You Are Probably not Interested in This: How a Latest Flavor of "Science" Works

Did you know that anyone, including you, can nominate you for the Nobel Prize? How come the circle of “winners” is so restricted?

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It took me half a day to write this, but I couldn’t resist. This is in response to Mr. Briggs’s excellent article:

The Right & Wrong Way To Do (Electromagnetic) Science: Interview With Hans G. Schantz

Disclaimer: My reaction is by no means against Schantz; it’s a critique of his replies in this conversation. In the long run, I can even imagine he and could become friends, if we manage to straighten out the discrepancies between our stances, which shouldn’t be all that difficult, if we both mean well and find common denominators, instead of arguing over details that would not be brought into a common interpretive plane. His analysis of Einstein, for that matter, deserves a lot of attention, although I’m not sure how many readers possess acumen and sufficient background in cultural history to relate to the details. For that matter, he is putting down “Nazi” scientists (which might be compulsory for him, so he cannot be blamed), while for another few decades, American “scientists” seem to have been relying on kidnapped German researchers (“Operation Paperclip”), whose achievements far outpaced the contemporary crap in “science.” On the other hand, I love his observation, “In summary, the history of science is as much about narrative power as it is about data.” Tru dat.

Mr. Briggs, however, I am already considering a friend working on the same project as I have been since 1987.

The questions are impressive; the answers no so much. Mr. Briggs is asking questions that turn the interviewee into a self-revealing subject! I‘m not sure if the questions were supposed imply irony, but they do, nonetheless.

My favorite is this: “I don’t hold with any kind of multiverse, but I am highly sympathetic to the idea that there is more to the world than what we can see, for there have to be good causal reasons for the things we can see. Even if we cannot know what these are. Is space all there is? Or is there something more?” Of course, the question has no feasible answer, but the interviewee doesn’t seem to realize that, and keeps going like the Energizer Bunny, using the eloquence of an academic who MUST maintain his status, instead of kindly humbling himself to the thinking person who would understand plain English, but not the “professional” terminological paraphernalia.

Even in the most honest response, Schantz fails to be accurate:

“Every generation of physicists has believed they were approaching a complete understanding of nature, only to have their fundamental assumptions shattered by the next revolutionary discovery. This suggests that our current theories — quantum field theory, general relativity, the Standard Model — however successful, are likewise approximations. They describe certain aspects of reality accurately within certain domains, but they almost certainly miss something fundamental about the nature of things.”

There is no such thing as a “generation of physicists” in the latest developments in Physics in the last 100 years or so; every single one of them has been blowing their own horns, and getting where the current hypothetical Paradise is: nowhere.

Of course, research done by AI must have exceeded human knowledge decades ago, but the interviewee seems to be bent on covering it up, talking about a "we" that doesn't exist.

Once systems theory is included in analyzing the conversation, the interviewee's answers speak for themselves.

Schantz seems to dismiss computer simulation and condones “con-puterized” analytics (that includes only variables, where the “researcher” is always right), while still using analogy.

How can he explain examining open systems just “playing by ear”? Mr. Briggs, again, astutely notes, “It’s well to treat things as the sum of their parts for engineering purposes. There is, after all, no other way to build a machine. But it seems Nature is not like this. The example I like is water: you can model your way to water even though you know all there is to know about hydrogen and oxygen. It’s not that we have more to learn and haven’t, but that water just is more than H plus O. Or do you disagree?” (Although I don’t think water accurately addresses to problem of interpreting open systems through closed ones, only the molecular structure and the fluidity of water, but indeed, problem-solving prevails in “science.”) In response, Schantz’s reply doesn’t even go as far as systems theory was already in 1923 (Lotman, long preceding the research of human cognition), when he restricts his scope to “linear” and “parallel” processing, which do have relevance in systems theory, but it's elementary and rudimental. And it is he, who praises Mr. Briggs for being smarter than he is! LOL! Schants, in his reply (which may have been too hasty) absolutely fails to realize that EVERY open system in life is recursive; perhaps it was too much for his “academic” level...

He resorts to platitudes like, “Electromagnetic fields do more than carry energy. They guide energy. Due to interference, energy may follow paths quite different from those of the field wavefronts. In other words, energy trajectories can diverge notably from simple geometric propagation.” I beg your pardon, but that’s humiliating to the audience, insulting their intelligence...

Mr. Briggs convenes by implying that much of “science” is based on mythical beliefs, although ALL “scientific” systems rely on one of more system-creating premises that cannot be proven (maybe, Godel’s theorem from 1932 would be applicable at this point) simply MUST be taken for granted by those who elect to pursue their lines of “research” (of course, research is inevitably follows the unstated request for the “result” by those who finance it).

In my experience, the progress of knowledge doesn’t directly follow the Hegelian assumption, “thesis-antithesis-synthesis,” but like Einstein (whom I still fail to admire, which is where Schantz and I agree), combine to partial pieces of “knowledge” into one, and the two don’t have to contradict each other (they probably never completely do)... Schants, of course, knows this, but instead of clarification, resorts to mind-scrambing: “The neat retrospective narratives we construct obscure a chaotic process filled with false starts, dead ends, and bitter controversies, where practice frequently precedes theory and revolutionary ideas must overcome institutional resistance and entrenched worldviews.” If you feel that to a cat, I’m sure, it will start to bark!

Of course, he has to present himself as indispensable and barks (mews?) out simple things in a “sophisticated” manner like “The standard account of modern physics presents an inevitable march from classical determinism to quantum indeterminacy. In reality, philosophical preconceptions such as Positivism and Naturephilosophie played a decisive role in how discoveries were framed and understood.” Actually, if he used plain English, everyone in the audience would know that there is no “transition” from “determinism” to “indeterminacy”; the two types of problem-solving systems (and they and nothing more than that) are irreconcilably different, while a unified paradigm doesn’t exist. Apparently, what he needs a book for, can be explained no more than two sentences (but that can be only realized through deductive thinking, which is not exactly common)...

In the meanwhile, he delves into microphysics, where even two physicists have a hard time agreeing how many dimensions they must assume to exist before attempting to use their interpretive frames (working theories) to predict events under the same circumstances. It is the latter where the “scientific principle” becomes inadequate: no two circumstances are ever completely identical...

And after all the smoke and mirrors, he ends up with... another theory! :)

However, Mr. Briggs’s penultimate question made me laugh out loud: “I know you’ve done a lot of work with antennas. (I have a lot of hams who are readers, and some who have no idea what a radio is.) So to end this with some fun, or what seems like fun to me, what is your favorite antenna story? And what do you think of my Nobel-prize eligible theory, confirmed by observations countless times, that the best location for any antenna is also the most inconvenient location?” After all the details, that seems like even more irony, drawing the interviewee in into a trap he has built for himself! I’m sure Mr. Briggs is fully aware that only insiders and global players ever win the Nobel Prize! Nonetheless, his last question is, well, uncomfortable. So, the reader is overwhelmed by antennas, and his/her consciousness can conveniently disappear in the mist, while remaining cognizant of their remarkable intelligence! (Sorry, I am not going to quote this part; you can check it out, if you are interested.)

In reality, whatever works in “science,” doesn't require a theory, only a working hypothesis based on unprovable premise(s), because... it works! Why? Who cares, except for academics who have to market themselves... During this interview, the academic is surely using a lot of flash cards to emphasize his sophistication! (The only thing he seems to forget he is not talking in a conference to other “scientists” who are there to make contacts and to celebrate themselves. He is out in the open!)

There is absolutely nothing new about the ideal method, during which induction and deduction meet in the middle. Alas, they never completely do, because the models used are irrevocably closed systems applied to open ones; a mundane logical fallacy to begin with, which accurately predicts the upcoming failure. That’s what I would call “the history of science”: doing the same things (cognitively), and expecting different results (in this case, better ones).

“Accurate science” is either something to sell, some technology to ensure the rulers’ power (which is publicized and sold to the crowds only after it’s obsolete), a gimmick to trick the masses into cognitive security, or a fool’s errand:

Computability in a self-improving algorithm promises the most, but after the AI is finished, its operators have no idea what it has done and how; they would need a few thousand lifetimes to comprehend it, during which the circumstances will, as usual, change. :)

So much about gnosis.

Anyway, the value of any theory shows in its problem-solving power. Can’t wait to see what this one will accomplish! And I beg to disagree with the reductionist principle: in my experience, the total tends to exceed the sum of its parts. Of course, that applies to open systems only, and “science” usually compartmentalizes in closed ones, where it's inevitably “right.”

What are the “must-reads” in “science”? First, one has to be able to use deductive logic, which about 95% of humans tend to ignore, but it’s not rocket science; anyone can do it after some practice (while also practicing thinking a few more “chess” moves than whatever is offered by “scientists”):

Nobody can read every important paper, but reading too many without being able to prioritize can only result in confusion.

Next, I would like to invite Schantz to a series of private discussions, because I am optimistic that we can straighten out our differences.

Currently, his proposed solution doesn’t seem to solve any problems, and I’m sure he and I can do better! :)

And no, I am not going to read many more “academic” papers in my life; have had my fill with them, to which many of my readers might be able to relate.

You might be wondering who is buying, and don’t worry, every participant get paid: