If an "unauthorised" source working for the NSA tells the press that thing X the NSA did was really not so bad because of Y, then that could be a reason to assume his bosses know about his "revelation".
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Although you could say it is still more likely even in such a case that he was informally authorised if the revelation helps his boss.
@MετάEd Nice! But I mean actually that the communications officer of bureau X calls up the reporter and says "Hi, it's me. this is of the record". And the reporter translates that into his handbook's "because they are not authorized to speak".
@Cerberus "informally authorized" is not the same as "authorized". "Boss will look the other way" is not the same as "authorized."
@Cerberus I don't understand your argument. Are you saying that an underling reporting unflattering information is never authorized, and one reporting flattering information is always authorized? Or what.
@GlenTheUdderboat I think you're reading too much into the words. Why are you so suspicious about people being unauthorized to speak about things? I'm unauthorized to speak about my workplace. There is no conspiracy. I could tell any story to a reporter, and my boss would be within his rights to discipline me. The story might be flattering, or not.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Why don't you apply the principle of charity and try to think of a reasonable interpretation of what I mean. That's far less work than for me to explain every little step.
If a source says he is unauthorised and what he reveals seems to be against the interests of his boss, then it seems reasonable to suppose that he was indeed not authorised, neither formally nor informally, nor even encouraged. In other words, that he really wants to remain anonymous.
If this is not the case, i.e. if his revelation is not clearly against said interests, then there is no way to tell.
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Although you could say it is still more likely even in such a case that he was informally authorised if the revelation helps his boss.
The criterion is not symmetrical, but it does also kind of work in the opposite way.
But all this seems obvious and common sense, and not worthy of our debate, hehe.
@Cerberus I don't think you can infer that a flattering revelation is authorized. It increases the probability, but you have to consider all the relevant context.
@Cerberus yeah, and not really worthy of a question on skeptics, IMHO
NSA spokesperson to reporter: 'This is what we want you to know on Snowden. It's off the record." Reporter thinks: OK, I'll use "because they are not authorized to speak". But the reporter should know this is almost certainly false.
@GlenTheUdderboat So your skeptics question is, "Is there a journalists handbook that encourages journalists to lie about whether or not their sources are anonymous because they're not authorized to speak?"
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 I don't think it would be the reporters who actually make it up; I rather think the sources just tells the reporter to say just that.
@GlenTheUdderboat seems like it would be. Otherwise, why would the sources be anonymous, if they were authorized? Make a list of the possible reasons for a source wanting to remain anonymous, and see how many of those fall under the "not authorized to speak" category.
@GlenTheUdderboat Fine, but also try to estimate the probability of any kind of source existing, and speaking to a reporter.
For example, some sources are anonymous because they fear that if they talk, something violent will happen to them or their family. How many of those people would be, say, police officers at a crime scene?
The wikipedia page claims that likelihood and probability are distinct concepts.
In non-technical parlance, "likelihood" is usually a synonym for "probability," but in statistical usage there is a clear distinction in perspective: the number that is the probability of some observed outcomes g...
"Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to media." And these are Iraqi police officials. They don't come up with such a phrase themselves, do they?
@Cerberus The Taliban as well? "Mohammad Azeem, a former guard of Taliban leader Mullah Omar, was also among those released, according to a Taliban official. He spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to reporters about the sensitive subject."
@GlenTheUdderboat Yes, of course. The Taliban has an organizational structure. The official who spoke to reporters wasn't allowed to discuss the case under question. It makes perfect sense to me. Maybe Mr. Taliban didn't use that exact wording to describe his situation, but why wouldn't it be true?
The journalist could have just said ".... who spoke on condition of anonymity" and given no reason for the source's reluctance at being identified. Why would they just insert a boilerplate lie?
anyway I still don't think the Q is appropriate for skeptics.se. It's called "Skeptics", not "Paranoid Conspiracy Theorists"
@Mr.ShinyandNew安宇 Yes, that's what I would do if I were such a journalist. But perhaps Glen has noticed a lot of "unauthorised"s? Perhaps some journalists use it as a boilerplate meaning simply "on condition of anonymity"?
The use of common phrases among journalists is just lazy writing and style books.
@GlenTheUdderboat lol, what? A reporter makes a perfectly plausible statement: A guy told me something, but doesn't want his name in the paper because he could get in trouble. YOU are now claiming that that reporter is lying. Why shouldn't the burden be on you?
In fact, you're not only claiming that ONE reporter is lying, but rather that it's an international conspiracy, in English-language papers, at least, that reporters are always lying about this.
@GlenTheUdderboat Well, then, what are you claiming.
The use of the phrase is probably for legal reasons.
If you find a million people dancing around a law using exactly the same language, it's because there's a statute somewhere that cares how they express something.
And that therefore papers' lawyers have demanded that all reporters use 'unauthorised to speak' for anonymous sources, just to avoid 1) harassment of the reporter and 2) legal claims by the sources (after their unmasking).
Your use of capitals leads on e to believe that you think of these groups, Pagans and Heathens, as somewhat organized, like the Scientologists or Wiccans. Some pagans and heathens may well feel that way (organized that is), but the usual sense of the term is as uncapitalized and is more about calling someone else a pagan or heathen rather than oneself. — Mitch32 secs ago
@Susan What you can do is leave an @comment under your own answer and delete it immediately. Then he will see at least the first couple of words in his inbox.
@Cerberus The book. It speaks of force to use the clause. Does that mean it is literally in the agreement or that the existing agreement forces them (in connection with law) to do so?
To talk about something or someone, we usually give an apostrophe, like John's pen. If the word ends with s, we say Adams' pen . But what if we are talking of something that ends with an apostrophe s like Jack's (what we sometimes say in short for Jack's home, or Jack's kitchen etc.). How do I us...
@Cerberus I thought I read it in the exact sentence where you directed me. Never mind though. My attention span has collapsed. Is that what attention spans do?
@tchrist Maybe your books are better than mine. I've been purchasing less and less in dead-tree format so it's disproportionately college (perhaps cheap) textbooks. I felt compelled to check a sample from my living room shelves too, and Knuth and Tufte were sewn as expected, but other than that I found only two among shelves of math and computer science books and two among several books of photographs. My husband's physics books won: the majority of those with hard covers had sewn signatures.
Now I can't unsee the shabby shape of the binding on some of those other books though. shudders
@tchrist: How long do you suppose a person's full name (first, middle, last, including hyphenateds) would have to be before it was in the top percentile of long names?
A distance of "64" in this case means "you can understand some of it, grammatical structure is mostly very similar, you can now and then make up a word and have it be correct". A distance of 105 means "not at all related in any way, completely and utterly different, totally unintelligible".
The wikipedia page claims that likelihood and probability are distinct concepts.
In non-technical parlance, "likelihood" is usually a synonym for "probability," but in statistical usage there is a clear distinction in perspective: the number that is the probability of some observed outcomes g...
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…
English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…