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If physics cries wolf too often…

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From physicist Jon Butterworth at The Guardian:

Jan Conrad, an astroparticle physicist, claims that “The field has cried wolf too many times and lost credibility”

and he worries that false discoveries are undermining public trust in science. He lists some dubious results which have caused a stir amongst physicists and the general public over the past couple of years, including the faster-than-light-neutrinos that weren’t, the primordial gravitational waves that are probably just dust, and several Dark Matter candidates which remain shrouded in uncertainty and contradiction.

His argument has some merit; in some cases there is an apparent rush to release, and especially to over-interpret, provisional and sometimes incorrect data. This is sometimes done because because of rivalries and competition, the desire to stake a claim. Other times it is simply that those concerned have found themselves too easy to fool. Such things can definitely distort the priorities of scientists and those who fund them. More.

My own response is, wakey, wakey.

Much of today’s public reasonably assumes that high science exists to support crackpot cosmology and its subsidiary theories, not to advance anything that would be remotely useful.

Not like moon landings, fMRI imaging, and the microwave oven.

More like some dweeb sci toff announcing on government TV that our brains are shaped for fitness, not for truth. Which lets the toff out of a LOT of serious evaluation, right?

See also:

Hi, Nonsense, meet Budget

and

How it got so crazy.

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Comments
Standard Cosmology, much like Darwinian evolution, is a theoretical black-hole that is designed to resist falsification.. a fog that settles over the data. They begin by wrapping a narrative around data that is already known, inventing imaginary objects for failed predictions, and trumpeting the few predictions (if any) that they do get right. Ultimately they just cruise on this mythology they've cooked up because the public believes if it were false, somebody would have said so by now, yet these ideas are not even being tested, and never really have been... Very sad.lifepsy
July 10, 2015
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Not to mention the distrust that the Global warming alarmists (and Darwinists) are generating in science:
“Deniers” in their midst – All is not well in Nobel Prize Land - Anthony Watts - July 7, 2015 Excerpt: Today, one of the nobel laureates who was an attendee has spoken out.,,, Nobel Prize Winning Physicist Dr. Ivar Giaever: ‘Global warming is a non-problem’ ‘I say this to Obama: Excuse me, Mr. President, but you’re wrong. Dead wrong.’ Dr. Ivar Giaever, a Nobel Prize-Winner for physics in 1973, declared his dissent on man-made global warming claims at a Nobel forum on July 1, 2015.,,, “I would say that basically global warming is a non-problem,” Dr. Giaever announced during his speech titled “Global Warming Revisited.”,,, Giaever now mocks President Obama for warning that “no challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change”. Giaever called it a “ridiculous statement.” “That is what he said. That is a ridiculous statement,” Giaever explained.,,, “How can he say that? I think Obama is a clever person, but he gets bad advice. Global warming is all wet,” he added.,,, “When you have a theory and the theory does not agree with the experiment then you have to cut out the theory. You were wrong with the theory,” Giaever explained. Giaever said his climate research was eye opening. “I was horrified by what I found” after researching the issue in 2012, he noted. “Global warming really has become a new religion. Because you cannot discuss it. It’s not proper. It is like the Catholic Church.”,,, “Then comes the clincher. If climate change does not scare people we can scare people talking about the extreme weather,” Giaever said.,,, “If anything we have entered period of low hurricanes. These are the facts,” he continued. “You don’t’ have to even be a scientist to look at these figures and you understand what it says,” he added. “Same thing is for tornadoes. We are in a low period on in U.S.” http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/07/07/deniers-in-their-midst-all-is-not-well-in-nobel-prize-land/ Watch Giaever’s full 30-minute July 1 speech here. http://www.mediatheque.lindau-nobel.org/videos/34729/ivar-giaever-global-warming-revisited/laureate-giaever
bornagain77
July 7, 2015
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