UNIT 1. Summary

Credibility Criteria.
critical thinking bring with it a number of techniques the ones can be used to assess the credibility of sources and the evidences they provide. Credibility Criteria is the name given to this techniques.

Neutrality.
It's shown that a neutral source is impartial, this one has no motive or reason to lie, to distort evidence, to present information wich supports only one side of an issue. An example of it could be the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, this was introduced so as to resolve disputes in the workplace.

Vested Interest.

If an individual or an organisation has one if this one, they have something to gain from promoting and defending a particular point of view. This could be an opportunity to lie, that is to say, they distort evidences that are the real ones in order to benefit themselves.
For example, Tabacco companies are an excellent example of a vested interest. All of us know that smoking is destructive to health, while this companies lie about what was smoking, trying in a way to avoid the ``disadvantages´´ of it.
But not always the vested interests are presented in compannies, or even thought identifying one of them does not necessarily reduce the credibility of a source. In reallity, they may have a good reason in order to support their idea to say just the opposite. Another example could be if a person is accused of a crime they did not commit, it is in their interest to tell the thruth and to present precise evidences to support their innocence.

Bias.
This concept promotes in a way a better particular view, having predilection for something, or seeing things in a particular way. Racil prejudice, Propaganda, Support for football, Loyalties to relative friends are examples of BIAS.
People see Hitler as a reasonable source of evidence about Jewish because of his extreme prejudice against jews.
A fan of a football team club would give a far more luminous report of their team victory than a fan of their arch-rivals.
An eyewitness to a fight, the one involved a friend may do their best to take out blame from their friend when giving evidences to the police.
Even though people could have a particular bia
s, this does not mean that the ones will influence in the situation.

EXPERTISE.
The testimony given by an expert are often higly credible. For example if we have a civil engineer, a forensic scientist, a geneticist, a criminologist, a meteorologist, an architect or a hospital consultant. Their training, their knowledge skills and their fantastic experience make them trusty sources to the evidence they provide.
However, sometimes are reasons to distrust their credibility. First of all, experts could also confuse. Buildings specially fall down becauseof a defect in the architects design. Doctors dont always make the correct diagnostic of a persons illness.

Reputation.
It makes reference to a person's character or a organization standing. In general the higher the reputation of a source is, the more credible it is seen to be.
However a reputation for honestly mean that the source provides accurate.

Observation and eyewitnes accounts.
The eyewitness discurse are usually seen more credible That the second hand or hearsay evidence. An eyewitness directly observes an event or an accident etc. During the re-telling of that event, details and important information sometimes are changed, left asside or even though sometimes people add false information in order to support their evidence. As a conclusion, hearday evidence is seen as less credible as the ones of first-hand or eyewitness speeches.

Corroboration.
This ones are pieces of evidences wich support each other. Corroboration inereases the credibility of the evidence.

Selectivility and Representatives.
What type of evidence id selected? Does it represent all sifes of an issue or only one side?
Campaings are groups of friends like greenpeace. The select only evidence wich support their views. This one-sided selection of evidence is seem to reduce their credibility as sources. It reflects their BIAS. The presentations of unrepresentative information can weaken the credibility of the source and the evidence they provide.

Context.
The context made reference to the setting in wich the evidence is produced. When assesing the credibility of evidence it is important to look at the wider context in order to indentify factors wich might affect the evidence wich people provide.

Credibility on truth.
Credible means something that is believable. It is not true. The word true means something that is real, a fact that it happens, that is to sat that this word means something that is correct. Credibility does not equ truth that credible evidence is not necessarily true evidence. So finally the evidence does not have to be true in order to be credible.