Report Confirms Everyone Who Disagrees With You A Bot

Researchers suggest that the status of “bot” may apply beyond the online world, even in your personal interactions not mediated by a mobile device.

Tel Aviv, July 11 – Researchers studying online political discourse have discovered that in line with your expectations, not a single source of an opinion on social media or in comments to web sites that differs from yours originates from the reasoned workings of a human mind, instead coming from an automated algorithm that spouts mere oppositional rhetoric.

The scientists examined hundreds of millions of tweets, Facebook posts, comments on blogs, and other interactive items on social networks, and found that 100% of the positions that do not dovetail with yours on matters of political significance occur in posts or entries by “bot” scripts programmed to generate antagonism and falsify the true picture of what the electorate really thinks, in an effort to sow division and destabilize domestic politics.

“We started from an axiomatic position” that your political opinions are manifestly correct, explained lead researcher Konfer Mayshin-Baez of Tel Aviv University. “Working from that given, we tested numerous ways in which normal human cognitive processes might arrive at some different outcome, and failed to find any compelling evidence that such a development is even possible. The only reasonable conclusion, therefore, is that disagreement with these opinions occurs not through reasoned analysis or argument, but through the contrarian process typical of, for example, Twitter bots.”

“The purpose of such bots is to sow discord,” continued Mayshin-Baez. “By creating the impression that an opinion – even the only right one, as we are dealing with in these cases – is not universally shared, and that many disagree with it, public solidarity erodes and we end up with fragmentation of the polity and divisions that undermine cohesion and healthy democratic institutions and processes.”

In its write-up of the analysis, the researchers suggest that the status of “bot” may apply beyond the online world, even in your personal interactions not mediated by a mobile device. “There is no compelling reason for this phenomenon to be restricted to the social media realm,” observed Dr. Sol Lipsizt, who was not involved in the study but has reviewed it. “Nothing magical inheres in social media or blogs that makes opinions any more or less valid if expressed there.” If someone disagrees with you in general, even face-to-face, Dr. Lipsizt stated, that also demonstrates they are a bot, and deserve ignoring or physical shutdown.

“Also, I see no real reason this has to apply only to political disagreements,” he added, glancing at a desktop photo of his wife.

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