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Well, literallycancer, that begs the question of why nobody helps me with their ability and suggestions to argue better. I have had to do everything on my own.

Well, literallycancer, that begs the question of why nobody helps me with their ability and suggestions to argue better. I have had to do everything on my own. The way this message of mine is treated is perhaps the reason for or the reflection of the fact that mankind's usage of science and technology seem predetermined to lead to destruction. But feel free to ignore me. Everyone does whatever they want regardless of their reason, facts, or personal truths, anyway.

schoen 10y ago
Your posts here have been pretty disparaging toward the scientific community. The scientific community does have problems with groupthink and cognitive biases, but it also has to contend with a flood of people who passionately defend idiosyncratic ideas without appearing to appreciate what counts as a scientific theory or scientific evidence. Every scientist and other technical domain expert has encountered dozens or hundreds of people offering the secret of why science is totally on the wrong track. (I don't work in physics or climate science, but I've experienced this in cryptography and number theory, which do relate to my job.) In order to be taken seriously, I'd suggest that novel physical theories should accurately use existing technical vocabulary and notation (and define and explain the motivation for any new vocabulary), be expressed in quantitative terms, not pick a fight with the scientific community or impugn its good faith or intelligence, and hopefully make empirical, testable predictions (including better-explaining observations compared to existing theories).
- blueprint 10y ago
  If I were attempting to propose a novel physical theory here, I would do exactly what you say. And in fact papers and apparatuses are being worked on. But here my point that we ought to establish another basket for our eggs stands entirely independently of the validity of such a theory/proposal. And what's interesting is how hard the push-back still is.
  - schoen 10y ago
    Space exploration and colonization have always been extraordinarily contentious issues, regardless of people's take on particular existential risks. I know people who think space colonization is unequivocally the most important thing humanity can possibly do, and people who think it's among the least important or maybe even actively wrongful. I don't think you can expect to find clear consensus on this point right now. But at least an Elon Musk-style "we should be working on permanent human presence in space to mitigate risks to humanity's survival" idea is relatively mainstream on HN. Elsewhere in the thread you seemed to strongly disagree with other commenters about the expense of space travel, seemingly based on a technical proposal that you want to make, and you were dismayed about other people's reactions to your ideas. But in at least some views, the empirical questions about cost and feasibility must matter a lot, because space colonization doesn't mitigate every problem or risk humanity faces and might not appear as the only or best option for mitigating some of them right now. Your technical ideas might cause you to weight some of these risks and costs very differently (for example, it sounds like you think human extinction on Earth is relatively likely soon and space travel can be made drastically cheaper than it is today), but that kind of disagreement puts you back in empirical-technical territory.

schoen 10y ago

Your posts here have been pretty disparaging toward the scientific community. The scientific community does have problems with groupthink and cognitive biases, but it also has to contend with a flood of people who passionately defend idiosyncratic ideas without appearing to appreciate what counts as a scientific theory or scientific evidence. Every scientist and other technical domain expert has encountered dozens or hundreds of people offering the secret of why science is totally on the wrong track. (I don't work in physics or climate science, but I've experienced this in cryptography and number theory, which do relate to my job.) In order to be taken seriously, I'd suggest that novel physical theories should accurately use existing technical vocabulary and notation (and define and explain the motivation for any new vocabulary), be expressed in quantitative terms, not pick a fight with the scientific community or impugn its good faith or intelligence, and hopefully make empirical, testable predictions (including better-explaining observations compared to existing theories).

blueprint 10y ago
If I were attempting to propose a novel physical theory here, I would do exactly what you say. And in fact papers and apparatuses are being worked on. But here my point that we ought to establish another basket for our eggs stands entirely independently of the validity of such a theory/proposal. And what's interesting is how hard the push-back still is.
- schoen 10y ago
  Space exploration and colonization have always been extraordinarily contentious issues, regardless of people's take on particular existential risks. I know people who think space colonization is unequivocally the most important thing humanity can possibly do, and people who think it's among the least important or maybe even actively wrongful. I don't think you can expect to find clear consensus on this point right now. But at least an Elon Musk-style "we should be working on permanent human presence in space to mitigate risks to humanity's survival" idea is relatively mainstream on HN. Elsewhere in the thread you seemed to strongly disagree with other commenters about the expense of space travel, seemingly based on a technical proposal that you want to make, and you were dismayed about other people's reactions to your ideas. But in at least some views, the empirical questions about cost and feasibility must matter a lot, because space colonization doesn't mitigate every problem or risk humanity faces and might not appear as the only or best option for mitigating some of them right now. Your technical ideas might cause you to weight some of these risks and costs very differently (for example, it sounds like you think human extinction on Earth is relatively likely soon and space travel can be made drastically cheaper than it is today), but that kind of disagreement puts you back in empirical-technical territory.