Around 1988-1990, I was working on the idea of “hypertext publishing”, which today we call the web. I was invited to give a talk to a few (<10) academics working on computer based info systems, I think at Xerox PARC. I argued that we then were hampered by our poor systems for finding out what other people had done and said.
Status is just a Proof of Stake method of determining who gets to write to Academic Consensus Reality.
Taking all the Contrarians seriously is a Proof of Work method. It takes a lot more energy to execute that protocol.
Most of academy is more interested in making sure there's no obvious Double Spend type attack on the consistency of its accumulated lore, rather than utility or max-truth per each view.
People even borrow the mantle of theoretical physics when they make up or use fake quotes for unrelated fields, like Einstein supposedly saying "If the bee disappeared off the face of the Earth, man would only have four years left to live." Rather than quote entomologists or agronomists - you know, actual experts on the subject - they choose a theoretical physicist.
Which is something Einstein (a) never said, and (b) would be irrelevant anyway, as Einstein was not an entomologist or agronomist. But the quote gets used repeatedly anyway.
Yes, theoretical physics is high status outside theoretical physics. But I am suggesting something about social dynamics within a subject like theoretical physics. Namely, status should be more important there than in mathematics or computer science (which involves proofs that can in principle be machine verified) and less important than in, say, philosophy or economics (where one can get away with a whole lot of bullshit).
The confirmation of people's work being right is an important way for people to gain status. In math, the proofs can be more easily verified than in theoretical physics, which ultimately requires experimental evidence.
But theoretical physics is very high status, and status is also very important there. In low status fields outsiders from high status fields can force folks to listen to them, more than can outsiders to high status fields.
Hypothesis: the importance of status in a field is inversely proportional to the level of rigor and objectivity in that field.
While status is certainly important in mathematics, low status is not an insurmountable obstacle to getting your results noticed. Yitang Zhang, for example, went from a nobody to a celebrity over night when he proved bounded gaps between primes:
From personal experience: I am at the third or fourth level of status in my speciality-- for instance, my publication distance from a Fields Medalist is 3-- but I've never had trouble getting the very best people in my field to take at least some notice of my work.
Status is just a Proof of Stake method of determining who gets to write to Academic Consensus Reality.
Taking all the Contrarians seriously is a Proof of Work method. It takes a lot more energy to execute that protocol.
Most of academy is more interested in making sure there's no obvious Double Spend type attack on the consistency of its accumulated lore, rather than utility or max-truth per each view.
Have there been attempts to model this situation?
People even borrow the mantle of theoretical physics when they make up or use fake quotes for unrelated fields, like Einstein supposedly saying "If the bee disappeared off the face of the Earth, man would only have four years left to live." Rather than quote entomologists or agronomists - you know, actual experts on the subject - they choose a theoretical physicist.
Which is something Einstein (a) never said, and (b) would be irrelevant anyway, as Einstein was not an entomologist or agronomist. But the quote gets used repeatedly anyway.
Yes, theoretical physics is high status outside theoretical physics. But I am suggesting something about social dynamics within a subject like theoretical physics. Namely, status should be more important there than in mathematics or computer science (which involves proofs that can in principle be machine verified) and less important than in, say, philosophy or economics (where one can get away with a whole lot of bullshit).
The confirmation of people's work being right is an important way for people to gain status. In math, the proofs can be more easily verified than in theoretical physics, which ultimately requires experimental evidence.
But theoretical physics is very high status, and status is also very important there. In low status fields outsiders from high status fields can force folks to listen to them, more than can outsiders to high status fields.
Hypothesis: the importance of status in a field is inversely proportional to the level of rigor and objectivity in that field.
While status is certainly important in mathematics, low status is not an insurmountable obstacle to getting your results noticed. Yitang Zhang, for example, went from a nobody to a celebrity over night when he proved bounded gaps between primes:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi...
You've either got the goods or you don't.
From personal experience: I am at the third or fourth level of status in my speciality-- for instance, my publication distance from a Fields Medalist is 3-- but I've never had trouble getting the very best people in my field to take at least some notice of my work.