Why does it seem like there is no moderation in Physics and Math?

[CptBork]

Why do you presume a discussion has to be about something that is attempting to expose a contradiction?

I didn't mean to narrow it down to contradictions alone. For example, I've seen and participated in more than one argument where a poster was claiming that the Twins Paradox of Special Relativity is a genuine problem that only (thankfully) gets resolved by General Relativity, negating the simple unambiguous solution Einstein himself gave in 1905 or the many other straight-forward approaches yielding the same result. I think what the majority of the posters find objectionable is to either distort the truth by misrepresenting a theory or fact, or to misrepresent one's self and one's own knowledge level in making an argument. The whole idea of a scientific discussion is to try and avoid shouting matches and appeals to authority, and that's what posters like Farsight are reduced to even as they accuse others of the same.

I'm not saying that I'm perfect and everything that comes out of my own mouth is true or free of error. However, I do have an intimate technical familiarity with many scientific subjects and am thus frequently able to appeal to widely established experimental facts and mathematical deductions, without any regard for whether Einstein or anyone else agreed with it. Making absurd, demonstrably false claims and then disingenuously misrepresenting one's self and others in defending them is what pisses most people off here and gets sanctioned.

Take Farsight as an example once more. I can say whatever I want about his theory and about nature in general, and what objective evidence can he appeal to in order to debunk it? A picture he drew? He doesn't know how to apply his own ideas to model something you could physically interact with on any level, he has no logical or experimental reality check; I wouldn't even trust him to estimate the fall time of a weight on a simple pulley, with his theory or anyone else's, yet he insists on having his claims stand on equal footing in the physics section alongside everything else, in his own thread as well as in other peoples' threads. He doesn't know what basic high school physics says, nor what advanced modern physics, and he still wants to tell us it's wrong all the same; it's stupendously ridiculous behaviour, and I think a part of him already knows that.

 

[Farsight]

All: the above is baloney. Again, I started a thread about gravity where I referred to Einstein and the evidence and other absolutely legit material. It's quality. You can see James R entering into what is a sincere discussion. But CptBork doesn't. He obviously didn't read the OP or the posts. He doesn't see that James R was enjoying a thoughtful thread. He just lumps with his post #80 saying this:

"Since Farsight seems to be repeating this garbage in every single thread on General Relativity, and thus already has plenty of opportunities to clutter up the Physics section, I propose that the moderators should move this particular thread to Alternative Theories, which is where it should have been posted in the first place".

The guy isn't honest. He makes out he's some kind of expert, but he's not. His physics knowledge is scant. In truth he's a feather-spitting ad-hominem naysayer troll who crawls out of the wallpaper to trash any decent discussion that gets going. And he isn't the only one.

 

[origin]

All: The guy isn't honest.

Based on history, I would believe CptBork over you everytime.

 

[OnlyMe]

All: the above is baloney. Again, I started a thread about gravity where I referred to Einstein and the evidence and other absolutely legit material. It's quality. You can see James R entering into what is a sincere discussion. But CptBork doesn't. He obviously didn't read the OP or the posts. He doesn't see that James R was enjoying a thoughtful thread. He just lumps with his post #80 saying this:

"Since Farsight seems to be repeating this garbage in every single thread on General Relativity, and thus already has plenty of opportunities to clutter up the Physics section, I propose that the moderators should move this particular thread to Alternative Theories, which is where it should have been posted in the first place".

The guy isn't honest. He makes out he's some kind of expert, but he's not. His physics knowledge is scant. In truth he's a feather-spitting ad-hominem naysayer troll who crawls out of the wallpaper to trash any decent discussion that gets going. And he isn't the only one.

Farsight, I believe it is unfortunate that Alternative Theories was placed in, On The Fringe, instead of under Science, but most of your ideas are Alternate Theory not because of your references, but because of your interpretation of those references. Referencing Einstein etc. May be a mainstream reference, but how you interpret the intent is not.

Note, you don't see it posted at the top of the sub forum but the rules for posting in Physics and Math were discussed during the time frame when the Alternative Theories sub forum was being created. Those guidelines included being able to provide the math when necessary or requested and references to generally accepted mainstream sources. Neither has been enforced in any absolute way.​

There are many physicists who have historically been on the opposite side of the discussion from Einstein, but they were not trying to re-interpret Einstein....., or trying to explain to him what he intended. Some of them had the advantage of discussion directly with him. We do not have that luxury today and we do not have the right to redefine his intent, even where we may disagree, with historical or contemporay interpretations, or conceptual projections.

You seem to, or at least come across as presenting your ideas and/or interpretations as absolute. That does not allow for discussion! Anyone who does not agree is wrong and every thread becomes an arguement, instead of a discussion.

You complain about how others treat and respond to you, but you do pretty much the same in your response to others. How can you expect anyone to take any complaint seriously, when you end the post quoted above with a reply that is every bit as much the kind of comment, you are complaining about? If you want to be taken seriously you have to act seriously and allow room for comment and disagreement. But most of all it would be a good start to lay off the I'm right and everyone else is wrong approach.

 

[btr]

Mass is another one for another day, btr. As regards special relativity, if you read Graham Farmelo's The Strangest Man, there's a little snippet on page 53:

"At that time, Cunningham and Eddington were streets ahead of the majority of their Cambridge colleagues, who dismissed Einstein's work, ignored it, or denied its significance".

That wasn't 1905 or 1915. That was 1923. Also see page 6 of Clifford M Will's The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment. He he says special relativity wasn't accepted by mainstream physicists until the late 1920s.

Regardless of the precise date we would arbitrarily assign (there was no sharp transition, in reality), this just reinforces my earlier statement; Special Relativity was very much an "alternative theory" in 1905 and for some years after that. Furthermore, rightly so! Hopefully that goes some way towards dispelling the negative connotations of the title Alternative Theory.

It was of course Max Planck who said science advances one funeral at a time.

Eine neue wissenschaftliche Wahrheit pflegt sich nicht in der Weise durchzusetzen, daß ihre Gegner überzeugt werden und sich als belehrt erklären, sondern vielmehr dadurch, daß ihre Gegner allmählich aussterben und daß die heranwachsende Generation von vornherein mit der Wahrheit vertraut gemacht ist.

"A new scientific truth does not triumph due to the fact that its opponents are convinced and agree with what they are told, but rather the fact that its opponents gradually die out and that the growing generation is from the outset familiar with that truth."

From the mouth of someone who lived from the mid 19th century, perhaps the height of the pre-relativistic and pre-quantum era, until just after the the Second World War, by which point relativity and quantum theory had become the very core of mainstream physics, I do find that statement quite ironic. Planck was unduly pessimistic, if indeed that is a faithful quote.

NB: I take it you're aware that Einstein adopted a presentism view in 1949? See this. Note though that the blurb says "time does not exist" and is somewhat misleading.

Unfortunately I cannot see anything but the blurb, but I suppose that might support what I said earlier about presentism being compatible with Special Relativity. I think it is a bad way to view the theory, though, for reasons I might go into elsewhere at some point (here would be the wrong place).

It ought to be "time does not exist as we ordinarily understand it". Think "time exists like heat exists".

There is a curious and very abstract analogy between time and temperature in quantum field theory, but I suspect that is not what you mean. Elsewhere, another time, though.

 

[Motor Daddy]

Based on history, I would believe CptBork over you everytime.

That would be faith then, because if you were sincere in truth, you would look at every single thing that came out of both of their mouths each and every statement they made. Then you would determine which was lying or telling the truth. Unless you mean that CptBork is incapable of lying, or Farsight's incapable of telling the truth? So when Farsight tells the truth and CptBork were to tell a lie, then that would leave you out in the cold, which is the exact same temperature as Heaven...

 

[Trippy]

I've reported a great many posts. I've just reported two more, on this very thread. Here we have a discussion about the sciforums problem, and as ever we have the abusive ad-hominem naysayers. Escaping moderation. In a thread entitled Why does it seem like there is no moderation in Physics and Math?

I don't receive reported posts for this subforum, SFOG is the realm of James R, Stryder, Tiassa, and Plazma Inferno!. I generally try and avoid moderating this particular subforum because of the appearance of self interest.

Nor have I, until recently, received reported post notifications for Physics & Math.

That's utterly unconvincing.

Right.
So the fact that I:
Asked him repeatedly to create a thred in SFOG to discuss issues he had with my moderation.
Suggested that if he didn't like it he could take it up with James R, Stryder, Tiassa, and Plazma Inferno!.
Have gone out of my way to explain to him that any moderation I have done in P&M has been effectively with one hand tied behind my back.
Have given him every opportunity and every vehicle available (at least the ones I'm aware of anyway) to pursue his complaint further.
Have even gone as far as having it done for him (because at the time I could not do it myself).
Even had a ban imposed by another moderator overturned so he could have his say.

Is utterly unconvincing? So much for an evidence based approach eh?

 

[Trippy]

And yet again here we have the ad-hominem abuse that has been going unmoderated. In a thread called Why does it seem like there is no moderation in Physics and Math? Where moderators are in attendance.

At 2:23 in the morning I was doing this strange thing that pretty much every species in the animal kingdom does - sleeping. I'm genuinely sorry if that inconvenienced you though.

 

[lpetrich]

You couldn't make it up. I quote Einstein, and this guy dismisses it.

Farsight, your method -- book-thumping -- is NOT a typical method of mainstream science. I know, because I have read a lot of the professional literature. It's much more typical of theology, however.

(rejection of relativity until the late 1920's) ... It was of course Max Planck who said science advances one funeral at a time.

Nobody's ever gotten a theory accepted by whining about what orthodox oxen one's critics are.

NB: I take it you're aware that Einstein adopted a presentism view in 1949?

Einstein is NOT an inspired prophet whose words are binding on physicists. Farsight, this is science and not theology.

 

[CptBork]

That would be faith then, because if you were sincere in truth, you would look at every single thing that came out of both of their mouths each and every statement they made. Then you would determine which was lying or telling the truth. Unless you mean that CptBork is incapable of lying, or Farsight's incapable of telling the truth? So when Farsight tells the truth and CptBork were to tell a lie, then that would leave you out in the cold, which is the exact same temperature as Heaven...

No need to take anything I say on faith, I'm not the one trying to reinterpret or toss out what mainstream science already teaches about the workings of gravity. Farsight posted a couple of pictures alluding to a vague idea, gave an obscure quote from one of the same blogs where he got the pictures in the first place, and when asked for details or even a basic trajectory calculation, he dodged and trolled. So if he wants to prove that I'm a liar, all he needs to do is actually show us how gravity works, just as he promised to do in the thread title, with precise details that could in principle be checked in the real world.

It's not like I'm even opposed to alternative theories; I've seen enough mathematical details to know there are serious problems with existing attempts to combine General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, and I'm thoroughly convinced that something deeper and different underlies them. You don't see me picking on String Theorists and Loop Quantum gravitationalists over the work they do, when they can demonstrate that they at least know what they're talking about and where established science stands at present. However, I'm also convinced that the existing equations mainstream science works with are extremely accurate and would have to be reproducible, as an approximation under the right conditions, from whatever theory ultimately pieces them together. So if someone shows up who doesn't have the faintest clue what those equations say or how to work with them, I'm sure as hell not going to buy any claims on their part that they single-handedly figured out how the whole universe works from the comfort of their couch.

 

[Motor Daddy]

No need to take anything I say on faith, I'm not the one trying to reinterpret or toss out what mainstream science already teaches about the workings of gravity. Farsight posted a couple of pictures alluding to a vague idea, gave an obscure quote from one of the same blogs where he got the pictures in the first place, and when asked for details or even a basic trajectory calculation, he dodged and trolled. So if he wants to prove that I'm a liar, all he needs to do is actually show us how gravity works, just as he promised to do in the thread title, with precise details that could in principle be checked in the real world.

It's not like I'm even opposed to alternative theories; I've seen enough mathematical details to know there are serious problems with existing attempts to combine General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics, and I'm thoroughly convinced that something deeper and different underlies them. You don't see me picking on String Theorists and Loop Quantum gravitationalists over the work they do, when they can demonstrate that they at least know what they're talking about and where established science stands at present. However, I'm also convinced that the existing equations mainstream science works with are extremely accurate and would have to be reproducible, as an approximation under the right conditions, from whatever theory ultimately pieces them together. So if someone shows up who doesn't have the faintest clue what those equations say or how to work with them, I'm sure as hell not going to buy any claims on their part that they single-handedly figured out how the whole universe works from the comfort of their couch.

I hear ya. I'm sure you got my point too, that just because someone lies it doesn't mean that everything that comes out of their mouth is a lie.

I'm not really interested in identifying and keeping track of who's a liar and who isn't, as everything that comes out of everybody's mouth is subject to scrutiny, especially on the internet where everything that's said is a written record of itself. No more of this "I didn't say that" stuff.

 

[Quantum Quack]

I didn't mean to narrow it down to contradictions alone. For example, I've seen and participated in more than one argument where a poster was claiming that the Twins Paradox of Special Relativity is a genuine problem that only (thankfully) gets resolved by General Relativity, negating the simple unambiguous solution Einstein himself gave in 1905 or the many other straight-forward approaches yielding the same result. I think what the majority of the posters find objectionable is to either distort the truth by misrepresenting a theory or fact, or to misrepresent one's self and one's own knowledge level in making an argument. The whole idea of a scientific discussion is to try and avoid shouting matches and appeals to authority, and that's what posters like Farsight are reduced to even as they accuse others of the same.

I'm not saying that I'm perfect and everything that comes out of my own mouth is true or free of error. However, I do have an intimate technical familiarity with many scientific subjects and am thus frequently able to appeal to widely established experimental facts and mathematical deductions, without any regard for whether Einstein or anyone else agreed with it. Making absurd, demonstrably false claims and then disingenuously misrepresenting one's self and others in defending them is what pisses most people off here and gets sanctioned.

Take Farsight as an example once more. I can say whatever I want about his theory and about nature in general, and what objective evidence can he appeal to in order to debunk it? A picture he drew? He doesn't know how to apply his own ideas to model something you could physically interact with on any level, he has no logical or experimental reality check; I wouldn't even trust him to estimate the fall time of a weight on a simple pulley, with his theory or anyone else's, yet he insists on having his claims stand on equal footing in the physics section alongside everything else, in his own thread as well as in other peoples' threads. He doesn't know what basic high school physics says, nor what advanced modern physics, and he still wants to tell us it's wrong all the same; it's stupendously ridiculous behaviour, and I think a part of him already knows that.

I get where you are coming from.. and from a solid intellectual perspective you are quite founded except... and yes there is always an exception [chuckle]...

Your responses over generalize using the terms synonymous with "All" or "Everything" which means that the you feel the ENTIRE content of what has been posted is subject to dismissal and are not prepared to entertain that which is valid in the post.

Dialectic Example:

Say, Albert Einstein finished stating his theory of GR for the first time and signed off misspelling his surname Einstien instead of Einstein.

Some one in the reading/listening audience yells out,

"Every time you talk you muck up and your use of language is abysmal why should we bother with what you say?"
"If you can't spell your own name why should we bother wading through the math of GR?"

Obviously if this approach was taken all the time there would be no future for science.

The issue is as far as I can tell, not about what Farsight is saying, but what value YOU can derive from what you feel is the scrambled egg of his posts. What Farsight says and does is his business, what you do is yours.

It is up to you to capitalize or not on what Farsight and others are offering.

It is not up to Farsight or any one else to satisfy your personal requirements, he is obliged however to present a case that can be questioned and allow understanding if possible.

This is why seeking understanding through discussion, rather than conflict is so important, because to do so you will actually gain something from participating instead of loosing every time you post your frustration at someone else's lack of formal qualification of his postings.

I have seen some of your work, Cpt Bork and have been impressed by it's thoroughness and quality however all that is made unavailable to me due to the fact that any thing I may wish to contribute or question is subject to confrontation and conflict and the level involved means that I will not ask questions nor seek further understanding.

... just thoughts.. ok... no offense intended...

 

[Quantum Quack]

Um....OK....that sounds like sarcastic disagreement. I think you may have lost track of who you were talking to. Might want to go back and reread the last page of the thread...

ahh I see why you would think as you do...
Please accept my apology and withdrawal of "sarcastic agreement"
I shall try to be more diligent in future... thanks..

 

[CptBork]

Dialectic Example:

Say, Albert Einstein finished stating his theory of GR for the first time and signed off misspelling his surname Einstien instead of Einstein.

Some one in the reading/listening audience yells out,

"Every time you talk you muck up and your use of language is abysmal why should we bother with what you say?"
"If you can't spell your own name why should we bother wading through the math of GR?"

Obviously if this approach was taken all the time there would be no future for science.

Where have I ruled out someone's ideas because of persistent spelling mistakes or some other minor nuissance? It's the ideas that conflict with established science which I rule out, and there's no way for that to change unless one can show why their alternative idea is better than the established ones, which in turn means the established science needs to be thoroughly understood and discussed. Even if Relativity and Quantum Mechanics had completely passed him by, Einstein would have still been famous to some degree just for his contributions to classical mechanics and applied statistics, enough to be frequently noted in major technical papers going all the way up to modern times. When he argued for the existence of photons and relative manifestations of space and time, his arguments were simple and compelling, simply getting to the point and doing a better, more accurate and self-consistent job of it than any previous attempt, which is why his ideas were accepted so quickly. He wasn't a David Hilbert, but he still knew a helluva lot more than a typical university graduate learns in the specific areas that he studied, he didn't just jump off the couch one day yelling "Eureka".

The issue is as far as I can tell, not about what Farsight is saying, but what value YOU can derive from what you feel is the scrambled egg of his posts. What Farsight says and does is his business, what you do is yours.

You're right that it's not about what Farsight is saying, insofar as it's more about what he's not saying. He tells us that he's got reality just about all figured out, and that we've got it all wrong and we've been misreading and falsely reproducing the work of a couple of scientists for the last 100 years, so I'm challenging him to describe something about reality. If even Newton's laws have more testable applicability in every imaginable domain than anything he can produce, why would anyone take him seriously? Like I said, it doesn't look like he can model so much as the motions of a simple pulley system (I invite him to demonstrate that I'm wrong about his background level), yet I'm to believe he's mastered electromagnetic theory to a level expert trained scientists have missed for a whole century. He tells us he's mastered the true nature of General Relativity better than any recognized authority in the field, but he can't plot the trajectory of a meteorite or even a reasonably close approximation, classical or otherwise.

It is up to you to capitalize or not on what Farsight and others are offering.

Well this is a key question... Do the majority of forum users here want the physics & math section to be an intellectual free-for-all where anyone can post whatever they like if it sounds reasonable to their own selves, or do they want some semblance of objective sanity checks and references to verify an idea's scientific validity? Seems to me like there are already several other sections intended for free-for-all posting, and most users here want the latter. A free-for-all "sounds good to me" approach isn't physics, it's philosophy, so why would anyone want to mislabel and detract from what it really is? What's so bad about arbitrary philosophy, that it has to be re-labeled as "scientific"?

It is not up to Farsight or any one else to satisfy your personal requirements, he is obliged however to present a case that can be questioned and allow understanding if possible.

How about it, then? Just one single case that can actually be compared in precise detail to existing knowledge. Even just one, what an amazing improvement that would be for him, I'd be delighted to see it.

I have seen some of your work, Cpt Bork and have been impressed by it's thoroughness and quality however all that is made unavailable to me due to the fact that any thing I may wish to contribute or question is subject to confrontation and conflict and the level involved means that I will not ask questions nor seek further understanding.

... just thoughts.. ok... no offense intended...

Honest to goodness, it's not about me or anything anyone thinks about me. If I were terribly concerned about my scientific image here or my comparative level of technical ability, I wouldn't go mouthing off in other forums, debating politics and everything else that personally interests me. Misrepresenting legitimate scientific work here and being disingenuous about the accuracy of that representation is like splashing a gallon of red paint all over the Mona Lisa right before a major public viewing, or at least that's how it feels to myself and several others here, which is why I object to certain types of inappropriate material being posted in certain sections. I have a genuine interest in the public knowing what is and isn't being said and done in the real world of physics research, as do many others, and I have no qualms about defending that knowledge for public consumption or at least making sure the public is aware of potential objections whenever nonsense is posted.

 

[AlexG]

Because there really isn't any. What moderators there are are more concerned with politeness than correctness.

 

[Farsight]

...which is why I object to certain types of inappropriate material being posted in certain sections...

Baloney. You don't even read the material I post. James R did, he saw it was robust, with solid references. You just piled in dismissing it. See lpetrich above accusing me of theology for referring to Einstein? It's like we're sitting comfortably talking theology and then you turn up. All foam-flecked, waving your arms and shouting: Only a man of the cloth such as I is qualified to speak of such matters! You seek to stifle discussion. On a discussion forum. On specious grounds. You can't point out where there's any problem in my gravity OP. Because there isn't any. But all you want to do is shout it down. Because you're a fraud. A fake. A charlatan. You're a cuckoo in the nest.

 

[Farsight]

Farsight, I believe it is unfortunate that Alternative Theories was placed in, On The Fringe, instead of under Science, but most of your ideas are Alternate Theory not because of your references, but because of your interpretation of those references. Referencing Einstein etc. May be a mainstream reference, but how you interpret the intent is not...

The guy said what he said. And you have to choose whether you're going to believe what Einstein said, or believe lpetrich when he tells you to ignore it because it's just book-thumping theology.

There are many physicists who have historically been on the opposite side of the discussion from Einstein, but they were not trying to re-interpret Einstein....., or trying to explain to him what he intended. Some of them had the advantage of discussion directly with him. We do not have that luxury today and we do not have the right to redefine his intent, even where we may disagree, with historical or contemporay interpretations, or conceptual projections.

I haven't redefined his intent. I give you the quotes and the links so you can read what he said and appreciate that somebody else has redefined his intent.

You seem to, or at least come across as presenting your ideas and/or interpretations as absolute. That does not allow for discussion! Anyone who does not agree is wrong and every thread becomes an argument, instead of a discussion.

Every thread becomes an argument because this forum is being continually sabotaged by self-appointed custodians of ignorance. See the gravity thread I mentioned. Note the interesting sincere discussion between myself and James R. But then see the "contribution" from paddoboy and PhysBang. And from Brucep and Beer w/Straw and Russ_Watters. And from the "contributions" from Aqueous Id and CptBork. It's just abuse, isn't it? I back up what I say about physics with evidence. And I back up what I say about moderation with evidence.

You complain about how others treat and respond to you, but you do pretty much the same in your response to others. How can you expect anyone to take any complaint seriously, when you end the post quoted above with a reply that is every bit as much the kind of comment, you are complaining about? If you want to be taken seriously you have to act seriously and allow room for comment and disagreement. But most of all it would be a good start to lay off the I'm right and everyone else is wrong approach.

I give the physics and the supporting evidence. Others don't. I raise a moderation issue and give the supporting evidence. Others don't.

 

[Farsight]

... Is utterly unconvincing? So much for an evidence based approach eh?

The evidence is that you've banned him for 31 days. You've banned him repeatedly. But you haven't banned PhysBang or any of the other abusive trolls.

 

[Trippy]

The evidence is that you've banned him for 31 days. You've banned him repeatedly. But you haven't banned PhysBang or any of the other abusive trolls.

:Roll:
On the one hand, your evidence is cherrypicked (a logical fallacy - you've ignored most of the data-set where I've tried to reason with and be reasonable with him).

On the other hand your evidence suffers from selection bias:

And no, I'm not going to go through all the people I believe you consider trolls and screengrab their infractions just to prove a point.

 

[lpetrich]

The guy said what he said. And you have to choose whether you're going to believe what Einstein said, or believe lpetrich when he tells you to ignore it because it's just book-thumping theology.

Farsight, your method is all wrong. Even if your Einstein quotes have been correctly interpreted by you, there are still big problems with your method of being dependent on Einstein's say-so. You seem to be treating him as a prophet who has revealed some great truths to us. True, scientists depend on each others' work, but they don't treat any fellow scientists' work as revealed truth, as you seem to be doing. Treating Einstein's writings as revealed truth is the sort of thing that I mean by arguing like a theologian.

Farsight, theories stand apart from the ones who invented them, and you ought to treat them that way. I further note that that does not mean going into hysterics about how someone supposedly denies Einstein when they reject your pet theories.