From the author: First published here: There was such a case: One day in the spring of 2004 I met a woman and she invited me to her home, saying that her husband was fishing. Well, I took champagne , sweets, flowers and with all the parade arrived at the place. And here we are, sitting and then lying down, having a great time, and then the sound of the key turning in the door is heard - my husband is back! Having barely had time to put on my underpants, I jump out onto the balcony, with the edge of my consciousness remembering that my sheepskin coat was left hanging in the corridor. My friend stuffs the rest of my things into the closet in the bedroom and quickly jumps out to meet her husband, putting on a smile along with her robe. My husband came drunk - it’s fishing. And I’m standing there, frozen, waiting for this drunken bastard to go to bed. But that was not the case... The wind on the eighth floor and the winter minus 10 are invigorating as never before. What should I do? I can’t hear him, but I can see perfectly all his movements through the window: toilet, bath, kitchen... My husband is in no hurry - he’s at home .And after a hearty dinner, a man wanted to smoke on the balcony. I don’t care anymore... As soon as he goes out onto the balcony, I hit him in the jaw as hard as I can and jump into the kitchen. The man passed out with a cigarette in his mouth. I get dressed and leave .The woman stands in shock. The next day I called her to find out how she was doing. She said that her husband not only forgot how he returned home, but also where he got a huge black eye under his eye, for which he received a frying pan from her for such "fishing". How reliable does this story look? We will return to it, but now - attention! Now I will say a banality: we live in times of information overload and get information from everywhere, including from the Internet. The pace of life accelerates, the information flow grows and everything that has not been subjected to critical analysis from it settles in the subconscious, and then we ourselves are surprised - “And I don’t even remember where I know this from, I read somewhere that ...", etc. “So what?!”, you say, because the conclusion is no less obvious: In addition, in order to find and assimilate information, it is equally important to evaluate the information in the text for reliability. By the reliability of information we will understand the ability of information to reflect reality (events and facts). And although the modern search for information is necessarily connected with the Internet, not all (to put it mildly) messages on the network can be considered reliable. But first, one more note: Information, in in our case, textual, has two unpleasant but inevitable properties: 1. To be distorted during transmission - after all, it depends on the abilities of the source of information (let’s call him “the author”) to accurately and accurately convey in words the facts known to him, clearly indicating personal impressions and experience, retelling of experience others with reference to the original source and personal assessments and interpretations.2. Be obsolete - after all, life and nature change every second and what was true yesterday may not be true today. And if so, then, let’s say, we are dealing with a certain text, be it an article, a message on a forum, news, a description of a product or service, the author of which we do not see or hear. Which means - none of the methods from the arsenal of catching liars by facial expressions, gestures and behavior when communicating face to face, in the style of the respected Dr. Lightman. (a character from the famous TV series Lie To Me) will not help in this case. And taking into account and taking into account unreliable information is fraught not only with the loss of time and effort, but, sometimes, health and even life... Well, okay, enough of the horror stories - let's move on to practice. So, friends, what can you really do to understand how much the text contains reliable information, and not stupidity, stupidity, outdated information or outright deception? 1st step: Checking for internal consistency First of all, the text should not contradict to myself. Logical inconsistencies and contradictions between parts of the text itself already indicate that it cannot be trusted. It is not necessary that a text containing internal contradictions is deliberately intended to mislead. It is possible that the author himself is sincerely mistaken about what he is talking about.writes. In any case, such text is no longer reliable and is not recommended for use. If the internal consistency check is passed, we move on. After all, this is only the first step, and lies can look very complex. Step 2: Comparison with existing information New information in the text may contradict information you already have. For example, your life experience and knowledge, as well as messages from the same source as the text being analyzed, but received earlier. If everything goes smoothly here, we move on to the next step. Go ahead. Step 3: Comparison of independent sources and access to the original source It sounds nice, but, of course, this is not always possible. Especially if the content of the text is unique, and there are simply no other sources with which it can be compared. But you can always strive for this, at least following the example of Comrade I.V. Stalin, who, as they say, received reports from several subordinates at once, who did not know what others were writing, which means that each wrote his reports in as much detail as possible and without concealment, since the deception would be immediately visible against the background of messages from other “comrades” . Although, of course, if you get information from the Internet, where content is copied and quoted many times, trying to find sources independent of each other is no easier than finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. Finding the original source is the most important stage in analyzing the reliability of information. After all, the original source may have more information than was originally reported, which means, if there is such an opportunity, it can be very useful to personally communicate with the author of the text and find out from him the details and what may raise doubts about the reliability of his text message. This leads to another conclusion. – An anonymous text should certainly be classified as dubious. But even if you go to the original source, you need to keep in mind that, as practice shows, even witnesses and participants in events do not remember and notice everything, not everyone will want to report, and, of course, not everything in their report will be true. What to focus on? To save effort and time, the easiest way is to rely on the reputation of the original source. If we talk about a person, then this is someone who has not been noticed in an obvious lie, and if we talk about the Internet, then this is, rather, an official website on the issue of interest. Although here we cannot do without a caveat - well, of course (of course!!!), official information can also be a lie. And one more note: even highly rated sites are not always the original source. 4th step: Testing in practice The meaning of any information is in its use. This means that only by checking the information in practice can we be sure that it is true. By the way, if you consume information that you do not intend to use, you are simply clogging your brain. These four simple steps when working with any text help increase awareness and will bring you at least a little closer to reality. PS But what to do if the text does not pass the authenticity test at one of the stages? Should we discard it completely or partially? Let everyone answer this question for themselves. After all, a lie is rarely 100% true and is more often mixed with the truth, like a vinaigrette. Therefore, the question is rather like this: how much time and effort are you willing to spend on checking information or, nevertheless, take a risk by relying on the available data? In the end, we cannot control everything in our lives and, sometimes, we have to decide to act at our own peril and risk. But this will be a conscious risk, and not a naive zombie journey along the path indicated by someone. PRACTICAL Task No. 1: Take any text from the Internet that interests you and check it for accuracy using the described four-step algorithm. For example, you can at least start from the anecdote at the beginning of the article. Task No. 2: Take another text and a few markers and make the following markings while reading: In green, highlight the author’s personal impressions, which he gives in the first person when he describes?