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Nine Crazy Ideas in Science
from the your-opinions-may-vary dept.
Here's the deck of nine ideas under consideration:
- More Guns Mean Less Crime
- AIDS is Not Caused by HIV
- Sun Exposure is Beneficial
- Low Doses of Nuclear Radiation Are Beneficial
- The Solar System Has Two Suns
- Oil, Coal, and Gas Have Abiogenic Origins
- Time Travel is Possible
- Faster-than-Light Particles Exist
- There Was No Big Bang
So in this review I'm going to give you generalities first, and bury "the butler did it" type information after a SPOILER warning.
One of the problems with the execution of this work is that you can pretty often tell when Ehrlich is enthusiastic about an idea just from his general tone as he writes about it... and conversely, in retrospect I think I should've been able to spot when he disagreed with, because the writing in those chapters was a little confusing.
Part of his schtick is that at the end of each chapter he rates the idea on a scale of 0 to 4 "cuckoos". Oddly enough I often find that I strongly disagree with his cuckoo ratings even just based on the evidence that he presents. But the absolute magnitude of my disagreements are typically no more than a single "cuckoo".
I was worried about some of his evaluation criteria (see the introduction available on-line as a sample chapter), because he includes several points that strike me as fairly dicey: "Who proposed the idea?"; "How attached is the proposer to the idea?" and "Does the proposer have an agenda?" These all relate to judging the person rather than the idea itself. (Consider that "consider the source" and "ad hominem argument" are pretty much the same as far as logic goes.) But he does clearly understand that these are just rules of thumb, and I note with some amusement that he doesn't resort to these particular rules anywhere in the later chapters. He's more interested in the logic of the arguments, which is as it should be.
I could bring up lots of quibbles (and I probably will after the spoiler warning), but overall I found this to be a great breezy read. I learned quite a bit from it. While nothing here made me do a reversal of my beliefs, I was often surprised that the evidence for something was stronger or weaker than I'd supposed.
Here we have an educated, astute, person doing a relatively independent review of some controversial, interesting technical subjects. Why aren't there more books like this?
Ah, but at least there's one more! I see that a sequel has just come out: Eight Preposterous Propositions: From the Genetics of Homosexuality to the Benefits of Global Warming . I bet I'll be submitting a review on that one shortly ...
Anyway, now into the nitty gritty. Here's your SPOILER WARNING. Skip the following if you want to play the "guess where he's going" game with this book. Let's take it chapter by chapter:
More Guns Mean Less CrimeI'm a "right to bear arms" kind of guy myself, and I was surprised that the data doesn't seem to support private ownership of guns as a crime deterrent. Ehrlich argues persuasively that the statistical evidence for this is very weak. I appreciate the fact that Ehrlich concludes that both the pro and anti gun sides are nuts: he rates them 3 and 2 "cuckoos" respectively, where a 3 is "almost certainly not true" and 2 is "very likely not true."
But here, we come to my first strong disagreement with him. If the effects aren't strong enough to measure, why the asymmetry in the "cuckoo" rating for the pro and anti side? I might rate them both at a 2 myself.
AIDS is Not Caused by HIVI've had the impression that the the Duesberg hypothesis was pretty screwy, but I was willing to tentatively consider it might have something of value. For example, what about the possibility that multiple diseases are now being diagnosed incorrectly as one single syndrome "HIV"?
But Ehrlich's analysis satisfies me that there's not much of scientific value in Duesberg's ideas at all. I don't argue with his 3 cuckoo rating (but I wouldn't blame you if you thought it deserved the full 4).
Sun Exposure is BeneficialEhrlich concludes that this looks fairly plausible, and gives it a 0 cuckoo rating, pretty much as I would have expected. Many people might find this surprising though, certainly the popular impression these days seems to be that sunlight is deadly.
Low Doses of Nuclear Radiation Are BeneficialHere, Ehrlich lays out the case for "radiation hormesis", and I really don't think this is that fantastic a notion (the difference between a poison and a medicine is often a matter of dosage, why wouldn't this be true of radiation?). But radiation is so demonized in the popular imagination that "radiation is good for you" comes off an insane joke. Ehrlich takes it seriously, and essentially concludes that while there are reasons for suspecting that this effect exists, it hasn't been entirely established. And here we have one of my quibbles: he awards it 1 cuckoo, which translates to "probably not true, but who knows". But there is no reason for saying it's probably not true. If something is not crazy, just not established, I would be inclined to award it "0 cuckoos," aka "Why not?"
The Solar System Has Two SunsThis is the "Nemesis" hypothesis, which it will probably come as no surprise is rated at 2 cuckoos. The short version of the story: originally they looked at part of the extinction record, and it looked like there was a definite cycle. But if you look at the whole record it doesn't seem to be there.
Oil, Coal, and Gas Have Abiogenic OriginsThis is subject that's been of some interest to me, ever since I heard Thomas Gold give a talk on this idea about a decade ago. It turns out that this is now looking much less like "an intriguing possibility" and much more like a truth awaiting a few funerals before it will be declared established. The odds are good that "fossil fuels" don't actually come from fossils, rather they're from hydrocarbons that pre-existed the formation of the earth, which means we're probably not going to run out of them. (So that means we can ignore those environmental wackos, right? Nope: imagine what happens to the atmosphere if we keep ramping up the rate at which we burn this stuff.)
Ehrlich rates this at 0 cuckoos, but maybe he should have invented a "-1 cuckoo" for this one.
Time Travel is Possible2 cuckoos: no surprises.
Faster-than-Light Particles ExistEhrlich mentions in his introduction in the interests of "full disclosure" that he's actually strongly attached to one of the ideas discussed here (the existence of tachyons), but by the time I'd gotten to that chapter I'd entirely forgotten about this, and I was disappointed to realize that he was being an advocate, not an independent reviewer (it includes a picture of him wearing a "no tardy-centrism" T-shirt).
Ehrlich rates this at 0 cuckoos, but come on. Even just based on the write-up he presents, it's a clear 1 cuckoo.
There Was No Big BangClocks in at 3 cuckoos, as you might expect.
You can purchase Nine Crazy Ideas in Science: A Few Might Even Be True from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
more reviews of this book (Score:5, Informative)
Re:more reviews of this book (Score:5, Interesting)
Hmmm. In Chicago, New York, Washington DC and others guns are all but illegal and they have very heavy crime problems. But, in places like Vermont and many other places that allow folks to walk around with loaded firearms crime is down. Washington DC and New York really are the biggest counter points to your statement though. Of course this is Karma suicide as a lot of anti-gun nuts reside on
Parent
Re:more reviews of this book (Score:5, Interesting)
Even though you call me a nut, I'll explain the position:
There are a lot of irresponsible idiots out there.
If guns are freely available, there will be a lot of irresponsible idiots out there with guns.
I therefore think that guns should be regulated in much the same way that we don't allow any idiot to drive around with an 18 wheeler.
There are also a lot of pro-gun nuts on
AFAICT, their opinion is: "I want a gun. I hate and fear all authorities, especially if they are called 'government'. I oppose any steps by said government to either make it harder for me to have a gun or to keep track of who has guns."
I strongly disagree with that position because it gets in the way of stopping irresponsible idiots from getting their clumsy hands on devices designed to make holes in people.
Of course, that makes me an "anti gun nut", because when you don't have rational arguments, name calling is the only substitute.
Damn liberal media [foxnews.com]...
Parent
Re:more reviews of this book (Score:4, Insightful)
There are a lot of irresponsible idiots out there.
If guns are freely available, there will be a lot of irresponsible idiots out there with guns.
If speech is free, irresponsible idiots will exercise it. The Chinese firmly believe that this threat to social harmony is unwarranted, so they restrict speech. Certainly there are a lot of people who believe that Rush Limbaugh engages in "hate speech" that leads to violence, suffering, and death. There are many people about whom the same thing may be said.
The real problem, of course, is your assumptions, which have nothing to do with rational arguments. By "rational" you apparently mean "If I compare apples to oranges you should accept that I'm right."
For your information, we have lots of "idiots" driving 18-wheelers. The purpose of licensing drivers is to assure that they know how to make the vehicle work, not to regulate their ownership, possession, or use of the vehicle
Licensing doesn't make people responsible. At best, it assures that they know how something functions well enough to use it.
People who advocate licensing guns aren't supporters of publicly funded gun-training programs like publicly funded driver training programs in our schools. They aren't interested in whether people know how to use guns properly. The sole basis of every gun registration regime that has ever been suggested in this country and in every other I'm aware of is to make it easier to restrict ownership and to seize the weapons when a full prohibition is passed.
To suggest that the gun-registration schemes proposed by the anti-2nd Amendment crowd are equivalent to licensing motor vehicle operators is specious and dishonest, because the goals are entirely different. The purpose of licensing a motor vehicle operator is to assure a minimum level of competence in motor vehicle operation. The purpose of licensing guns is as a first step to confiscation.
Oh, and if you don't want name-calling, don't engage in it. Ending your post with a line that suggests that people who disagree with you don't have rational arguments is pompous and assinine
Parent
Re:more reviews of this book (Score:4, Insightful)
And this is where rationality flies off the window.
Because, you might have noticed, I used the example of 18 wheelers. Yeah...there are laws against 18 wheelers...no one is allowed to own or drive 18 wheelers...
sigh
Remember the terrorists during the 9/11 attacks didn't use guns.
Irrelevant.
On 9/11 they used jet planes.
If laws worked there'd be no crime.
Who modded this insightfull? I seriously want to have a chat with the person who modded THAT insightfull. He is advocating a society without laws, and you mod him insightfull?
Just because some crazy irresponsible individual may get his/her hands on a gun doesn't mean that I should give up my second ammendment right to bear arms. In fact, it exemplifies the need for the second ammendment.
Circular logic...my head is spinning.
So, I'll try this again, because you did NOT read it correctly the first time, you just jumped up and trolled with the usual prefabricated and slightly insane rant...
Guns should not be freely available to everyone.
Guns should be available only to those who can prove that they are capable of handling them responsibly.
Read that again, no, again. Yeah...that's right, I do say that guns should be available...ain't that something!
Just not to any idiot who will go off to shoot at cars on the highway because he's bored!
Parent
Re:Irresponsible Idiots (Score:4, Interesting)
And you reply: "Good argument!! There are lots of irresponsible idiots so don't let anyone have guns."
So, you have never seen an 18 wheeler in your life, have you?
Who, the HELL, is modding that crap up? Seriously, what is wrong with you. I say "restrict", I get trolled with semi-litterate idiots who say that I said "ban".
Is this bizarro slashdot or something?
Why is it not possible to have a fucking rational discussion about guns when people from the U.S. are around? Its not that hard people: read what the other person actually wrote, not what you are expecting to read!
On to the rest:
So it's OK to let irresponsible idiots drive 3000 pound cars.
No, its not.
And it's OK to let irresponsible idiots buy chainsaws.
Please, PLEASE look up murder statistics. Compare numbers of homicide with firearms to homicide with chainsaws.
Please.
Parent
Re:more reviews of this book (Score:5, Insightful)
That said, assuming that criminals will always have guns, I don't want to be unarmed and have to rely on the mercy of the criminal. I would much rather have the shotgun, because while he's much more likely to shoot (and maybe even hit me), it's very unlikely that in my dark home he will instantly kill me. And I can still vaoprize his chest cavity with my close-range shotgun, even one-armed.
Now, let's take all this to their natural conclusions, rather than just stating the part of the equation that makes your argument look good. My single instance is much more violent, if it ocurrs, but taken as a whole, does this increase violence for everyone? Likely not. There is one less violent criminal. Other criminals may see that crime might not be so safe or fun. The pivotal point is, is this a situation where an arms race will ocurr? That's far from certain. Depends on how practical the criminals are, and like any group, there is a mixture here, from very impractical vandals, all the way up to movie-esque cat burglars, who want no part of violence.
My own opinion, is that an arms race situation is pretty absurd. The next criminal doesn't break into my uncle's home next with a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, just because I killed a colleague with my shotgun.
On the other hand, you can play it safe, hoping to earn the mercy of the felon, as he rapes your wife at gunpoint, making you watch... because, hell, if you *had* a gun, he might have had to kill you first!
Parent
5 Crazy Ideas for Slashdot. (Score:3, Funny)
2. Editors will stop rejecting relevant stories that aren't theoretical (ie overheated Teflon causes flu-like symptoms for 2 days)
3. Spelling errors will become a thing of the past on the front page
4. Trolls will be stopped
5. Reviews about books written over a year ago won't appear on the frontpage
Re:5 Crazy Ideas for Slashdot. (Score:5, Funny)
6. Duplicates are a thing of the past
Parent
A planet ... (Score:5, Funny)
He forgot... (Score:5, Insightful)
A great site on atomic energy is:
http://www.atomicinsights.com/AEI_Topics.html [atomicinsights.com]
You forgot one (Score:5, Funny)
Coal? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Coal? (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re:Coal? (Score:5, Informative)
Start with the question "what is oil & coal?" Oil is a liquid slew of organic hydrocarbon chains, coal is organic hydrocarbons that haven't had high enough pressure to liquify, and shale is oil bubbles trapped in mineralized rocks.
Then ask, "how do I get the hydrocarbons?" You can start with dead plant/animal matter who used to live on the surface, then compress it at high temperatures and pressures. The pressure breaks apart the cellular structures into base strands that we can later burn as fuel. There's a company that's proven they can liquify turkey guts and convert it into low grade fuel; there was a Slashdot article on it a while back.
Now, an alternate theory has developed from recent discoveries of life on the sea floor. Organic life can exist in oxygen starved, high pressure environment around lava vents; also, bacterium have been found that can survive at much higher temperatures (hundreds of degrees F) than previously thought.
Combine the two, and you say "what if bacterium can survive in the earth's crust close to the mantle for heat"? This organic matter would live in a high pressure environment, and when they die, their cells could also be liquified into oil. In Sweden, they have been extracting oil for a decade from depths that should pre-date the appearance of plant life in the area... Search on Thomas Gold for his theories on oil formation on this method.
Parent
Astmmetric guns (Score:5, Insightful)
Because (like the vast majority of such things) the pro- and anti- positions are themselves asymmetric -- the anto-gun position is not a simple negation of the pro-gun one, similarly the pro-life position is not a simple negation of the pro-choice one.
It's something quite a few studies like this one suffer from, too many fall foul of the same few logical fallacies.
Sun Exposure is Beneficial (Score:5, Funny)
Where else, but Slashdot... (Score:5, Funny)
"But the absolute magnitude of my disagreements are typically no more than a single "cuckoo"."
personalities do play a role. (Score:5, Insightful)
Most scientist will assume the ideal situation and assume that colleagues are playing fairly. Therefore, the system is fairly easy to game, for at least a little while. All it takes is a small group of 'scientist' with an agenda. This usually involves some idea that they really want to be 'true'. These characters only need to selectively choose demonstrations and filter data in such a way that their 'truth' is shown to result from the data. Of course real science has great difficulty defending against such attacks because, as in all things, playing by the rules to discover truth is vastly more difficult than just asserting something is true and then picking the few examples that support the position. Even when no malice is involved, such fictions have taken years to disprove.
In the case of softer sciences, or even the harder sciences where duplicating of demonstrations are really difficult, the credibility of the person is critical. The ease by which such sciences are gamed is the reason why we have so much confusion over a variety of social issues, even though the basic consensus is amazingly clear. OTOH, consensus can be wrong, which is why science uses resources to look at all sides of the issue
As an aside, the physicists, and really scientists in general, I know are extremely open minded. They just get jaded after a while due to the number of malcontents that abuse science to promote personal doctrine. To a trained and logical mind, the rhetoric some of these idiots spout is really equivalent to just throwing throwing feces everywhere.
Quantifying your ad hominem attacks (Score:5, Funny)
The Crackpot Index A simple method for rating potentially revolutionary contributions to physics: A -5 point starting credit.
1 point for every statement that is widely agreed on to be false.
2 points for every statement that is clearly vacuous.
3 points for every statement that is logically inconsistent.
5 points for each such statement that is adhered to despite careful correction.
5 points for using a thought experiment that contradicts the results of a widely accepted real experiment.
5 points for each word in all capital letters (except for those with defective keyboards).
5 points for each mention of "Einstien", "Hawkins" or "Feynmann".
10 points for each claim that quantum mechanics is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
10 points for pointing out that you have gone to school, as if this were evidence of sanity.
10 points for beginning the description of your theory by saying how long you have been working on it.
10 points for mailing your theory to someone you don't know personally and asking them not to tell anyone else about it, for fear that your ideas will be stolen.
10 points for offering prize money to anyone who proves and/or finds any flaws in your theory.
10 points for each new term you invent and use without properly defining it.
10 points for each statement along the lines of "I'm not good at math, but my theory is conceptually right, so all I need is for someone to express it in terms of equations".
10 points for arguing that a current well-established theory is "only a theory", as if this were somehow a point against it.
10 points for arguing that while a current well-established theory predicts phenomena correctly, it doesn't explain "why" they occur, or fails to provide a "mechanism".
10 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Einstein, or claim that special or general relativity are fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
10 points for claiming that your work is on the cutting edge of a "paradigm shift".
20 points for emailing me and complaining about the crackpot index, e.g. saying that it "suppresses original thinkers" or saying that I misspelled "Einstein" in item 8.
20 points for suggesting that you deserve a Nobel prize.
20 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Newton or claim that classical mechanics is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).
20 points for every use of science fiction works or myths as if they were fact.
20 points for defending yourself by bringing up (real or imagined) ridicule accorded to your past theories.
20 points for each use of the phrase "hidebound reactionary".
20 points for each use of the phrase "self-appointed defender of the orthodoxy".
30 points for suggesting that a famous figure secretly disbelieved in a theory which he or she publicly supported. (E.g., that Feynman was a closet opponent of special relativity, as deduced by reading between the lines in his freshman physics textbooks.)
30 points for suggesting that Einstein, in his later years, was groping his way towards the ideas you now advocate.
30 points for claiming that your theories were developed by an extraterrestrial civilization (without good evidence).
30 points for allusions to a delay in your work while you spent time in an asylum, or references to the psychiatrist who tried to talk you out of your theory.
40 points for comparing those who argue against your ideas to Nazis, stormtroopers, or brownshirts.
40 points for claiming that the "scientific establishment" is engaged in a "conspiracy" to prevent your work from gaining its well-deserved fame, or suchlike.
40 points for comp
Re:Quantifying your ad hominem attacks (Score:4, Funny)
John Baez's Crackpot Index is a great way to quantify your ad hominem atacks in physics. http://www.math.ucr.edu/home/baez/
Once you've read that, treat yourself to a post [google.com] where the poster attempts to achieve a maximum crackpot index score by violating all the rules in sequential order.
Parent
Abiogenic Oil (Score:5, Informative)
When you consider how much biomatter would have to have been tied up in swamps and then covered in just the right ways and held at just the right pressures and temperatures to produce the amount of oil and coal we've already pulled out of the ground, and how inefficient that process would have to have been, the "fossil" explanation becomes pretty unlikely. When you look back at the history of that explanation, it becomes pretty clear that nobody cared much, then someone noticed plant leaves and bark patterns in some lumps of coal and everyone said "Oh, that must have been it." (HINT: Petrified forests weren't grown by stone trees)
Cook's theory isn't really "abiogenic", BTW. The only abiogenic "fossil fuel" under his theory would be plain methane. Rather, he believes that methane left over from planet formation is steadily separating out, and somewhere in the mantle (around 10-30 kilometers subsurface) a bacterial ecosystem based on sulfides and methane is forming it into complex hydrocarbons. Given that we already know of sulfide-based, high-temperature ecosystems in the deep ocean thermal vents, it's really not much a stretch anymore.
By that theory, the oil-richness of the Middle East becomes inter-related with the East African Rift (both being the consequence of a deep upwelling of methane-rich rock). But we're going to have to wait for those funerals before it will be acceptable for a petro-geologist to admit they have been back-asswards about it for the last century. The "Appropriate Technology" bunch is going to have a screaming fit, as well.
--Dave
Re:Abiogenic Oil (Score:4, Informative)
Methane clathrates are not frozen methane. They are composed of methane molecules trapped within crystals of water ice. I have never heard that methane "freezing out of the atmosphere" is the source of these deposits. The generally accepted explanation is that natural gas (methane) migrates along faults to the ocean bottom. The low temperatures (even in the tropics) and high pressures at the sea floor lead to the formation of clathrates. Oil and gas seeps are well known in the Gulf of Mexico, thus it's not surprising that clathrates are found there. If geologists once asserted that clathrates form from atmospheric methane, I've never heard of it.
Parent
Abiogenic Oil and Coal? Twaddle. (Score:4, Insightful)
Gun Ownership vs Right to Carry (Score:5, Interesting)
His data showed a consistent and predictable decline in violent crime after the passage of concealed carry laws. Furthermore his data shows that violent crime was exchanged for crimes where there was less risk of meeting a person during commision (car theft, etc). Both of these are consistent with basic economic hypotheses (ie. greater risk costs means less people participate)
Of course when it comes to criminals evaluating their risks, it doesn't matter how many people have guns locked in cabinets at home, it matters how many people MIGHT have them hidden under their jacket.
John Lott: More Guns Less Crime
Kleck and Kates: Armed, new perspectives on gun control.
are the two most important available books that use logic and statistics to examine how firearms affect crime.
No Four Cuckoos in Book? (Score:5, Interesting)
Surely he could have found one or two to fit the high end of the scale.
How about crop circles by electromagnetic fields?
Trust me, you can't reason with the pro crop circle camp, I've debated with them over at Space.com
Some other over looked -- way out ideas.
No Anti-Gravity Speculation?
The Anti-Gravity by Spinning Super-Conductor: Seems to be clocking in at 3 cuckoos by my estimate
However
Gravity Wave Detection and coupling to Electromagnetic Fields: a 1 cuckoo currently, but could go higher or lower in the
near future with new experiments.
Multiple Universes: I'd give this a zero, but experimental confirmation is going to be a real bitch.
Dark Mater: a zero cuckoo for sure, but we haven't really seen the damn stuff yet.
Brane Collision origin of the universe: 1 to 2 cuckoos, but could gain respectability. Less violent than Big Bang, less
inflation, but still an abrupt origin in the 10-20 Billion Year range.
String Theory: a zero cuckoo. It's hard to bet against a theory that just keeps changing, refining, and redefining itself.
In the end String Theory will probably be the GUT, but by then will probably have no strings
Underlining process to Universe are computational: Main premis to Stephen Wolfram's "New Kind of Science." I like Stephen, and even use to work for him, but he has a long way to go before being able to claim a truly "New Kind of Science." I'd say 1 cuckoo.
Cold Fusion: I'd give it 2 cuckoos (these guys just won't go away)
Homeopathic Medicine: I'd give this one a 5 on the 4 cuckoo scale.
MOND Modified Newtonian Dynamics: 1 cuckoo probably, but could really upset the apple cart in physics. Has even had write ups in Scientific American
see
Where's the Dark Matter? [sciam.com]
These are just a few off the top of my head, I look forward to seeing some other Slashdotters lists.
HIV=AIDS? (Score:4, Interesting)
She has HIV, does not take any of the AZT drugs and is and has been healthy as a horse for a looong time.
Re:HIV=AIDS? (Score:5, Insightful)
>>and is and has been healthy as a horse for a
>>looong time.
Well.......... DUH!
Guess what --- approximately 10% of HIV infections are people who are considered "long term non-progressors". They luckily have the right chance combination of genes that lets their immune system keep the virus under control. Indefinately, or at least much longer than the general population.
Around 1% (value subject to debate) have immunity to it.
One person has a spectacular result and doesn't need drugs.... Whooop-de-do. Don't they teach anybody basic statistics anymore? Even Ebola doesn't kill 100% of those infected.
One result is not proof or a result. It's a fluke.
Parent
disagree with the reviewer's cukoo ratings (Score:4, Insightful)
No. That's not how it works. When positing the existence of things, or putting forth an explanative theory to describe why things that are there got that way, the burden of proof is always on the positor. Therefore someone who is willing to believe a theory purely because it hasn't been proven wrong DOES deserve at least a little cukoo rating for that.
Ob moderation joke (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Science is a constantly evolving field (Score:5, Insightful)
The chances of all of those variables being "perfectly tuned" to allow human life to evolve are certainly small, but are only statistically interesting if you presume that human life was some sort of universal "goal" from the outset. At that point, arguing for Inetlligent Design is just question begging.
Parent
Re:Science is a constantly evolving field (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re:Science is a constantly evolving field (Score:5, Insightful)
For example, the argument you gave about the extremely unlikely odds that we would be here is trivial to refute. ANY event that happens is dependent on an extremely unlikely chain of events. Any little shift in that chain, and poof, the entire thing is completely different. For example, a big lotto win for Bob XXX in Des Moines is an extremely unlikely event. The odds against it are unimaginable, and any little change would have made Bob XXX lose the lottery. Even a little molecular sized disturbance in the airflow propelling those little balls would have done it. Nevertheless, people win the lottery almost every week. They beat the unimaginable odds.
After Bob XXX won the lottery, would Bob be justified in thinking that he won the lottery due to intelligent design? No, because if he didn't win the lottery, either someone else would have won, or nobody would have won. When he looks back at his lottery win, it's hard for him to see that *all* the possibilities were equally unlikely to happen, but one of those possibilities *must* happen.
When you add up the probabilities of every extremely unlikely event, you always come out to exactly 1.
Please, present more arguments, and I will present the superior counter-argument. Intelligent design is very interesting to think about, and studying it can be an instructive act in itself.
Parent
Science 1, Religion 0 (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Why Agendas Matter (Score:5, Insightful)
Five cuckoos.
From the original Slashdot article:
Science is a human endeavor. It's conducted by humans. Science is a process, however, and that process is defined in such a way that it doesn't matter which humans conduct it.
Perhaps with homeopathy and other forms of medical quackery coming as a close second, "creation" "science" is the canonical example of why "Does the proposer have an agenda" and "How attached is the proposer to the idea" are important questions you have to ask yourself when evaluating a theory.
The scientific method is independent of humanity. Any sentient being is capable of doing science. But to the best of our knowledge, the only sentient beings that are performing science are humans. We know from observation that humans are fallible. Humans let their emotions get in the way of the facts. When a human is very attached to a theory, and even more so when a human has an agenda that can be advanced by promulgation of that theory, it's not guaranteed, but it's highly more probable, that the human will depart from the scientific method in an effort to cling to a theory that's been repudiated.
One of many links: A Bullshit Detection Guide [ttp]
Creation "science" fails on: 1A: Manipulative buzzwords - "Intelligent"? "Design"? :)
1C: Audience the BS appeals to: Self-explanatory here
1E: Underdog appeal: "Just the little ol' Christians fighting the hordes of Godless Atheistic Communistic Scientists that Run the Schools"
1F: Requires A Negative View of Authority: As above. Evolution is part of the Grand Conspiracy to Keep The Christians Down.
2B-1: A small group of "experts" pretending to own the field
2B-2: Experts beyond their field of expertise.
2B-3: False claims of objectivity. It used to be called Creation Science, then it got renamed to Intelligent Design. Wonder what it'll be called next week when the scam is exposed?
2E: Blizzard of Numbers - the Creation "scientist" to whom I'm responding is the case in point: "26 variables? 66 variables? Does he really know enough about physics, cosmology, and biology to be sure it's not 27, or 65? Does anyone?!?!
Intelligent Design: Pegs the BS Detector. Five cuckoos.
ID is a nice belief system if you're already a creationist who accepts on faith that the Universe was created by the God of Genesis (optional: 6,000 years ago in a week), but it's not science.
For the record, I'm not bashing Christians here. Frankly, I see zero inconsistency between Genesis and our presently-understood notions of cosmology. Take a guy from 4000 BC and show him a PBS documentary on current theories of cosmology, and ask him to write what he saw. You're likely to get something like "Umm, I saw this vision with moving pictures about how the universe came to be. So, like, first there was nothin'. No time, no space, zilch. Then Something Happened, a couple of branes smacked into each other and nobody knows quite what that means yet. But that was the start of our universe. Then they said something about electromagnetic force breaking symmetry with the weak force, which I couldn't understand, and there was light, which I could understand. Then it cooled enough that the mean free path of a photon got pretty long, and I didn't know what that meant, but that was when it b
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Re:Why Agendas Matter (Score:4, Insightful)
Not so. Intelligent Design as a scientific theory: Pegs the BS Detector. Five cuckoos. Yes.
But that doesn't mean the idea itself is BS. Put the phrase "I love my wife" or better yet, "Love is good" through the BS detector. It fails miserably. You can't prove that love is good. Intelligent design is a nice idea, I hope it's true, but we'll NEVER know. It's untestable in every way. That's why it's nuts to argue it as science. It'll never be science. It'll never be measurable, logical, or testable.
Therefore it's just as nuts to claim the idea worth 5 cuckoos as it is to claim it as scientific truth. There is just NO WAY TO EVER KNOW, in any scientifically meaningful way, even if a voice from the sky proclaims it for all to hear.
So again, as science it's 5 cuckoos, but as an idea it's not so bad. Again, I hope it's true. 1 cuckoo.
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Re:Why Agendas Matter (Score:5, Insightful)
Au contraire. My 5 cuckoo rating was because I've looked at the evidence for both theories, and come to two conclusions:
1) The proponents of intelligent design do not practice the scientific method, therefore the theory of intelligent design is not a scientific theory in the first place, and on that basis alone, it can be rejected. 2) The fact that ID is not a scientific theory doesn't say anything for or against evolution. It just so happens that the theory of evolution is pretty damn consistent with the data uncovered. (And the "theory" of intelligent design is not as consistent with the data as the theory of evolution.)
> An unhealthy attachment to the status quo will hinder scientific progress as much as following any crackpot idea that comes along...
Absolutely! Einstein was flat-out wrong about quantum mechanics, and Linus Pauling was flat-out wrong about Vitamin C megadosing. Boneheadedness is a human condition, and it's not restricted to creationists.
My point is that even if I did accept ID as a scientific theory, I'd still be forced on the overwhelming strength of the data to reject it in favor of the theory that best fits the data, and that theory is - until someone comes up with a hell of a lot of data saying otherwise - evolution.
And while I haven't personally done radioisotopic dating of rock samples, I know how a mass spectrometer works, and I've even used one. If I really did feel strongly about the issue, I know that I could drop a few hundreds of thosands of dollars over a few years, dig up my own damn rocks, and work it out from first principles. But I'd likely screw it up several times along the way, and that's why I'm willing to stand on the shoulders of others by the mechanism of peer review when it comes to calibrating my tools and understanding the underlying processes.
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Re:Of course (Score:5, Funny)
So was the Segway.
JP.
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Re:Of course (Score:5, Interesting)
No, I don't think it ever was considered a "crazy idea" at all, at least not by anyone who understood it. It was a hit right out of the chute.
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Re:Of course (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words - for every crazy idea that turns out to be right, there are 999 that are just plain crazy. The fact that one turned out to be correct doesn't in any way validate those which are just plain wrong.
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ob. Carl Sagan quote (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Of course (Score:5, Insightful)
The real difference between his 'crazy idea' and these 'crazy ideas' is a matter of defined mathematical equations that proved to be true. As I see it, these theories are only conjectures as ways things might be with no truly defined methodology for it's reasoning other than, "hey, why couldn't it be this way instead?" (If that's true, pull up a chair and I will tantalize you into the next century with 'crazy ideas' :) ) I understand it's possible all of mathematics could be a joke, but from what I have studied and know it would be highly unlikely for that to be true. Therefore, once we were able to prove his theories in lab settings, it became no more then an abstract theory and a revolutionary way. His numbers proved correct down to an arbitrarily defined decimal.
While both ideas are crazy, don't argue if you don't have some overwhelmingly surmountable proof other then a work that explains a brilliant theory in an extremely abstract way. That doesn't make the theory out to be crazy in and of itself.
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Re:Of course (Score:5, Interesting)
Actually, mathematics has been proven to be true. One of the classical masters (I believe either Plato or Aristotle) laid the work for it; Basically he took basic set theory
He did? This is interesting since formal set theory wasn't formulated until the mid-nineteenth century. Aristotle did come up with the axiomatic system of deriving all possible truths from a basic set of simple truths, but that's hardly set theory as such.
which is not mathematics but a logical framework that is provably true, and used it to prove that all mathematical operations of the time is also provably true.
Except of course the ones Euclid couldn't prove to be true so he assumed them to be axioms - some of which were later derived from the other axioms.
Certain modern mathematical concepts, most notably i (the square root of negative 1) were not included in this treatise, however.
Imaginary numbers were encountered by mathematicians in the sixteenth century and established as a concept by the early eighteenth century - hardly a modern concept. By comparison set theory, linear algebra and statistical probability theories didn't emerge until late nineteenth/early twentieth century!
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Re:Stephen W. Hawking, anyone? (Score:5, Insightful)
I guess sympathy is why he's got Hawking Radiation named after him, holds Isaac Newton's chair at Cambridge, is a Fellow of the Royal Society, and have won the following awards:
- Eddington Medal
- Einstein Medal
- Maxwell Medal
- Heinemann Prize
He may be controversial, and have been wrong in the past, which he is the first to admit, but his track record shows quite a few leaps of thought that turned out to either be correct or possible but currently unprovable.
Regards,
--
*Art
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Re:Oxidation of Fuels (Score:3, Insightful)
That depends (Score:3)
If this is your evidence, then yes, you are cuckoo.
However, if you have compelling, or even rational, evidence to the contrary, please let us know.
Re:Cuckoos and Galileo... (Score:5, Insightful)
There is no such thing as "formal acceptance" there isn't even really such a thing as the "scientific community". The big bang is generally accepted as the current best theory by the majority of astrophysicists. Does this mean it is true? No, it just means its the theory that fits most consistently that observational and experimental data currently available to us.
The fact of the matter is, the scientific community has been wrong more often than right. With further investigation, ideas are refined, and those that don't fit the observations are rejected.
That's correct and exactly the way it should be. Science is a process, not a collection of laws or facts. You gain knowledge of the way things work by applying the scientific method. That means that the set of best theories is constantly being re-evaluated and changed. That's a key differentiator of science from (for example) dogmatic religions.
But the process takes a long time. For nearly 2,000 years the best Western thinkers believed that the Earth was the center of the universe. That's a long time to be wrong about something so big.So even though I believe that the scientific method has its merits, I recognize the limitations.
As opposed to which system? The limitations of the scientific method are usually limitations of our ability to gather data. We can't attach more certainty to theories like Big Bang or Evolution because we have incomplete data to work from, for obvious reasons. That's not a limitation of the scientific method at all. If your notion of gathering knowledge is not based on the evidence available, then you are in a considerably worse situation that science can give you, incomplete though that may be.
If I had a time machine and could travel to the future, I would not be the least bit surprised if 500 years from now the Big Bang theory and Evolution were considered myths from the past.
While that's certainly a possibility, its much more likely that they will be considered incomplete. Much as Newtonian physics wasn't replaced by relativity, it was just seen as a particular case of relativistic physics at "low" speeds compared with c.
Even now, there's substantial logical and statistical problems with the "proofs" of Evolution.
Not really. Would you care to cite these supposed problems, or are you just trying to argue from authority?
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Re:Cuckoos and Galileo... (Score:4, Insightful)
Few atheists, if any, will claim that proof of evolution is somehow proof *against* the existence of God. (Most atheists are aware of the fact that you can't prove or disprove the existence of supernatural entities like God, for whom there cannot, by definition, be any evidence.)
This is a problem with people, not with the scientific method. If you can suggest a better method for accurately determining the nature of the universe, I'm sure everyone would be glad to hear it -- but right now, science is the best method we have.Parent
Re:Cuckoos and Galileo... (Score:4, Informative)
Are you refering to darwinian ideals of evolution, or the concept as a whole?
True original darwinism as the sole motivator for the changes in species over time is being challenged, but the concept as a whole - that life came from very simple beginings and has changed/adapted over time is not. The mechanisms involved are what are being challenged - such as the idea that small changes in genotype over time that favor the survival of a particular subset of a species lead to massive changes in the long-view. Fossils for the 'in-between' variants are not being found, hence it is becoming more widly accepted that large leaps are made, and that such large leaps could actualy be triggered by environmental pressure.
However, these new mechanisms being discused and discovered are just that - mechnisms. Evolution as Darwin envisioned it may be being disproven, but the idea that life evolves over time is not.
If, instead of refering to darwinian evolution, you are refering to evolution as a whole - then you are seriously mistaken. There is no creationist or other theory of life that is being pushed ahead of evolution by scientists. The logical and statistical problems you mention are about the problems with darwinian evolution and its mechanisms.
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Faster than light implies time travel in SR (Score:5, Informative)
In special relativity, faster than light travel (FTL) implies time travel quite directly.
So to treat the two subjects as being significantly different means to be working in a theory other than relativity.
Special Relativity (SR) is nice and simple but fairly limited in scope, but agrees extremely well with experiments within that scope.
Its extension to cover gravity, General Relativity (GR) is extremely elegant, and also agrees well with experimental observations, but is not integrated with the rest of the infrastructure of fundamental physics (quantum physics, quantum electrodynamics, the Standard Model...)
So general relativity may eventually become obsolete, even though currently it's currently a great theory, and whatever replaces it may modify special relativity too. So this isn't some kind of absolute statement.
Still, in the absence of a theory that is trying to supplant relativity, FTL implies time travel. Presumably the author of the book knows this, despite listing FTL and time travel as two different subjects.
For more info see these two sections of the relativity FAQ: relativity: time travel [ucr.edu] and relativity: FTL [ucr.edu], hosted by and partly written by John Baez, a quantum gravity researcher with impeccable physics background (I've done some online study under him; he's also a fantastic teacher).
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