this one publication could capture such a story.
To prevent oneself from being fooled by hoaxes or any other misinformation, it is important to take time to reflect on the photo or information. Ask various questions such as what is the source of the information, the credibility of the source, the intention behind the photo, the alternative source of information available, the style, content and accuracy and completeness of the information, the sponsors of the photo or information among many others. These questions will help to provide insights about the credibility of the photo or information
Legendary Hoax from the Museum of Hoaxes References
Hoaxes.org. (2014). The Hoax of Museum Blog: the composite Princeton. Retrieved from: http://hoaxes.org/
SDSU.edu. (2010). Evaluating sources of information. Retrieved from: http://infotutor.sdsu.edu/ILexplorer/Standard_3/evaluating_info.pdf
