3 ms·

Good synopsis. Given the pedigree of scientists involved my money is on #4.

hwillis 10y ago
I'm skeptical. The conclusions drawn in the first paper were... egregious. I think its more likely that there was insufficient oversight. I'm reminded of the FTL neutrino experiment.
- greglindahl 10y ago
  It's definitely an extraordinary claim. Even people excited about the possibilities should be tempering their expectations.
  - logicallee 10y ago
    do researchers not have professional courtesy to do something like replicate an experiment without publishing the experiment it was based on (without letting the cat out of the bag)? (I mean if they were approached to do so by a researcher with an extraordinary result.) What I mean is if someone across the world sent you a detailed methodology to test, without mentioning the result you're expected to get, would you do it for them without wanting coauthor credit, and without talking to anyone else about it?
    - hwillis 10y ago
      No. A project lead doesn't (usually) do all of something personally, so outside of large personal favors you'd be asking someone to have people under them do a ton of work to replicate something for no tangible benefit. At most you get a special mention, or very rarely are added to the author list. Replicating experiments requires extremely expensive equipment, materials, expertise and time. You can't bang out most experiments in a few afternoons. If you want to have your results replicated you do them again, because you're gonna be fastest and you're the only person you know 100% will follow the same steps.
      - logicallee 10y ago
        Thanks. This makes sense. Now that it had been published, are teams going to try to replicate and understand it? Or are some seeming breakthrough papers ignored because they "must" be wrong?
        hwillis 10y ago
        Given the publicity someone is probably already planning on looking into it. Publicity is one of the major differences between crank science that is ignored and other things like the reactionless drive at NASA. I wouldn't say that papers are ignored because they must be wrong. It's hard to make a definitive statement either way, but "revolutionary" experiments very rarely come with good rigor and examination (the neutrino experiment is one of the few counterexamples, it was excellent). Crappy papers get ignored, revolutionary or not. It's very rare that a paper is well-done, upsets normal beliefs, and isn't immediately seized on by the media and community.

I'm skeptical. The conclusions drawn in the first paper were... egregious. I think its more likely that there was insufficient oversight. I'm reminded of the FTL neutrino experiment.

greglindahl 10y ago
It's definitely an extraordinary claim. Even people excited about the possibilities should be tempering their expectations.
- logicallee 10y ago
  do researchers not have professional courtesy to do something like replicate an experiment without publishing the experiment it was based on (without letting the cat out of the bag)? (I mean if they were approached to do so by a researcher with an extraordinary result.) What I mean is if someone across the world sent you a detailed methodology to test, without mentioning the result you're expected to get, would you do it for them without wanting coauthor credit, and without talking to anyone else about it?
  - hwillis 10y ago
    No. A project lead doesn't (usually) do all of something personally, so outside of large personal favors you'd be asking someone to have people under them do a ton of work to replicate something for no tangible benefit. At most you get a special mention, or very rarely are added to the author list. Replicating experiments requires extremely expensive equipment, materials, expertise and time. You can't bang out most experiments in a few afternoons. If you want to have your results replicated you do them again, because you're gonna be fastest and you're the only person you know 100% will follow the same steps.
    - logicallee 10y ago
      Thanks. This makes sense. Now that it had been published, are teams going to try to replicate and understand it? Or are some seeming breakthrough papers ignored because they "must" be wrong?
      - hwillis 10y ago
        Given the publicity someone is probably already planning on looking into it. Publicity is one of the major differences between crank science that is ignored and other things like the reactionless drive at NASA. I wouldn't say that papers are ignored because they must be wrong. It's hard to make a definitive statement either way, but "revolutionary" experiments very rarely come with good rigor and examination (the neutrino experiment is one of the few counterexamples, it was excellent). Crappy papers get ignored, revolutionary or not. It's very rare that a paper is well-done, upsets normal beliefs, and isn't immediately seized on by the media and community.