Re: Cranks on the endangered species list

GSS wrote:
An unquestioning faith is the keystone of all regions.

I assume you meant "religions". Yes.

The problem around here is that all too many people unfamiliar with modern physics mistake understanding and agreement with "unquestioning faith".

"Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic"
-- Arthur C, Clarke

"Sufficiently advanced understanding is indistinguishable from faith."
-- Tom Roberts

The key is to advance YOUR OWN understanding so that you can distinguish them.


However,
demanding an unquestioning faith in any of the scientific disciplines
will surely lead to stagnation and self destruction in that
discipline.

No scientific discipline "demands" that. What they require is UNDERSTANDING, not faith. But to you, and to all too many people around here, the two are indistinguishable.


The so called 'crackpots' and 'cranks', are extremely important
members of the scientific community, who are nurturing the important
discipline of Physics and preventing its degeneration into a religious
faith.

Not true. There is no instance in the history of physics of someone making a contribution to the field without understanding the then-current theories and experiments. Contrary to your claim, crackpots and cranks who do not understand the now-current theories and experiments are not any part of the scientific community. People who present dissenting opinions with full knowledge of current theories and experiments are neither crackpots nor cranks -- one obvious difference is these latter can get published in the mainstream literature. Cranks and crackpots generally cannot get published in the mainstream literature, because a major purpose of peer review is to avoid wasting readers' time with "impossible" nonsense (see my next paragraph for the meaning of "impossible" here).


Exploration of all possible alternatives, hypothesis and
viewpoints, is absolutely essential for the well being and progress of
any scientific discipline.

Yes. The key word is "possible", which in science means "consistent with all known experiments". Without knowing the current experimental record, a crackpot or crank simply does not understand what is and is not POSSIBLE.

One must generally understand the then-current theories
used when the experiment was published, in order to be
able to read their paper(s) intelligently. The MMX is an
excellent example of this, as are Miller's measurements.
Such papers are inherently embedded in the context and
milieu of physics when they were written.


It is certainly not necessary that all dissenting opinion must be
workable, brilliant or acceptable to the mainstream.

No. But it _IS_ necessary that USEFUL "dissenting opinion" be POSSIBLE (in the above sense). Impossible "dissenting opinion" is useless and can be safely ignored. That's why so few real scientists pay attention to this newsgroup -- >90% of the posts are nonsense (or worse), and >99% of the "dissenting opinions" are IMPOSSIBLE (in the above sense).


Dissenting
opinion must be treated as an essential part of the exploration
process, to explore various inadequacies and shortcomings in the
current paradigm and to explore various alternatives.

Not when such "dissenting opinion" is IMPOSSIBLE (in the above sense).

The scientific literature is full of "dissenting opinion". Practically all of modern physics was once "dissenting opinion". And there are several current schools of thought about extending relativity ("doubly special relativity", "loop quantum gravity", "string theory", ...). But you won't hear about them around here, because they are all advanced topics far beyond the capabilities of just about everybody who contributes to this newsgroup; there are MUCH better forums in which to discuss them (primarily the literature, not the internet). The cranks and crackpots around here are in a completely different world, which is unrelated to science (and thus uninteresting to most scientists).


Tom Roberts
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Cranks on the endangered species list
    ... modern physics mistake understanding and agreement with "unquestioning ... "Sufficiently advanced understanding is indistinguishable from faith." ... unrelated to science (and thus uninteresting to most scientists). ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Cranks on the endangered species list
    ... "Sufficiently advanced understanding is indistinguishable from faith." ... Not when such "dissenting opinion" is IMPOSSIBLE. ... unrelated to science (and thus uninteresting to most scientists). ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Cranks on the endangered species list
    ... modern physics mistake understanding and agreement with "unquestioning ... "Sufficiently advanced understanding is indistinguishable from faith." ... unrelated to science (and thus uninteresting to most scientists). ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Cranks on the endangered species list
    ... modern physics mistake understanding and agreement with "unquestioning ... matter of "unquestioning faith". ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Cranks on the endangered species list
    ... modern physics mistake understanding and agreement with "unquestioning ... matter of "unquestioning faith". ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
Quantcast