OAKLAND, Calif., Aug. 15 /PRNewswire/ -- "'Words! Words! Words!,' as Eliza Doolittle so scornfully put it in My Fair Lady when Professor Higgins said things to her that had about as much substance as smoke. Well, that's the Internet today. Only a million times worse."

So says Dr. Irving David Shapiro, author of "You Must Not Let Them Con You! There's Too Much at Stake," which a reader once described as "the owner's manual for the mind/brain that didn't come with the equipment."

"By and large," he continues, "the overwhelming majority of the stuff you get on the Internet today is self-serving, bogus, useless hogwash. For example,

-It's information that's a deliberate lie, intended to get you to do something that you wouldn't ordinarily do. -It's information to which a spin has been applied, so that you will see something the way the spinner wants you to, rather than the way you'd most likely see it on your own. -It's noninformation that looks like information, walks like information, talks like information, sounds like information, and acts like information, while all the time being completely devoid of meaning. -It's a statistic that claims to measure something when, in reality, such measurement is impossible. -It's information from an 'expert' whose only expertise lies in looking and sounding like one. -It's an assertion made up of nothing more than someone else's biases, hang-ups, disappointments, failures, misinterpretations, ways of seeing the world, conditioning, etc. -It's informational nonsense that became conventional wisdom because of the tendency that most people have to repeatedly parrot whatever they hear and read without prior thought of any kind. -It's someone's inference, judgment, or opinion that has about as much reality as the 'Tooth Fairy.'"

"The worst part of it," he continues, "is that people make decisions based on that hokum. And you know how that goes - garbage in, garbage out."

So as a public service Dr. Shapiro has written a booklet for the Mens Sana Foundation - entitled InfoTest - that's now available on the Internet in pdf format. Completely free.

"Among other things," Shapiro says, "InfoTest shows you how to tell the difference between meaningful stuff and nonsense; what's really factual and what's not; whether it's likely that the writer is trying to inform you of something or he's just trying to BS you; and it ends with the acid, ultimate, final, foolproof, never-fail test, which I'll let you read for yourself when you get the booklet."

The new completely free booklet on how to tell Internet garbage from the real thing can be downloaded in pdf format by logging on to http://www.menssana.org/books/treasure.php and then by clicking on the InfoTest link you'll find there.

As Shapiro puts it, "InfoTest is the indispensable Internet traveling companion. Don't go online without it."

The Mens Sana Foundation, founded in 1969, is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, public-benefit organization.

This release was issued through eReleases(TM). For more information, visit http://www.ereleases.com/.

CONTACT: Dr. Irving David Shapiro of The Mens Sana Foundation,
+1-510-835-2946 or shapiro@menssana.org

Web site: http://www.menssana.org/books/treasure.php

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