4 ms·

Eric Weinstein is a delight to listen to: a polymath, a contrarian, a great interviewer, really gifted verbally. I'm a Portal subscriber and I've listened to hi

by sigil 7y ago

Eric Weinstein is a delight to listen to: a polymath, a contrarian, a great interviewer, really gifted verbally. I'm a Portal subscriber and I've listened to his Rogan interviews all the way through. That said... I have the sinking feeling that you're right about the breadth-first thing, and it's about to become a bigger issue. Back in the 80s Weinstein was working on an alternative Grand Unified Theory. When his work was marginalized, he never really got over it, and he's now using his platform (an important platform for many other reasons!) to try and right that wrong. To that end, he just published a 2013 talk he gave at Oxford on this theory. [0] What he has not published in all these years, afaik, is an actual math paper describing his theory. This is the mark of a charlatan. I fear for Eric, and for all the other positive things springing up around The Portal, if it's discovered he lacks the depth and rigor we've all been assuming he has. In other words, he could turn out to be not just a "breadth-first associative thinker," but someone who lacks the self-awareness to know when he's out of his depth; a dangerous know-it-all. Eric if you're reading this: publish the paper the damn paper -- with the help of a mathematician or physicist if needed -- or drop it. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7rd04KzLcg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7rd04KzLcg

knzhou 7y ago
PhD student in theoretical physics here. I will confirm: Weinstein is a charlatan, and all of us know it. As far as I can tell, the only people who believe in him are non-physicists who consume exclusively pop science. In other words, he's acting as the literal definition of a dishonest public intellectual. It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise.
- crispyambulance 7y ago
  > It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise. I agree, if by "verbal fluency" you mean stringing together heavyweight jargon and concepts like Eddy Van Halen doing a guitar riff. Even in a colloquium filled with subject matter experts that kind of pace is off-putting and raises red-flags instantly-- but this guy does it when communicating with the general public, fully knowing that people are going to be lost in a matter of seconds. ... so yeah, that and NO FREAKING PAPERS. It's a bit disconcerting for a theory that purports to unify relativity with quantum mechanics.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    Exactly, he was obviously intentionally trying to overwhelm people with jargon. That drives me crazy. Other physicists don't do this, because it serves no purpose aside from making the speaker look smart, and we have other priorities.
- jamesrcole 7y ago
  In general, or just in physics? If the former, what is the evidence for that?
  - knzhou 7y ago
    I can only speak for sure about what he's said about physics. The fundamental problem with talking about highly technical things (like theories of everything) to a popular audience is that it's totally one-sided: he could spout nonsense and none of his listeners would have the slightest chance of noticing, as long as it sounded complicated enough. It's just like how you could talk somebody tech illiterate into installing malware. I don't know about his other opinions, but for nontechnical topics, the audience can check for themselves whether the conclusions make sense. So if you think they do, it's probably fine.
    - Igelau 7y ago
      > I can only speak for sure about what he's said about physics. Please do.
      - dodobirdlord 7y ago
        In case you don't get a response, this seems topical. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cocktail-party-physics/dear-guardian-youve-been-played/ https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cocktail-party-physics/... It seems that there has (a) been no paper, so his theories remain too vague to even properly criticize, but (b) as far as people can tell from the vagueness, his theory predicts the existence of particles that the LHC should have detected but has not.
        genzoman 7y ago
        his theory predicts the existence of particles that the LHC should have detected but has not. So has another pop science disaster, string theory.
      - knzhou 7y ago
- AzzieElbab 7y ago
  Whenever you feel saying "all of us" your credibility goes down to zero.
  - knzhou 7y ago
    I'm sorry if you don't like it, but it's true.
- 77pt77 7y ago
  > It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise. Humans pay more attention to tone than to content. More than we care to admit.
- playing_colours 7y ago
  I have mixed feelings about Weinstein, but I am not a physicist. He said on Joe Rogan podcast that he was a not professional physicist, and he sounded quite modest about the correcness of his theories, said that he was looking for constructive feedback. To me, that's a sign of a self-aware person. On the other hand, he kind of uses his Portal community and podcast - where there are interesting important discussions on many social issues - to promote his theory. This theory sounds smart for non-physicists, they cannot see flaws in it, and he preaches passionately about it - thus he can ignite enthusiasm in his community about the theory and grow the cult of the unrecognised genius, misunderstood and rejected by official science community. Dr.Weinstein, please, write a book, a paper, elaborate on some response before pushing your theory on masses. This can discredit your other important activities.
motohagiography 7y ago
The main difference between breadth first search, and depth first search is that it is applicable to different types of problems. It's great to master something, but depth first thinkers also tend to be content with the external peer recognition of their narrow niche, without challenging it or moving it forward. It's a lot like fox/hedgehog and other tropes. So to use breadth as a euphemism for charlatanism is a bit tendentious. From what I can tell, the main indicator of being a charlatan is losing political battles. I saw the guy on Rogan and I sympathize with the challenge of having both the breadth and depth to wade into that band of status anxiety where mediocre talents feel threatened by cross disciplinary thinkers focused on a bigger picture. They can behave like an immune response and pile on, so it's a hard spot to be in. Couldn't say whether he was or wasn't, but to be sure, depth-first thinking has equivalent limits.
ianai 7y ago
To me the entire portion of that interview with Joe Rogan was just someone talking about absolutely everything but the elephant in the room. Then he eventually talked himself out of all other topics and detailed why he was really there - to discuss his GUT. Yes, it’s weird for someone outside of a field to try and introduce a whole new concept to it. But it’s been done. Einstein was a parent clerk, I think one of the Bernoulli’s was a lawyer for an entire career before contributing anything, and Galois made a huge contribution to math immediately before being killed and from absolute obscurity. Look, academia is sick and has been sick for as long as anyone can remember. I left math because all it takes is one grudge from one professor to tank your entire academic career. For as long as that’s going to continue people will be contributing to human knowledge through out of band channels.
- sigil 7y ago
  Eric might be onto something. I want to believe. It’s not only possible that academia has rejected valuable but threatening ideas, it’s likely. However, the only way forward from this point is for Eric to publish his ideas in definite form — in the language of mathematics — for the rest of us to evaluate for ourselves. Paper or GTFO.
  - 0x8BADF00D 7y ago
    This reminds me of the ICO scams in recent times. They would publish a half baked white paper and raise millions in a few days. Instead of being a viable alternative to the venture capital model, ICOs became a tool to separate the unwitting from their money. Maybe that’s what Weinstein and his ilk are really after.
    - ianai 7y ago
      Show me where he’s asked for money for his idea.
elamje 7y ago
Based on the negative comments here, I get the feeling that many people feel like it is fraud to put forth an innovative idea without a paper to back it up. It makes me think of Nassim Taleb who has really added some valuable mental models that are extremely intuitive to the layman, but now his twitter existence is spent posting boring paper after paper of math to prove his ideas are correct. I am unqualified to speak to Weinstein’s theory and what it lacks, but I like underscoring the trend I mentioned above when it surfaces in some form. On another note, I highly recommend listening to the Jeffrey Epstein podcast on the Portal. It’s not a typical podcast, but rather something Weinstein felt obligated to release into the ether.
Reedx 7y ago
It's worth keeping in perspective. ~99% of his platform has been about other things. Also, in the referenced video he says he wants to work on further developing the theory now. It's not complete and doesn't claim that it'll work. He says repeatedly that it may be wrong, even pointing out it could be fools gold. He also notes he's not a physicist and doesn't have all the necessary skills. He's openly questioning, starting to present an idea and working on it. At this point it doesn't strike me charlatan-like and I don't see how it's dangerous given all of his disclaimers... just seems like an outsider taking an unorthodox approach.

by sigil 7y ago

knzhou 7y ago

PhD student in theoretical physics here. I will confirm: Weinstein is a charlatan, and all of us know it. As far as I can tell, the only people who believe in him are non-physicists who consume exclusively pop science. In other words, he's acting as the literal definition of a dishonest public intellectual. It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise.

crispyambulance 7y ago
> It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise. I agree, if by "verbal fluency" you mean stringing together heavyweight jargon and concepts like Eddy Van Halen doing a guitar riff. Even in a colloquium filled with subject matter experts that kind of pace is off-putting and raises red-flags instantly-- but this guy does it when communicating with the general public, fully knowing that people are going to be lost in a matter of seconds. ... so yeah, that and NO FREAKING PAPERS. It's a bit disconcerting for a theory that purports to unify relativity with quantum mechanics.
- knzhou 7y ago
  Exactly, he was obviously intentionally trying to overwhelm people with jargon. That drives me crazy. Other physicists don't do this, because it serves no purpose aside from making the speaker look smart, and we have other priorities.
jamesrcole 7y ago
In general, or just in physics? If the former, what is the evidence for that?
- knzhou 7y ago
  I can only speak for sure about what he's said about physics. The fundamental problem with talking about highly technical things (like theories of everything) to a popular audience is that it's totally one-sided: he could spout nonsense and none of his listeners would have the slightest chance of noticing, as long as it sounded complicated enough. It's just like how you could talk somebody tech illiterate into installing malware. I don't know about his other opinions, but for nontechnical topics, the audience can check for themselves whether the conclusions make sense. So if you think they do, it's probably fine.
  - Igelau 7y ago
    > I can only speak for sure about what he's said about physics. Please do.
    - dodobirdlord 7y ago
      In case you don't get a response, this seems topical. https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cocktail-party-physics/dear-guardian-youve-been-played/ https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cocktail-party-physics/... It seems that there has (a) been no paper, so his theories remain too vague to even properly criticize, but (b) as far as people can tell from the vagueness, his theory predicts the existence of particles that the LHC should have detected but has not.
      - genzoman 7y ago
        his theory predicts the existence of particles that the LHC should have detected but has not. So has another pop science disaster, string theory.
    - knzhou 7y ago
AzzieElbab 7y ago
Whenever you feel saying "all of us" your credibility goes down to zero.
- knzhou 7y ago
  I'm sorry if you don't like it, but it's true.
77pt77 7y ago
> It's just sad, and it really shows the yawning chasm between verbal fluency and real expertise. Humans pay more attention to tone than to content. More than we care to admit.
playing_colours 7y ago
I have mixed feelings about Weinstein, but I am not a physicist. He said on Joe Rogan podcast that he was a not professional physicist, and he sounded quite modest about the correcness of his theories, said that he was looking for constructive feedback. To me, that's a sign of a self-aware person. On the other hand, he kind of uses his Portal community and podcast - where there are interesting important discussions on many social issues - to promote his theory. This theory sounds smart for non-physicists, they cannot see flaws in it, and he preaches passionately about it - thus he can ignite enthusiasm in his community about the theory and grow the cult of the unrecognised genius, misunderstood and rejected by official science community. Dr.Weinstein, please, write a book, a paper, elaborate on some response before pushing your theory on masses. This can discredit your other important activities.

motohagiography 7y ago

The main difference between breadth first search, and depth first search is that it is applicable to different types of problems. It's great to master something, but depth first thinkers also tend to be content with the external peer recognition of their narrow niche, without challenging it or moving it forward. It's a lot like fox/hedgehog and other tropes. So to use breadth as a euphemism for charlatanism is a bit tendentious. From what I can tell, the main indicator of being a charlatan is losing political battles. I saw the guy on Rogan and I sympathize with the challenge of having both the breadth and depth to wade into that band of status anxiety where mediocre talents feel threatened by cross disciplinary thinkers focused on a bigger picture. They can behave like an immune response and pile on, so it's a hard spot to be in. Couldn't say whether he was or wasn't, but to be sure, depth-first thinking has equivalent limits.

ianai 7y ago

To me the entire portion of that interview with Joe Rogan was just someone talking about absolutely everything but the elephant in the room. Then he eventually talked himself out of all other topics and detailed why he was really there - to discuss his GUT. Yes, it’s weird for someone outside of a field to try and introduce a whole new concept to it. But it’s been done. Einstein was a parent clerk, I think one of the Bernoulli’s was a lawyer for an entire career before contributing anything, and Galois made a huge contribution to math immediately before being killed and from absolute obscurity. Look, academia is sick and has been sick for as long as anyone can remember. I left math because all it takes is one grudge from one professor to tank your entire academic career. For as long as that’s going to continue people will be contributing to human knowledge through out of band channels.

sigil 7y ago
Eric might be onto something. I want to believe. It’s not only possible that academia has rejected valuable but threatening ideas, it’s likely. However, the only way forward from this point is for Eric to publish his ideas in definite form — in the language of mathematics — for the rest of us to evaluate for ourselves. Paper or GTFO.
- 0x8BADF00D 7y ago
  This reminds me of the ICO scams in recent times. They would publish a half baked white paper and raise millions in a few days. Instead of being a viable alternative to the venture capital model, ICOs became a tool to separate the unwitting from their money. Maybe that’s what Weinstein and his ilk are really after.
  - ianai 7y ago
    Show me where he’s asked for money for his idea.

elamje 7y ago

Based on the negative comments here, I get the feeling that many people feel like it is fraud to put forth an innovative idea without a paper to back it up. It makes me think of Nassim Taleb who has really added some valuable mental models that are extremely intuitive to the layman, but now his twitter existence is spent posting boring paper after paper of math to prove his ideas are correct. I am unqualified to speak to Weinstein’s theory and what it lacks, but I like underscoring the trend I mentioned above when it surfaces in some form. On another note, I highly recommend listening to the Jeffrey Epstein podcast on the Portal. It’s not a typical podcast, but rather something Weinstein felt obligated to release into the ether.

Reedx 7y ago

It's worth keeping in perspective. ~99% of his platform has been about other things. Also, in the referenced video he says he wants to work on further developing the theory now. It's not complete and doesn't claim that it'll work. He says repeatedly that it may be wrong, even pointing out it could be fools gold. He also notes he's not a physicist and doesn't have all the necessary skills. He's openly questioning, starting to present an idea and working on it. At this point it doesn't strike me charlatan-like and I don't see how it's dangerous given all of his disclaimers... just seems like an outsider taking an unorthodox approach.