This blogpost is written in advance of my forthcoming lecture at Brunel University of London Law School, concerning investigative discourse analysis:
An analysis of the construction of a sentence, the length of that sentence, choice of tenses and propositions, choice of words and structure generally to identify changes inconsistent with the usual course of language indicative of false information.
Deconstructing Doublespeak
Ironically, deconstructing the possibility of doublespeak, what I am trying to discover is whether someone is lying by what they say.
In order to prepare you as a potential participant I offer to you an understanding of structure and manipulation found in everyday conversation, in words, in imagery etc…
I then look at the issues of lying in a wider context, and its effects upon the world generally in terms of security.
Let me start with a conceptual framework, (rather than a theory), of Paul Gricean (1989), referred to as ‘the four Gricean maxims’ namely:
- Quantity.
- Quality.
- Relation.
- Manner.
A change in any of these four maxims would potentially distort the truth of a matter.
What Gricean was saying was that to come across as reliable, credible, true, is to speak plainly: To say what you need to say, when you need to say it, and how it should be said.
To fully share information received (quantity), which is relevant (relation), clear, and distinct (manner), avoiding false information (quality), marks the validity, plausibility, credibility and reliability of that information, and reflects upon who says it, and why.
As my fencing instructor/physics teacher Mr. Torpy, once taught me, when dishing out 1,000 lines:
‘Whatever I do or say, must not be stupid, but must be truthful and straightforward’.
McCormack in his Information Manipulation Theory 1, (1992), concluded that deceivers manipulate in two primary categories:
- The amount of information that is shared.
- Whether or not such information is distorted.
Re-thinking his Information Manipulation Theory, later in 2014, and applying his theory against Gricean maxims, McCormack concluded differently in Manipulation Theory 2 (2014), applying a broader multi-faceted approach which involved reference to experts in the fields of speech production, cognitive science, and artificial intelligence models of problem-solving, that false information is integrated into almost all conversation. It is situationally problematic, and an intent to deceive may arise and decay at any point.
Doublepseak
With reference to the term .’Doublespeak’, there are four kinds of doublespeak:
- Euphemisms: Sometimes to protect the feelings of another person, or perhaps to respect social taboos, masked in a thin veil of courtesy and good manners: Good intentions; white lies. However, when used to mislead or deceived, it is language designed to alter our perception of reality.
- Jargon: Verbal shorthand to communicate clearly, efficiently, and quickly. When used with good intentions, it is to simplify otherwise complex language. However, when used to mislead or deceive, it is language designed to alter our perception of reality.
- Gobbledeygook, or beaurocratese:
- Inflated language: designed to make the ordinary seem extraordinary. Used with good intentions, to make light and funny a conversation or difficult topic.
During World War 2 and beyond, the Ministry of Information, was in fact designed to be a ministry of censorship, propaganda, and disinformation.
Ministry of Defence is in actuality a ministry of war…to eliminate with extreme prejudice…to coin a term from the CIA.
Doublespeak is then designed to make lies sound truthful, and murder, acceptable.
A concern at RUSI, aired in an article published in Issue 6, 2024, was in relation to evolving information, and understanding misinformation and disinformation.
Broady defined:
- Misinformation is innocent information, spread without intent to deceive.
- Disinformation is a deliberate spreading of false information to mislead a target audience.
Globalisation and the fact that anyone anywhere can publish anything from a mobile phone/device, means there is a sea of information which is to all intents and purposes difficult to distinguish as to whether it is meaningful or meaningless.
The pandemic of over-reliance upon social media, tends to be promoted by extremities of emotion, most usually humour, and horror.
Unchecked, unregulated, and without the necessary education to distinguish good and bad and false information, this constant stream of information, of armchair warriors, and unsolicited opinions can and will lead to a national security threat. The effects of this constant stream, pierces the consciousness of civil life, erodes public confidence, and undermines democratic institutions, denigrating public esteem, according to the authors.
A deeper and larger concern is that every 150 years or so, and seemingly upon a rapid development of technology and specifically the efficiency of communications, there is a positive correlation between a perception of infringement of security.
After The Age Of Reason And Certainty
Stefan Zweig, in his book ‘The World of Yesterday’, (1944), referred to pre-World War one as the golden age of security, where everything was founded upon permanence. It was an age of reason. An age of certainty. Everything in its place and in its time following a known and well-trodden process of living and of life. One knew who they were, what they would do as a job, where they would live, when they would retire, how much they had in the bank, and what was left for the next generation.
Zweig says that ‘security’ was a precious commodity in a world of liberal idealism…acceptance of everyone’s rights to everything and anything: a laissez-fair, live and let live approach to life, confusing classic conventions of rights and wrongs…a world in which is currently being repeated, and we appear to be now living in.
Zweig posits that an influx of information brought by the telegram, and by radio, caused a stir in the way people processed information, without having sufficient time to consider what was being said, and to react to it. He blamed insecurity upon technological advances of ‘German efficiency’ through industrialisation and expansion and ruthless competitiveness.
In Amos Oz’s essay ‘How to cure a fanatic’ (2004) also commented anecdotally as Zweig had done decades before, that for there to be security and calm, one has to be aware of three certainties:
- Where I will spend my life.
- What I will do for a living.
- What will happen after I die.
Oz says that it was a loss of those elemental certainties that may have provided for the most heavily ideological last half century.
What replaced planning for an opportunistic future, was living for the moment and living for the day. A drive and desire for instant happiness, and the pursuit of an instantaneous ‘happy ever after’.
The Arab Spring rising, and other revolutions globally, interestingly occurred at another milestone push of globalization in the increased use and reliance upon social media, access to the internet, and instant communications.
Some decades earlier, Judge J Skelly Wright, US Court of Appeal in a speech given at George Washington University said:
‘[in]…some areas of the law it is easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys…in the current debate over the broadcast media [radio broadcasts], and the first amendment, each debator claims to be the real protector of the first amendment, and the analytical problems are much more difficult than in ordinary constitutional adjudication…the answers are not easy’.
What Is Good? What Is Bad?
How do we, the ordinary folk of the world, discover what is right and what is wrong. What is true and what is false. What is good, and what is bad?
In applied cognitive psychology (2023), two studies were undertaken to decide whether a narrative inoculation, improves truth discernment.
In other words, if a reader is forewarned of the possibility of fake news, does this improve one’s ability to be less susceptible to believe everything one reads, see, and hears? The study concluded that by psychological inoculation, a classic attitudinal intervention used to induce psychological resistance against persuasion (McGuire 1964), that this in itself could improve detection of both real and fake news, by inducing critical thinking.
By neutralizing misinformation (Neutralising misinformation through inoculation’ [2017]), people would accept less as true, by asking a number of questions and invoking critical thinking:
- Have I heard this before?
- Does it fit in with what I already know?
- What do relevant others think about it?
Inoculation theory would prepare people for potential misinformation by exposing some of the logical fallacies inherent in misleading communications.
Indeed, in Sweden, there is a pamphlet entitled ‘If war comes’. It goes on to say that the best protection against false information and hostile propaganda is to critically appraise the source:
- Is this factual information or opinion?
- What is the aim of this information?
- Who has put this out?
- Is the source trustworthy?
- Is this information available somewhere else?
- Is this information new or old, and
- Why is it out there at this precise moment?
The objective of Sweden is to nurture citizen’s cognitive processes, rather than prescribing specific beliefs: For you to be the judge and make up your own mind, armed with the right questions to apply critical thinking.
As an afterthought, it is problematic that even when something is published is untrue, whether published innocently, or else with a view to damage, whatever is said or done, or seen in imagery, leaves an imprint.
Therefore, national security should be concerned with both misinformation and disinformation. Both can have destabilizing and negative effects upon those who see it. The influence is there, even if deposited subliminally.
In jurisprudence, the harm principle exists so that the Government acts as parent/grandparent to an adult/child who knows no better, without being armed with the appropriate tools to critically analyse. Social media is taken at face value.
Those who take references from experience and facts which are known historically have a better prospect of distinguishing. Today’s generation, I fear, potentially lacks those tools of critical thinking, whose senses are numbed by an influx of information which may or may not be true. This in turn affects moral compasses. This in turn effects a sense of good and bad/right and wrong.
Professor David Rosen is a solicitor-advocate with over 25 years’ of experience in commercial litigation. He is principal of David Rosen & Co, a certified fraud examiner, and a full academic Professor of Professional Practice at Brunel University of London Law School where he continues to lecture regularly. David is considered a master-strategist and is a member of the Royal United Services Institute, and the Society of Legal Scholars amongst others.
