Nine Crazy Ideas in Science

doom writes "The general concept of Robert Ehrlich's book is absolutely superb: Nine Crazy Ideas in Science: A Few Might Even Be True. Here, someone with a technical background (Ehrlich is a physics prof at George Mason) and an open mind investigates in detail a number of 'crazy' ideas, to see if there's anything to them. The execution of the idea is not quite as superb, but Robert Ehrlich has done better at this difficult job than anyone else I know of. This book is highly recommend as a good review of the evidence on some scientific controversies." Read on for doom's review, in which he goes through Erlich's nine-part list, but mind the spoilers.

Nine Crazy Ideas in Science: A Few Might Even Be True
author	Robert Ehrlich
pages	244
publisher	Princeton University Press
rating	Great idea, very good execution
reviewer	doom
ISBN	0691070016
summary	A scientist evaluates some "crazy ideas"

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

The game here is that Ehrlich is not telling you in advance what his conclusions were. He says he's tried to keep an open mind, and claims that during his investigations he actually changed his mind about some things (though he never says about what exactly).

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 Crime

I'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 HIV

I'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 Beneficial

Ehrlich 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 Beneficial

Here, 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 Suns

This 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 Origins

This 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 Possible

2 cuckoos: no surprises.

Faster-than-Light Particles Exist

Ehrlich 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 Bang

Clocks 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

[Anonymous Coward]

VeryGeekyBooks [verygeekybooks.com] has more reviews of this book.

Re:more reviews of this book

[gantzm]

(P.s Yes, guns do cause more crime. The rest of the world learnt to read a bar chart years ago.. do they teach them in your schools yet?)
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 /.

Re:more reviews of this book

[Planesdragon]

But, in places like Vermont

Do you realize that the state of Vermont has possibly fewer people than Chicago? (I might be wrong, but the population density is still way down.)

A better comparison would be Dallas and Chicago.

Re:more reviews of this book

[NoMoreNicksLeft]

You're absolutely right. No one can deny that an armed criminal in europe is less likely to blast the homeowner at first site, because of how unlikely it is that he will need to.

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!

Re:more reviews of this book

[cwhicks]

Without giving an opinion either pro or anti, I just want to point out that logically speaking the argument you posted is extremely weak.
Do you see no other difference between Vermont and NY/D.C./Chicago other than their gun laws that might account for crime rates variations?

Re:more reviews of this book

[Scrameustache]

Of course this is Karma suicide as a lot of anti-gun nuts reside on /.

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]...

Re:more reviews of this book

[JInterest]

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

Re:more reviews of this book

[JonKatzIsAnIdiot]

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.

I believe that you are entirely correct. The driver licensing system would be a great model to use for licensing gun users. Now remembering that you only need to obtain a driver's license and register your car when you expect that you are going to operate it on a public roadway, the closest would be a concealed carry permit. For guns that are going to be left at home, or tr

Re:more reviews of this book

[Scrameustache]

The fact that there's a law against having a fire arm will not stop crazy irresponsible people from getting one.

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!

Re:more reviews of this book

[benedict]

This is the fallacy of the excluded middle.
It's like saying, "if computer security worked,
we would have no security breaches." Computer
security does work, it prevents some security
breaches; gun control does work, it prevents some
gun crimes.

Re:Irresponsible Idiots

[Scrameustache]

I clearly said:

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.

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.

Re:more reviews of this book

[blincoln]

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.

I've got to agree on this one.

I lived in Vancouver, BC for three years. There was a huge problem with what they called "home invasions," where a couple of thugs would break into a house, then use knives to intimidate the residents into being tied up, then walk off with all

Re:more reviews of this book

[praedor]

That kind of argument is crap. If a neighboring state allows nearly unregulated access to guns then the neighbor state that doesn't, that tightly regulates guns, is screwed. Those who want guns in regulated state simply drive to unregulated state, buy their guns, then drive back to regulated state, commit their crimes, etc. Thus, the state with tighter gun control gets screwed (and thus any reasonable statistical analysis gets screwed) by the low gun control state.

This sort of thing isn't a problem in

Re:more reviews of this book

[benedict]

It wasn't until I read your post that I realized
that D.C. and Geneva are identical in every respect
except for their gun laws. Thanks for opening my
eyes!

Re:more reviews of this book

[zulux]

or show an increase or decrease in crime as guns are either outlawed or legagalized in a country.

Then how about Vancouver BC, Austraila, England and Whales:

http://la.indymedia.org/news/2003/11/95799.php [indymedia.org]

Re:more reviews of this book

[zulux]

loadsa guncrime in the US, hardly any in the EU (as in insignificant in comparison).

That's a great theory. Too bad you're wrong.

Crime in England and France and Germany is *HIGHER* than in the US.

Here are Interpol 2001 crime statistics (rate per 100,000):

* 4161 - US
* 7736 - Germany
* 6941 - France
* 9927 - England and Wales

From http://www.tinyvital.com/BlogArchives/000220.html [tinyvital.com]

Re:more reviews of this book

[JimBobJoe]

P.S Yes, guns do cause more crime. The rest of the world learnt to read a bar chart years ago.. do they teach them in your schools yet?)

Apparently the book actually confirms something I've always considered true; that there simply is too much contradictory evidence to prove either side of the issue. Even though I am a pro-gun person, I tell people that the quantity of guns is irrelevant to crime, one way or another, since you can find all sorts of combinations of crime and gun ownership. Crime is a cultur

Re:more reviews of this book

[overunderunderdone]

Yes, guns do cause more crime. The rest of the world learnt to read a bar chart years ago.. do they teach them in your schools yet?

Is this [polyticks.com] chart showing the number of murders per 100,000 people before and after the passage of a concealed carry law the one you were referring to?

Hmm... In that chart more guns DID result in less crime. Perhaps you had another chart in mind? Or did you just misread this one.

My point is not that I believe the "more guns, less crime" thesis. It's just that you're going to

5 Crazy Ideas for Slashdot.

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Duplicates are a thing of the past

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.

[bujoojoo]

1. Duplicates are a thing of the past
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

You missed one:
6. Duplicates are a thing of the past

A planet ...

[burgburgburg]

where apes evolved from men [imdb.com]?

He forgot...

[AKAImBatman]

...atomic power should be a consumer product [atomicinsights.com]. Many people would rate this as a 4 cuckoo because of the "danger" of terrorists developing a nuclear weapon. The truth is that atomic power is exceedingly easy, safe, and clean to produce and should be a zero cuckoo idea. Don't think that they'd completely rid us of batteries tho. In order to power your car with a RadioIsotope Generator (non-fission), you'd need hundreds of pounds of plutonium. However, if combined with batteries, you could reduce the amount of plutonium significantly, and have an auto-recharging electric car. Sure, it means a few more pit stops on long trips, but you NEVER have to refuel!

A great site on atomic energy is:

http://www.atomicinsights.com/AEI_Topics.html [atomicinsights.com]

You forgot one

[Uma Thurman]

Slashdot: nearly 700,000 cuckoos.

Coal?

[One Louder]

I'm not a geologist, but I was under the impression that fossils are regularly found in coal, and that we've observed the intermediate steps of its formation from peat bogs.

Re:Coal?

[Creedo]

Actually, there is an argument now that coal and oil are formed in totally different ways. Coal is real fossil fuel, and oil is generated by underground bacteria. A biologist friend of mine was telling me this. I think it has to do with Gould's abiogenic theory, but I am not certain.

Re:Coal?

[GoofyBoy]

Read up! [borderlands.com]

Re:Coal?

[Orne]

I'm not a geologist either, but here's how I understand it.

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.

Re:Coal?

[praedor]

But limestone is itself of biogenic origin. It is entirely made up of microorganism skeletons (diatoms, etc). The limestone, that is, not the fossil fuel.

Astmmetric guns

[Chocky2]

Re guns: If the effects aren't strong enough to measure, why the asymmetry in the "cuckoo" rating for the pro and anti side?
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.

Re:Asymmetric guns

[Valdrax]

Surely then, the anti position should be considered the least plausible, since the status quo is to recgonize the basic human right to keep and bear arms.

Why is the ownership of a gun somehow special as a basic human right?

Is owning a dog a basic human right?
Is owning a house a basic human right?
Is owning a car a basic human right?
Is owning a tank a basic human right?
Is owning a cruise missle a basic human right?
Is owning a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapon a basic human right?

Are an

Re:Astmmetric guns

[cpeterso]

since the status quo is to recgonize the basic human right to keep and bear arms.

Unfortunately this is not true: "U.S. Supreme Court Refuses to Hear Second Amendment Challenge to California's Assault Weapon Ban" [ascribe.org]

the court held that the Second Amendment guarantees the collective right of the people to maintain effective state militias, but does not provide any type of individual right to own or possess weapons.

Firesign Theatre

[lildogie]

"Dogs Flew Space Ships!"

"The Aztecs Invented The Vacation!"

"Men And Women Are The Same Sex!"

"Our Forefathers Took Drugs!"

"Your Brain Is Not The Boss!"

Yes, That's Right, Folks.....

"Everything You Know Is Wrong!"

Sun Exposure is Beneficial

[nizo]

Well duh, that is one way our body makes vitamin D, if I remember correctly. It is the amount of exposure that matters. Speaking of sun exposure, my favorite university memory of walking across the medical school campus was the cluster of smokers puffing away and sunbathers roasting right next to the Cancer Research and Treatment Center sign. One of these days I have got to take a picture of that.

Where else, but Slashdot...

[Carbonite]

would you ever see such a quote:

"But the absolute magnitude of my disagreements are typically no more than a single "cuckoo"."

personalities do play a role.

[fermion]

In science, unfortunately, sometimes you have to judge the person. The reason is that science is supposed to flow from observation to honest repeatable demonstrations to conclusions that fairly incorporate what was learned from the demonstrations.

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

[decapentaplegic]

John Baez's Crackpot Index is a great way to quantify your ad hominem atacks in physics. http://www.math.ucr.edu/home/baez/


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

[azaris]

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.

Abiogenic Oil

[Mahrin Skel]

I think the non-fossil origins of oil and other subterranean hydrocarbons is just about a lock. Of course, I'm not any sort of chemist or geologist, but the idea that only biological processes can produce hydrocarbons has been in trouble ever since we found out Titan has a methane atmsophere (aka "Natural Gas").

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

[GeoGreg]

I haven't read the book, so I won't comment directly on Gold's mechanism for rising gas-rich magmas. However, volcanologists and igneous petrologists know that the characteristics of magma (such as density and viscosity) depend on the original composition of the magma (including volatile content) as well as its history, such as the composition of any country rock incorporated into the magma body as it rises, components lost to fractional crystallization, mixing of multiple magma bodies, etc. As in most of the earth sciences, the physical systems involved are complex. Highly gas-rich erupted lavas are probably like the "froth" that pours out of a bottle of champagne when the cork is released. As the outgassing proceeds, some of the confining liquid is carried along. That doesn't imply that the entire volume of liquid is as gassy as the froth. I'm suspicious of anyone who would say "I've got a great new mechanism that explains everything". He'd better have some good evidence to back it up that is consistent with what we already know about the composition and physical characteristics of magmas. And if he claims that the geologists have been neglecting important information, he'd better have good evidence for that, too.

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.

Brilliant question

[lone_marauder]

If the effects aren't strong enough to measure, why the asymmetry in the "cuckoo" rating for the pro and anti side?

With an obvious answer. An excellent review! This is really useful information in deciding whether to buy the book. Since I prefer not to pay for biased pseudoscientific drivel, I won't be purchasing the book.

say what?

[elmegil]

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.

Um....if they prexisted the formation of the earth, but they're in the earth now, where would they be coming from that "we're probably not going to run out of them"?? Unless there's some wormhole down there in the bowels of the planet, their origin doesn't affect their finite nature, only the possibility that our estimates of their quantities are wrong.

Abiogenic Oil and Coal? Twaddle.

[rumblin'rabbit]

Someone find me an oil or coil reservoir outside of a sedimentary basin, and I'll swallow this B.S. That some methane may have abiogenic origin is conceivable, but the natural gas we collect now is clearly primarly biological in origin. Petroleum geologists are not so dumb that they could so seriously wrong about the origins of petroleum.

Gun Ownership vs Right to Carry

[dlakelan]

The data on gun ownership alone is not particularly correlated with crime deterrent, but that's conveniently ignoring the data on concealed carry licenses published by John Lott, not-coincidentally in a book called "More Guns Less Crime"

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?

[DumbSwede]

No Four Cuckoos on a Four Cuckoos scale?

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?

[Docrates]

For a good read on an advocate of HIV != AIDS, go here [aliveandwell.org].

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?

[furiousgeorge]

>>She has HIV, does not take any of the AZT drugs
>>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.

disagree with the reviewer's cukoo ratings

[DunbarTheInept]

This isn't so much a comment about the book as about the person who reviewed it here on slashdot and posted the article. The reviewer makes the same mistake repeatedly, of assuming that if an idea hasn't been proven wrong, than it's proponents don't deserve a cukoo rating at all - it should be zero.

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

[worst_name_ever]

I mod this post "-1, Cuckoo".

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[JPrice]

"Intelligent Design" is neither a particularly new theory, nor a particularly compelling one.

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.

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[shirai]

I realize you aren't supporting Intelligent Design but there are two counter-points which are standard and obvious but also one SURPRISING AND SCARY INSIGHT to do with Darwinism and human REVERSE-EVOLUTION.

First the counter-points:

1. Who created the intelligent designer?

2. Evolution works because of the survival of the fittest and that DOES make sense.

The insight:

In today's society, EVERYBODY survives and in many cases the successful are NO MORE LIKELY to reproduce than the poor, unwealthy and/or unsuc

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[Anonymous Coward]

Intelligent Design is just the latest attempts of the creationists to pretend they are scientists. It suffers from the same flaw as other such "theories" -- it presumes that which it seeks to prove. In a nutshell, their argument is that life is too complicated to have arisen from a random process, so must have been created by some intelligence. In other words, we can't explain it, so it must be god.

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[tuffy]

I'm not convinced any hypothetical "design" at work is all that intelligent [talkorigins.org] to begin with. Nature is not without flaws, and lots of them. We just accept it as normal because we don't know any different.

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[Uma Thurman]

Intelligent design should be 3 or 4 cuckoos, because for every argument that exists in favor of ID, there's a better argument that shows why that argument is a fallacy.

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.

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[Uma Thurman]

the nonreducible complexity problem

Nonreducible complexity is a concept put forward by the Intellegent Design advocates. So far, all the examples of irreducible complexity (the exact term they use) aren't really irreducible.

If you have a specific example of irreducible complexity, I'll give it a shot. The famous example given is the eye, which has been shown to be a) useful in all intermediate stages and b) existant in nature in all intermediate stages.

But your analogy to a lottery winner is silly.

Th

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[Uma Thurman]

can it really be said to exist in any practical way?

"Practical way" subtly implies an observer, so it can't exist in a practical way. It can't exist in a non-practical way either, because that implies that there is a practical way, which implies an observer. It would have to exist in a way that is completely independent of practical. I have no idea what that means, but it's logical.

'irreducible complexity' problem WRT the eye. Can you point me in the right direction?

First the ID side, which I think is

Science 1, Religion 0

[SpaceRook]

There is no greater proof that science has won the Evolution VS. Creationism argument than the "Intelligent Design" theory. The religious right knows that they cannot win with a "faith based" argument in this day and age, so they've resorted to rhetorical jujitsu and created "Intelligent Design" theory. (Intelligence Design summary : the world is so gosh darn complex that SOME higher power must have created it, right?).

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[efuseekay]

This post is so reflective of the circuitous arguments that are often used to justify Intelligent Design.

There is no respect to ID given by the scientific community. I don't know where you get those numbers 26 and 66 on the number of variables needed for "our existence".

You 3rd paragraph is a bunch of nonsense strewned with enough difficult words to make it sound important but actually contain no information.

Finally, I think I've just fed a Troll.

Why Agendas Matter

[Tackhead]

> With this in mind, there's another crazy idea I've been reading up on lately. Intelligent Design, a recent theory that has gained enough respect from the scientific community

Five cuckoos.

From the original Slashdot article:

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.

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

Fixed URL for "Bullshit Detection Guide"

[Doug Merritt]

The parent article gave a broken link (all dots and slashes removed from the URL):

One of many links: A Bullshit Detection Guide

The correct link is http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Oracle/4855/bs.htm [geocities.com]; the page is titled "A BullSh-- detection Guide" so I hadn't found it in a google search, either (usually my first line of defense for bad URLs)

Re:Why Agendas Matter

[cowtamer]

I'm a fundamentalist Christian (i.e., I accept the Genesis account and everything else) with a Molecular Biology degree from a big 10 school. Seriously.

There's one significant fallacy that the anti-creationists are falling into here: Just because an idea (i.e., God created the Universe, the Earth, etc.) is defended by people who do not necessarily know what they are talking about doesn't invalidate the idea. It only invalidates the ideas of those particular defenders. A good example is the people (on my

Re:Why Agendas Matter

[Tackhead]

> But notice this: whenever a modern-day scientist (or /.'er) encounters the idea that evolution is not how _we_ came to be, he will AUTOMATICALLY think the idea deserves 5 cuckoos, without looking at the evidence.

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.

Re:Why Agendas Matter

[Strange Ranger]

Intelligent Design: Pegs the BS Detector. Five cuckoos.

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.

Re:Science is a constantly evolving field

[fenix down]

...there are no fewer than twenty-six variables necessary for our universe to even consider permitting life...

The one problem everybody has with the Standard Model. [whine]It's not preeeeeety![/whine] Yes, it's unsettling when we don't have a reason figured out for fundamental shit like Planck's constant and c, but, much like the incredible mysteriousnessness!!! of both the moon and the earth being almost perfectly spherical, (what are the odds?!) it's not such a leap to presume that maybe, just maybe,

Re:Faulty logic

[CyberDruid]

If there is just one civilization, that just means that it is very hard for a single universe to get the parameters right for life. There is no particular reason to think that only our set of parameters exists. According to Big Bang theory, the number of non-circular dimensions and some nature constants where set early on. But according to the many-worlds (which I would argue is almost certainly more correct than the Copenhagen interpretation) interpretation of quantum physics all the other possible parame

Re:Of course

[jpm242]

When it was first thought of, the theory of relativity was just a 'crazy idea'.

So was the Segway.

JP.

Re:Of course

[drooling-dog]

When it was first thought of, the theory of relativity was just a 'crazy idea'.

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.

Re:Of course

[madprof]

Given it was derived from known experimental data that is indeed the case. Revolutionary, and hard to swallow for some I bet, but it took just 11 years for a more complete follow-up and a further 3 years for experimental data to prove that ideas espoused follow-up had great credibility.
Funnily he received the Nobel Prize for Physics for his work on the photoelectric effect, not relativity.

Re:Of course

[kmac06]

It was a hit right out of the chute.

Not really. As I understand it, it was seen pretty much as a theory that happened to explain certain things, but theories don't mean much until they correctly predict/explain something not originally intended. For general relativity, this happened when Einstein's revised gravity formulas explained the change in orbit of Mercury, something that was unexplained by gravitational pulls of other planets, but perfectly explained by general relativity.

According to Stephen Hawking

[StewedSquirrel]

According to Stephen Hawking in one of his books, the theory was not popular because it showed strong evidence against there being "absolutes" in the Universe, which implied that not only were things like absolute location and absolute speed nonsensical, it also implies that absolute time, and thus absolute existance are merely constructs for us to better wrap our minds around our Universe.

Hawking argues that the theory of Relativity itself does in fact fly in the face of the existance of "God" because it

Re:Of course

[djh101010]

Yes, and so were (and are) a bunch of ideas which truly are crazy. Just because one can point to examples of theories that at first sounded impossible which later were accepted as fact, doesn't mean that all (or indeed, many) of them are.

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.

ob. Carl Sagan quote

[corbettw]

"They laughed at Einstein. They laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown."

Re:ob. Carl Sagan quote

[VisorGuy]

What the?!?

Is this the Scientists version of the Chewbaca Defense?

Re:ob. Carl Sagan quote

[The Only Druid]

No, you're missing the point. The argument [presented by the grandparent post] is that just because some true theories were initially scoffed at, not all theories which are scoffed at will eventually be proved as true.

This is a simple logical truth, if you dont realize it already: using the Lemmon notation, you can see it as the following-

(Ex)(Sx&Tx)->(x)(Sx>Tx)

This is clearly not true, and is thus unprovable. You can demonstrate this with truth tables if you need to, but thats rather h

Re:Of course

[register_ax]

You're absolutely right you know. The only difference is that this theory was proposed by a man who had just received his doctorate (PhD) from publishing "On a new determination of molecular dimensions." He was working in a patent office because he couldn't find a teaching position. Bad market, didn't have the skills, it doesn't matter much more then the guy wasn't at all crazy, just thought things out different because a lot of where things were going were becoming stale.

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.

Re:Of course

[Coryoth]

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.

It does get a little hairy when you start reducing it to as basic a set of concepts as you can. You start getting hung up on certain things. The Axiom of Choice [wolfram.com] is a fine example. Almost all modern mathematics requires it to be true. It feels like it ought to be true. Then again youy can do nasty things like the Banach Tarski Paradox [wolfram.com] if you assume it tru

Re:Of course

[azaris]

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!

Re:Of course

[Steve Franklin]

I believe you're missing the entire point. Mathematics is a map, a la Korzybski, that DESCRIBES reality. This is not the same as and is in fact far from being the same as the common and incorrect assumption that it EXPLAINS anything. All that can be said is that reality BEHAVES AS IF it were obeying the equations that are used to describe it. A good example to think about would be a computer pinball game in which you can change the gravitational parameters of the machine. Nothing in mathematics prevents thi

Re:Of course

[kimgh]

You start with a set of assumptions, and you end with a set of theorems, truths, which follow inevitably from those assumptions.

I think Erdos said this: A mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems.

Not quite on topic, but I've always liked this quote.

Oh, sure..

[msimm]

One theory proven and thounsands of nuts are forever vindicated! ;-)

Stephen W. Hawking, anyone?

[arth1]

When it was first thought of, the theory of relativity was just a 'crazy idea'.

It has been readjusted (I take it you're speaking of the general version) multiple times, not the least because of quantum theory and Feynman.

As for the reviewer agreeing that "there was no big bang" is absolutely kooky, and deserves a full set of birds, I beg to disagree. If you read up on Stephen Hawking's works, you'll see that there's multiple possible alternatives to a Big Bang -- at least a Big Bang originating from

Re:Stephen W. Hawking, anyone?

[arth1]

Stephen Hawking has never been "a leading scientist." His ideas are not accepted by mainstream physicists. He's a pop culture icon only because he wrote a book that everyone proudly displayed on their coffee table. The guy's a quack who illicits sympathy for his plight and nothing more.

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

Re:Oxidation of Fuels

[Chocky2]

It can still be a significant issue -- afterall even if surplus COx, SOx & NOx are absorbed/washed away they're still present in the eco-system. Even if the source-fuels are available in limitless supply there are still potential problems with waste by-products (including waste energy (esp heat)), of course this is still a problem with "green" energy sources aswell.

Re:Oxidation of Fuels

[adrianbaugh]

Why should the origin of hydrocarbons affect whether we are likely to run out of them? Just because they originated in outer space doesn't mean they are necessarily abundant.

Re:Oxidation of Fuels

[fenix down]

The reviewer doesn't really explain the theory, and his bit is kinda misleading.

The idea is that hydrocarbons, rather than being formed from rotting garbage or coming from outer space, are formed via big furnacey things in the mantle. This is supposed to explain events where oil fields appear to have refilled themselves, and the distribution of fields and the wierdities of the geology in and around them.

Personally, I don't buy it, even if I do agree that it's becoming reasonable to question whether organ

That depends

[Tony]

It depends on what you accept as "evidence." For instance, the major reason some people oppose the Big Bang theory is because it goes hand-in-hand with evolution, and necessitates a univers billions of years old. Since this "goes against the Bible," both the Big Bang and Evolution are considered false.

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.

Here we go again

[AKAImBatman]

*sigh*

Even secular science is constantly questioning "The Big Bang". For example, M-Theory (modern string theory) postulates that the Universe could have been born of a collision with another M-Brane (i.e. Universe). Such a collision could produce more than enough stress on space-time to produce the matter and energy in our universe. Thus the inception of our universe was less of a "bang" and more of a "splat".

Personally, I think that's one of the best theories I've heard to date. The only problem is that

Re:Here we go again

[NialScorva]

The "Big Bang" is rather simple, actually. We see that the universe is expanding. If you run the clock backwards, it comes to a point. So at some point in time, the universe had to expand from that single point at a fairly quick rate. "Big Bang" was a moniker given to Hubble's expanding universe by an opponent to be mocking. It was adopted and stuck around.

The M-Brane theory doesn't contradict the Big Bang, it is just a model of what might have caused the expansion to start. The "Big Bang" doesn't re

Big Band evidence

[burgburgburg]

Benny Goodman, Duke Ellington, Satchmo Armstrong. Even Brian Setzer.

Sheesh.

You mean we're going to have to wait 500 years ...

[burgburgburg]

for the Rapture?

Seriously though, it would have been so much easier if you'd just said "I'm a Creationist" right at the beginning. Then we could have laughed and pointed that much sooner.

BANG! It is Big BANG Theory!

[burgburgburg]

It is not Big BAND Theory. The Big Band Theory is that Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington created the world in 7 songs.

Sheesh.

Re:Cuckoos and Galileo...

[gwernol]

The Cuckoo rating is entirely irrelevant. Consider the Big Bang Theory. It hasn't yet been formally accepted (as a Physical Law*) by the scientific community, yet the author considers the notion of the Big Bang never happening to be nonsense?

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?

Re:Cuckoos and Galileo...

[gillbates]

Re: Evolution. Since evolution is a family of theories, I'll choose one - abiogenesis. IIRC, the smallest practically useful DNA chain is about 4,000 bases. Given that there are 4 bases, the odds of a single DNA molecule forming the smallest useful chain are about 1 in 4^4000. Since it's been a long time since I've heard this argument, my numbers may be wrong. But the basic gist of it is this: given what we know, to build the smallest useful DNA chain by random trial and error would require more atoms

Re:Cuckoos and Galileo...

[Dirtside]

Since evolution is a family of theories, I'll choose one - abiogenesis.

You should have chosen one that's actually *from* the evolution family. Abiogenesis is not generally considered an aspect of evolution, not by evolutionary biologists, geneticists, or anyone else in the field. But as long as we're talking about abiogenesis...

Given that there are 4 bases, the odds of a single DNA molecule forming the smallest useful chain are about 1 in 4^4000. Since it's been a long time since I've heard this argument, my numbers may be wrong.

It's not that your numbers are wrong; it's your premise that's wrong. This isn't how scientists propose that abiogenesis occurred, so attacking it as if it somehow disproves that abiogenesis *could have occurred* is pointless.

Michael Behe has covered similar problems in his writings.

Behe's big stick is irreducible complexity. He basically looks at a system, and says, "I can't think of any way this system could be less complex and still be of any use. Therefore, the system could not have evolved." The problem with this is that simply because *he* is incapable of figuring it out, doesn't mean that it's impossible to figure out (many of his examples have been refuted by others -- search about on talkorigins.org for a bit).

Science doesn't prove anything!. It explains.

Yes, and scientists know this. They *try* to explain it to laypersons, but inevitably people take science as gospel. (Of course, even scientists are only human: changing the ideas that you've spent a lifetime refining is difficult, no matter who you are.) Is it a problem with the scientific method itself, that most people simply aren't smart enough to understand it?

Witness the manner in which evolution has been used by atheists to justify their lack of belief in God.

I don't think this is prevalent among atheists. Most atheists (like myself) look at God the same way we look at any other claim: You want me to believe something? Fine. Show me some evidence. It's no different than wanting evidence for the effect a new freeway will have on urban traffic patterns, or wanting evidence for how physical processes in a star can cause it to collapse into a white dwarf.

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.)

And of course, the real problem is that because science has become so credible, it is often sought as an authority for legislative or social changes. Thus, the otherwise objective nature of science becomes soured when funding becomes contingent on the political ramifications of the results.

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.

Re:Cuckoos and Galileo...

[Coventry]

Even now, there's substantial logical and statistical problems with the "proofs" of Evolution.

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.

Your bias is showing

[DunbarTheInept]

scientific community has been wrong more often than right

(followed by)

For nearly 2,000 years the best Western thinkers believed that the Earth was the center of the universe.

The "scientific community" as we know it didn't even exist 2000 years ago. Blaming science for the mistakes of it's predicessors makes as much sense as blaming Christians for feeding Socrates Hemlock for daring to question the established order of things. It happened before they were even around yet.

Re:Two Sun Theory?

[GoofyBoy]

Read up! [space.com]

Re:Two Sun Theory?

[splaytree]

The theory is there's a companion dwarf star to our Sun 1-3 light years away. Here's some info [space.com].

Re:Where does the 2nd amendment say...

[I8TheWorm]

Ooooohhhh... I wish I had mod points for you.

Re:Disagree

[tomhudson]

Last time I looked, not only was time travel possible, but we're all approaching the future at the rate of 1 second per second.

So, given that objects do move through time (that's why it's called space-time - it's possible to move about any of the axis) the question is, why does one axis (time) seem to be uni-directional (arrow of time problem).

The only people who could argue against this have already assumed room temperature, and I don't hear them saying much.

Faster than light implies time travel in SR

[Doug Merritt]

I'd have given 2 cuckoos to tachyons, only 1 cuckoo to time travel

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).