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"Just asking questions" and then rejecting a community's answers seems like a fruitless strategy for learning. It is also uncomfortably close to the tactics of
by hitekker 6y ago
"Just asking questions" and then rejecting a community's answers seems like a fruitless strategy for learning.
It is also uncomfortably close to the tactics of creationists, antivaxxers, and other conspiracy theorists.
- danpalmer 6y agoI don't think I am rejecting the community's answer, I'm encouraging the community to be better at communicating their answer, rather than brushing off questions from lay-people with impenetrable answers. I'm very keen to have things explained at my level, because I get the "crackpot" feeling from Wolfram, I just don't know enough to understand why he's wrong. I've done science communication myself, I helped run a science festival, I know many people who still do it and are very good at it. I know how important it is to communicate well and how much impact it can have! I've even seen good science communication turn creationists and antivaxxers. I must admit I had seen the parallels while writing these things, but I've also seen people who unfortunately do believe these things turned away from mainstream science because they aren't yet at a level of understanding that the community mandates they operate at. Unfortunately for the mainstream scientific community there's often a disdain for communication like this. The fact that Wolfram is relatively good at it makes the whole situation more difficult.