Evaluation of Social Media Sources

The first source that I found is a Facebook post made by John Hopkins Medicine. The post addresses the controversy of a recently done Chinese experiment and also has a link to an article on the John Hopkins website with more information. Johns Hopkins Medicine is one of the top medical schools in the country. Googling their name comes up with multiple articles about national and international rankings. This reputation gives the post a lot of credibility because they are some of the top researchers in the medical field. Currently Johns Hopkins is ranked as the top biomedical engineering program in the nation so they are very involved within the use of CRISPR Cas9 and the debate over the ethics of using it.

The content of the post matches all of the information I have found in my general sources and scholarly sources. Since the information has been repeated multiple times I am assuming it is correct and reliable. Johns Hopkins Medicine's Facebook account has been up for years and is verified. They also post a variety about all sorts of medical studies and topics. Because of their reputation and that they are verified, it is very likely that the information that they have posted is a reliable source.

https://thenypost.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/hopkins_hospital_workers.jpg

https://biochemicalsociety.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/bbsrc_logo.jpg

The second source that I found is a Facebook post made by Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council(BBSRC). I had never heard of BBSRC but after I googled it I learned that they are very involved in scientific research at most United Kingdoms Universities and they are government funded. This gives them a degree of credibility because they work for the government and for educational institutes so they are doing legitimate research. BBSRC is directly involved in the controversy because they do research using CRISPR Cas9 and other genetic engineering experiments. The post quotes some of their top researchers and also gives their opinion on the topic and how they believe that genetic engineering should keep going on as long as it follows all of the ethical policies that are already in place.

The information within the post is supported by the other articles that I have read. These ideas include the fact that CRISPR Cas9 is in early stages and there needs to be more work done before it is ready to be used on humans. All of BBSRC's Facebook posts deal with some sort of research or science. The topics vary but they are legitimate posts. I believe that the source is reliable because the Facebook page has been up for almost 4 years and I googled the institution and they are very involved in United Kingdoms research. They work with Universities and the government so they are trying to do credible studies.