4 ms·

I am making a note to read the paper because this interview was a disaster. The interviewer asked a personal question about religious beliefs and denies that th

I am making a note to read the paper because this interview was a disaster. The interviewer asked a personal question about religious beliefs and denies that the question was inappropriate after putting him on the defensive by questioning his reasoning from a decidedly uninformed perspective. Why not survey others in the field and voice their objections instead of condescending to the interviewee? This reads like some weird gotcha journalism... in The New Yorker of all places.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
tokai 8y ago
If you as an interviewer ever say "Hold on. Let me finish", you have failed and should rethink your methodology. It was embarrassing to read.
- pmoriarty 8y ago
  There's a much better interview here: https://boingboing.net/2018/12/06/interview-with-the-astronomer.html https://boingboing.net/2018/12/06/interview-with-the-astrono...
  - tokai 8y ago
    Thank you. I'll read it. I have heard multiple interviews of Loeb on youtube.[0] I like that he doesn't hide away the potential for wonder in astrology/cosmology. In that way he reminds me of Sagan a great deal. Sagan faced some ridicule as well in his time, so go figure. [0] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz3qvETKooktNgCvvheuQDw/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz3qvETKooktNgCvvheuQDw/vid...
TomMckenny 8y ago
For some reason, it seems a widespread habit to drift from astronomical or quantum discussions into religion. So widespread that we see Apollo astronauts reading Genesis and Youtube search results on those topics return a jumble real science with mysticism. Yet this seems to happen much less for, say, chemistry, geology, materials science etc. (nor software questions mercifully) It's not quite clear why (western?) minds are wired this way. Particularly since chemistry was tied up with mysticism for centuries yet subatomic science is brand new. But it would be nice if at least professional interviewers would avoid straying into non-sequiturs.
explainplease 8y ago
> This reads like some weird gotcha journalism... in The New Yorker of all places. Why is that surprising to you? It's amusingly similar to the discussions here about astronomy: based on observations and predictions, if one were looking for gotcha journalism, one would probably point a telescope for the gotcha wavelength at the New Yorker.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

tokai 8y ago

If you as an interviewer ever say "Hold on. Let me finish", you have failed and should rethink your methodology. It was embarrassing to read.

pmoriarty 8y ago
There's a much better interview here: https://boingboing.net/2018/12/06/interview-with-the-astronomer.html https://boingboing.net/2018/12/06/interview-with-the-astrono...
- tokai 8y ago
  Thank you. I'll read it. I have heard multiple interviews of Loeb on youtube.[0] I like that he doesn't hide away the potential for wonder in astrology/cosmology. In that way he reminds me of Sagan a great deal. Sagan faced some ridicule as well in his time, so go figure. [0] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz3qvETKooktNgCvvheuQDw/videos https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCz3qvETKooktNgCvvheuQDw/vid...

TomMckenny 8y ago

For some reason, it seems a widespread habit to drift from astronomical or quantum discussions into religion. So widespread that we see Apollo astronauts reading Genesis and Youtube search results on those topics return a jumble real science with mysticism. Yet this seems to happen much less for, say, chemistry, geology, materials science etc. (nor software questions mercifully) It's not quite clear why (western?) minds are wired this way. Particularly since chemistry was tied up with mysticism for centuries yet subatomic science is brand new. But it would be nice if at least professional interviewers would avoid straying into non-sequiturs.

explainplease 8y ago

> This reads like some weird gotcha journalism... in The New Yorker of all places. Why is that surprising to you? It's amusingly similar to the discussions here about astronomy: based on observations and predictions, if one were looking for gotcha journalism, one would probably point a telescope for the gotcha wavelength at the New Yorker.