Fascinating observations from watching real science in action. Half of data conflicts with theoretical expectations: Although the researchers were mostly using established techniques, more than 50 percent of their data was unexpected. (In some labs, the figure exceeded 75 percent.) … “The results kept contradicting their theories. It wasn’t uncommon for someone to spend a month on a project and then just discard all their data because the data didn’t make sense.” …
QED is a hodgepodge Rubegoldburg of tangled and intertwined mathematical tomfoolery which, once you get done going around the world nine times to get to your own elbow, finally results in something approximating a right answer. It is neither elegant, easy to use, or insightful, and even Feynman on his deathbed proclaimed it a hierarchal mathematical structure without a theory.
You did read my statement about how we get good enough approximations, yes?
But QED is very little different than the old Epicycle theory of planetary motion. You can GET correct enough answers from it to work with without ever coming close to the reality.
Simply put, if you had bothered to actually read the article I posted in response to, you would see how clearly obvious it is that science DOESN'T KNOW WHAT THE REAL TRUTH IS. They have some good ideas, they have some very useful tools, but when 75% of all experiments result in findings that are unpredicted, unexpected, and cannot be reconciled with theory, then it's a pretty good indicator that the THEORY is wrong, not reality.
The problem with most theoretical sciences is that they stopped being about reality the day they allowed mathematics to become more important than reality. Physics is about REALITY, not mathematical fictions. By divorcing theory from that very real physical limitation, we have created a vast horde of mathematicians who are constantly complaining about how the real world fails to met their mathematical expectations, a entire generation of scientists who spend all their time doing their best to make science as obscure and impenetrable as possible to anyone who is not part of their inner circle, and who's sole concern has ceased to be truth, but has become an endless quest for funding.
Science is about understanding the world. This post makes it quite clear that there is a vast difference between what they CLAIM to understand, and what the REALLY DO.
And you are quite naive to believe I haven't done my research. I grew up cutting my teeth on this stuff. It's simply as I have grown older and considerably LESS naive that I have started to see the cracks and rotting foundations of a science system I once loved. I believe and always shall, that EVIDENCE trumps THEORY every day. I have simply made an effort to study ALL the evidence, both for and against, which it is quite apparent, you have not.
Would our scientific understanding of reality be different if Maxwell's full original equations had remained unchanged? We'll never know will we? But the fact that everything, including QED, were developed and influenced by the altered versions instead of the complete versions means it would have been different, and as such, perhaps a study should be done to see HOW different it might be, rather than the simple dismissal you chose to cope with any possible request to look outside the little box you've chosen as your comfort zone.
And you illustrate precisely why this article, and this study, will be ignored in the long run. Scientists are humans. And like you, they would rather dismiss without examination anything which does not fit into their world view. Enormous progress may have been made, but when you build a palace on a patch of sand, sooner or later the entire thing is going to come crashing down.
Which world view is correct? In the end I suspect that none of them will be. But by denying any need to continually re-examine and re-evaluate all evidence, instead advocating picking and choosing which evidence to study and which to toss out, you are as guilty as the researchers mentioned above for failure to actually OVERCOME BIAS and let reality be the final truth sayer.
I have often wondered how much “quantum weirdness” could be explained if the original 20 equations were used with their more complete descriptions instead of the four Oliver Heaviside mangled and condensed because he felt the fourth dimensional calculations needed to be “murdered” from the math
Let's clear this up right now: the answer is "none." People pompously promoting this would-be re-interpretation of classical EM are evidently (and sometimes, it appears, deliberately) unaware of the enormous progress in theoretical physics since the time of Maxwell and Heaviside. Classical electromagnetism has gently given way to Quantum Electrodynamics (QED), now widely regarded as the most successful physical theory every devised by humankind, and which explains vastly more phenomena, with absolutely stunning accuracy, and which was not envisioned at all by Maxwell and Heaviside. Yes, those gentleman were brilliant geniuses and ahead of their time, but please don't kid yourself; they were not ahead of our time! The world's greatest minds (no exaggeration) since their time have exhaustively examined attempts to unify classical electromagnetism and gravity more or less along the lines you are mentioning, and along countless other paths as well. Einstein worked on such unification theories for a long time and many others have too. There is simply no coverup, no conspiracy, no mental block, and no deep dark secret that you know while the rest of the physics community doesn't. Mr. or Ms. Valkyrie Ice, you are naive to think there is such a secret. There is no "there" there. But there are many good books on theoretical physics. If you really want to understand modern physics, you should start studying and learning from the modern textbooks. Even if you spent your life on it, it could be a life well spent. Good luck in your studies.
well if his theory is that people ignore data over because they are trying to support a theory, i suppose he wouldn't have much to say if there were exceptions.
Yes Tim. I've read those. The Backman (1972) study is the most recent in depth psychometric study of Jewish intelligence. The other cites generally use very small sample sizes, or use proxy tests instead of psychometric tests.
My point, if the commenters would actually read it over, is that Robin quoted an excerpt about how Jewish creativity comes from being marginalized and that this excerpt directly reflects Christian biases about Jews, biases that the commenters make clear are so deeply ingrained they can't even discuss them clearly. The title of the blog is "Overcoming Bias," is it not? If you - or Robin or whomever - takes on bias because he or she has grown up in a Christian milieu with a Christian understanding, then that necessarily inculcates biases.
Then if you actually read my post, you certainly can't see that I said the Jews invented science or that they've done all the great science of the last millennium. That would be idiotic. When someone throws out Copernicus, they clearly haven't read that I noted Jews weren't released from the ghettoes until Napoleon - and a simple timeline shows that Copernicus, Newton, Humphrey Davy, etc. all lived before that. Making such an elemental misreading indicates the kind of knee jerk reaction I expected. (I hope I don't need to mention that in any case the idea that I - or anyone - would claim that only Jews would be smart enough to figure things out is both racist and senseless.)
My point is that Judaism institutionalized creative thinking and that tradition is deeply ingrained in Jewish society. Even the most devout come up with the wildest creative ideas - including some that are unfortunate, such as work a few years ago from the son of the Chief Rabbi in Italy that speculated whether blood libel stories might have a root in truth. That is abhorrent but it comes from the same source as Mel Brooks' Springtime for Hitler.
"Ashkenazi Jews have the highest average IQ of any ethnic group for which there are reliable data. They score 0.75 to 1.0 standard deviations above the general European average, corresponding to an IQ 112-115. This has been seen in many studies (Backman, 1972; Levinson, 1959; Romanoff, 1976), although a recent review concludes that the advantage is slightly less, only half a standard deviation Lynn (2004)."
to be honest, this is post covers exactly why it is the height of hubris for any scientist to declare what is or is not possible. They can delineate the state of knowledge, they can even make probability statements, but to ever say anything is categorically "impossible" is to conversely be saying "We know all there is to know, and no new knowledge is possible."
Because anomalies exist, we know that the state of our knowledge is incomplete. In theoretical sciences, dismissing these anomalies is especially unforgivable, because the anomalies indicate that there are flaws in the theory that must be investigated. By favoring the math over the experiment, modern physics and astrophysics has ceased to generate knowledge and has instead begun to complicate their theory to continually force reality to match their math. Like the epicycle model of solar mechanics, their results produce enough correct answers to make some of the information useable, or else we would not have developed many of our current technologies, but the evidence continues to build that the underlying model is flawed with every single discovery that is "unexpected" or "anomalous"
Take for example the current discovery by Voyager that our solar system is passing through a cloud of gases held together by a magnetic field. What causes magnetic fields? A flow of current. Electricity and magnetism are two aspects of the same force. It is impossible to have one without the other. So why hasn't that been acknowledged? Because Astrophysics refuses to accept that electrical potentials could exist across interstellar distances. Physics has done much the same by tossing out the scalar and potential aspects of Maxwell's original equations to leave solely the vector analysis version. I have often wondered how much "quantum weirdness" could be explained if the original 20 equations were used with their more complete descriptions instead of the four Oliver Heaviside mangled and condensed because he felt the fourth dimensional calculations needed to be "murdered" from the math. What might Einstein have done if the fourth dimension had still existed in Maxwell's work by the time he began working on Relativity?
I can only hope that as it becomes easier and easier to keep 100% accurate records, we will stop allowing scientists to toss out "anomalous data" and instead use it to do what it should be doing, telling us we need to dig deeper and find the REAL truth, rather than simply seek that which supports our beliefs. If it does nothing else, maybe reports like this and the Climategate fiasco will force better record keeping and experiment recording.
Constant, maybe absolutism helped science go relative un-persecuted during the Revolution. Wik has absolutism starting in 1610 -- after "De Revolutionibus", but before "Principia". And I'm sure states began strengthening prior to 1610.
After all, when the state is physically strong, not quite as much cohesion, tradition, religion, mores, and other soft power is needed. You could ask Ni Chi (Nietzsche that is; little joke) or Mencius Moldbug. The last and most essential soft power is that over the army/militia and police.
I don't see why ``half'' is emphasized in the beginning of this post. To my sensibilities, half of all data agreeing with theory is immensely encouraging; if you'd have asked me (before reading this) what percentage of data agreed with the average scientist's theories, I'd have bet good money on under one percent.
Interesting juxtaposition. The brain turns data into information.Technology turns data into information.Black Smiths turn data into information.Persistence (conception for example) does this all the time.Theory generation is an ideological practice.Are confusing having a theory with having a reason?
Replying again, in case I have been too strident, marginalization means lots of things.
The things that result from it that might help innovation might be a desire for success (though if you are marginal perhaps you don't desire it, not being familiar with it, maybe you only want a mediocre life) and a lack of commitment to the existing status quo (though perhaps at the margins you try to be more ostensibly commited, in order to minimize your marginal status).
However, as I've hinted above, I think these plausible advantages are strongly outweighed by a lack of access to information (created by social distance and possibly by a "ghetto mentality" insularity at the margins of society), a lack of access to publishing and financing ideas and fear of risk at the margins (people do not take risks if they are in a situation where the consequences of those risks are severe, no?).
Another possible mitigating theory would be that American ashkenazim are more intelligent than Israeli ashkenazim.
I don't think it's completely unreasonable to conjecture that a smarter variant of ashkenazim might prefer the Bay Area to the Middle East.
ps cultue vs. iq discussions here might be more usefully framed as organizational vs. individual intelligence. For example, organizations may encourage more risk-taking and less sexual promiscuity or polygamy than may be optimal for individuals, when the two have persistence maximizing (for the individual these might be genetic or conscious qualia based, for the organization they may be network algorithmic based) interests that conflict.
Why did only it catch fire and rapidly uncover 99% of what we now know?
It would surely be hard to over-stress the importance of it not being deadly-dangerous to be a contrarian thinker. Imprisonment, being burned alive, poisoned with hemlock - stuff like that tends to have a chilling effect.
"If some level of marginality does help, marginality surely hurts when it is too intense."
Reminds me delightfully (in terms of my appreciation for natural ironic humor) of this Lindbergh quote via wikipedia:
"Lindbergh's reaction to Kristallnacht was entrusted to his diary: "I do not understand these riots on the part of the Germans", he wrote. "It seems so contrary to their sense of order and intelligence. They have undoubtedly had a difficult 'Jewish problem,' but why is it necessary to handle it so unreasonably?"[70]
In his diaries, he wrote: “We must limit to a reasonable amount the Jewish influence...Whenever the Jewish percentage of total population becomes too high, a reaction seems to invariably occur. It is too bad because a few Jews of the right type are, I believe, an asset to any country.”
> his highlights include contributions atomic theory
That much is philosophia to me, because he didnt prove that. Wik, for what its worth, has him under "philosophical atomism" and lists the "first empirical evidence" under "modern atomic theory".
Let's clear THIS up right now.
QED is a hodgepodge Rubegoldburg of tangled and intertwined mathematical tomfoolery which, once you get done going around the world nine times to get to your own elbow, finally results in something approximating a right answer. It is neither elegant, easy to use, or insightful, and even Feynman on his deathbed proclaimed it a hierarchal mathematical structure without a theory.
You did read my statement about how we get good enough approximations, yes?
But QED is very little different than the old Epicycle theory of planetary motion. You can GET correct enough answers from it to work with without ever coming close to the reality.
Simply put, if you had bothered to actually read the article I posted in response to, you would see how clearly obvious it is that science DOESN'T KNOW WHAT THE REAL TRUTH IS. They have some good ideas, they have some very useful tools, but when 75% of all experiments result in findings that are unpredicted, unexpected, and cannot be reconciled with theory, then it's a pretty good indicator that the THEORY is wrong, not reality.
The problem with most theoretical sciences is that they stopped being about reality the day they allowed mathematics to become more important than reality. Physics is about REALITY, not mathematical fictions. By divorcing theory from that very real physical limitation, we have created a vast horde of mathematicians who are constantly complaining about how the real world fails to met their mathematical expectations, a entire generation of scientists who spend all their time doing their best to make science as obscure and impenetrable as possible to anyone who is not part of their inner circle, and who's sole concern has ceased to be truth, but has become an endless quest for funding.
Science is about understanding the world. This post makes it quite clear that there is a vast difference between what they CLAIM to understand, and what the REALLY DO.
And you are quite naive to believe I haven't done my research. I grew up cutting my teeth on this stuff. It's simply as I have grown older and considerably LESS naive that I have started to see the cracks and rotting foundations of a science system I once loved. I believe and always shall, that EVIDENCE trumps THEORY every day. I have simply made an effort to study ALL the evidence, both for and against, which it is quite apparent, you have not.
Would our scientific understanding of reality be different if Maxwell's full original equations had remained unchanged? We'll never know will we? But the fact that everything, including QED, were developed and influenced by the altered versions instead of the complete versions means it would have been different, and as such, perhaps a study should be done to see HOW different it might be, rather than the simple dismissal you chose to cope with any possible request to look outside the little box you've chosen as your comfort zone.
And you illustrate precisely why this article, and this study, will be ignored in the long run. Scientists are humans. And like you, they would rather dismiss without examination anything which does not fit into their world view. Enormous progress may have been made, but when you build a palace on a patch of sand, sooner or later the entire thing is going to come crashing down.
Which world view is correct? In the end I suspect that none of them will be. But by denying any need to continually re-examine and re-evaluate all evidence, instead advocating picking and choosing which evidence to study and which to toss out, you are as guilty as the researchers mentioned above for failure to actually OVERCOME BIAS and let reality be the final truth sayer.
I have often wondered how much “quantum weirdness” could be explained if the original 20 equations were used with their more complete descriptions instead of the four Oliver Heaviside mangled and condensed because he felt the fourth dimensional calculations needed to be “murdered” from the math
Let's clear this up right now: the answer is "none." People pompously promoting this would-be re-interpretation of classical EM are evidently (and sometimes, it appears, deliberately) unaware of the enormous progress in theoretical physics since the time of Maxwell and Heaviside. Classical electromagnetism has gently given way to Quantum Electrodynamics (QED), now widely regarded as the most successful physical theory every devised by humankind, and which explains vastly more phenomena, with absolutely stunning accuracy, and which was not envisioned at all by Maxwell and Heaviside. Yes, those gentleman were brilliant geniuses and ahead of their time, but please don't kid yourself; they were not ahead of our time! The world's greatest minds (no exaggeration) since their time have exhaustively examined attempts to unify classical electromagnetism and gravity more or less along the lines you are mentioning, and along countless other paths as well. Einstein worked on such unification theories for a long time and many others have too. There is simply no coverup, no conspiracy, no mental block, and no deep dark secret that you know while the rest of the physics community doesn't. Mr. or Ms. Valkyrie Ice, you are naive to think there is such a secret. There is no "there" there. But there are many good books on theoretical physics. If you really want to understand modern physics, you should start studying and learning from the modern textbooks. Even if you spent your life on it, it could be a life well spent. Good luck in your studies.
well if his theory is that people ignore data over because they are trying to support a theory, i suppose he wouldn't have much to say if there were exceptions.
Yes Tim. I've read those. The Backman (1972) study is the most recent in depth psychometric study of Jewish intelligence. The other cites generally use very small sample sizes, or use proxy tests instead of psychometric tests.
My point, if the commenters would actually read it over, is that Robin quoted an excerpt about how Jewish creativity comes from being marginalized and that this excerpt directly reflects Christian biases about Jews, biases that the commenters make clear are so deeply ingrained they can't even discuss them clearly. The title of the blog is "Overcoming Bias," is it not? If you - or Robin or whomever - takes on bias because he or she has grown up in a Christian milieu with a Christian understanding, then that necessarily inculcates biases.
Then if you actually read my post, you certainly can't see that I said the Jews invented science or that they've done all the great science of the last millennium. That would be idiotic. When someone throws out Copernicus, they clearly haven't read that I noted Jews weren't released from the ghettoes until Napoleon - and a simple timeline shows that Copernicus, Newton, Humphrey Davy, etc. all lived before that. Making such an elemental misreading indicates the kind of knee jerk reaction I expected. (I hope I don't need to mention that in any case the idea that I - or anyone - would claim that only Jews would be smart enough to figure things out is both racist and senseless.)
My point is that Judaism institutionalized creative thinking and that tradition is deeply ingrained in Jewish society. Even the most devout come up with the wildest creative ideas - including some that are unfortunate, such as work a few years ago from the son of the Chief Rabbi in Italy that speculated whether blood libel stories might have a root in truth. That is abhorrent but it comes from the same source as Mel Brooks' Springtime for Hitler.
Perhaps check out its references:
"Ashkenazi Jews have the highest average IQ of any ethnic group for which there are reliable data. They score 0.75 to 1.0 standard deviations above the general European average, corresponding to an IQ 112-115. This has been seen in many studies (Backman, 1972; Levinson, 1959; Romanoff, 1976), although a recent review concludes that the advantage is slightly less, only half a standard deviation Lynn (2004)."
to be honest, this is post covers exactly why it is the height of hubris for any scientist to declare what is or is not possible. They can delineate the state of knowledge, they can even make probability statements, but to ever say anything is categorically "impossible" is to conversely be saying "We know all there is to know, and no new knowledge is possible."
Because anomalies exist, we know that the state of our knowledge is incomplete. In theoretical sciences, dismissing these anomalies is especially unforgivable, because the anomalies indicate that there are flaws in the theory that must be investigated. By favoring the math over the experiment, modern physics and astrophysics has ceased to generate knowledge and has instead begun to complicate their theory to continually force reality to match their math. Like the epicycle model of solar mechanics, their results produce enough correct answers to make some of the information useable, or else we would not have developed many of our current technologies, but the evidence continues to build that the underlying model is flawed with every single discovery that is "unexpected" or "anomalous"
Take for example the current discovery by Voyager that our solar system is passing through a cloud of gases held together by a magnetic field. What causes magnetic fields? A flow of current. Electricity and magnetism are two aspects of the same force. It is impossible to have one without the other. So why hasn't that been acknowledged? Because Astrophysics refuses to accept that electrical potentials could exist across interstellar distances. Physics has done much the same by tossing out the scalar and potential aspects of Maxwell's original equations to leave solely the vector analysis version. I have often wondered how much "quantum weirdness" could be explained if the original 20 equations were used with their more complete descriptions instead of the four Oliver Heaviside mangled and condensed because he felt the fourth dimensional calculations needed to be "murdered" from the math. What might Einstein have done if the fourth dimension had still existed in Maxwell's work by the time he began working on Relativity?
I can only hope that as it becomes easier and easier to keep 100% accurate records, we will stop allowing scientists to toss out "anomalous data" and instead use it to do what it should be doing, telling us we need to dig deeper and find the REAL truth, rather than simply seek that which supports our beliefs. If it does nothing else, maybe reports like this and the Climategate fiasco will force better record keeping and experiment recording.
Seems I shouldn't even mention Jews in a post unless I want the whole discussion to be about them.
Constant, maybe absolutism helped science go relative un-persecuted during the Revolution. Wik has absolutism starting in 1610 -- after "De Revolutionibus", but before "Principia". And I'm sure states began strengthening prior to 1610.
After all, when the state is physically strong, not quite as much cohesion, tradition, religion, mores, and other soft power is needed. You could ask Ni Chi (Nietzsche that is; little joke) or Mencius Moldbug. The last and most essential soft power is that over the army/militia and police.
I don't see why ``half'' is emphasized in the beginning of this post. To my sensibilities, half of all data agreeing with theory is immensely encouraging; if you'd have asked me (before reading this) what percentage of data agreed with the average scientist's theories, I'd have bet good money on under one percent.
I admit this is nitpicking.
Interesting juxtaposition. The brain turns data into information.Technology turns data into information.Black Smiths turn data into information.Persistence (conception for example) does this all the time.Theory generation is an ideological practice.Are confusing having a theory with having a reason?
Replying again, in case I have been too strident, marginalization means lots of things.
The things that result from it that might help innovation might be a desire for success (though if you are marginal perhaps you don't desire it, not being familiar with it, maybe you only want a mediocre life) and a lack of commitment to the existing status quo (though perhaps at the margins you try to be more ostensibly commited, in order to minimize your marginal status).
However, as I've hinted above, I think these plausible advantages are strongly outweighed by a lack of access to information (created by social distance and possibly by a "ghetto mentality" insularity at the margins of society), a lack of access to publishing and financing ideas and fear of risk at the margins (people do not take risks if they are in a situation where the consequences of those risks are severe, no?).
Another possible mitigating theory would be that American ashkenazim are more intelligent than Israeli ashkenazim.
I don't think it's completely unreasonable to conjecture that a smarter variant of ashkenazim might prefer the Bay Area to the Middle East.
ps cultue vs. iq discussions here might be more usefully framed as organizational vs. individual intelligence. For example, organizations may encourage more risk-taking and less sexual promiscuity or polygamy than may be optimal for individuals, when the two have persistence maximizing (for the individual these might be genetic or conscious qualia based, for the organization they may be network algorithmic based) interests that conflict.
Why did only it catch fire and rapidly uncover 99% of what we now know?
It would surely be hard to over-stress the importance of it not being deadly-dangerous to be a contrarian thinker. Imprisonment, being burned alive, poisoned with hemlock - stuff like that tends to have a chilling effect.
"If some level of marginality does help, marginality surely hurts when it is too intense."
Reminds me delightfully (in terms of my appreciation for natural ironic humor) of this Lindbergh quote via wikipedia:
"Lindbergh's reaction to Kristallnacht was entrusted to his diary: "I do not understand these riots on the part of the Germans", he wrote. "It seems so contrary to their sense of order and intelligence. They have undoubtedly had a difficult 'Jewish problem,' but why is it necessary to handle it so unreasonably?"[70]
In his diaries, he wrote: “We must limit to a reasonable amount the Jewish influence...Whenever the Jewish percentage of total population becomes too high, a reaction seems to invariably occur. It is too bad because a few Jews of the right type are, I believe, an asset to any country.”
> his highlights include contributions atomic theory
That much is philosophia to me, because he didnt prove that. Wik, for what its worth, has him under "philosophical atomism" and lists the "first empirical evidence" under "modern atomic theory".