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0 pointslutusp13y ago0 comments

> I believe it depends on where he got this information. If he had heard that information from a scientist in the field ...

That's a somewhat different topic, but it's relevant. Not all scientists can be relied on to deliver accurate claims. Case in point:

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/10/report-dut...

All Stapel's papers were published in refereed journals. It will be years, possibly decades, before Stapel's many retracted papers are no longer referenced in the scientific work of other psychologists.

My point? Advertising copy must be vetted by knowledge, not appeals to authority. It only took me 15 seconds to find a source that falsified the claim about mosquitoes, and it's not my field. It can't hurt that I knew it was false at the outset.

The problem with claims about mosquitoes and light is that there are a lot of dishonest vendors who lie about this, and a copy writer with insufficient training will almost certainly repeat the lies of others. I think that's what happened in this case.

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sukuriant13y ago· 1 in thread

While I agree, I still believe this could have been an honest mistake including trusting someone that should know the answer.

lutuspOP13y ago

Yes, I agree, but this won't help a company that claims technical expertise about their own product, but whose advertising copy contains such an elementary error. My use of "lying" was hyperbolic, but imagine how the investors -- or the SEC -- would react to such a "misstatement of fact" in a larger company.

For me, the other issues -- deceiving the public, public safety, and due diligence -- lead me to use what might not be the best word to describe it, but lacking a more convenient term, I often use "lying" in a case like this, where the future of the company may well hinge on the initial impression this page creates.

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