4 ms·

Gravitational Waves: The Silent Disaster

20 points by nixtaken 6y ago

chrispeel 6y ago
This article does not come across as especially credible. I'm not a physicist, but my bullshit detector is indicating that the main thing desired here is attention There's a nice photo of the author on his website: http://alexander-unzicker.com/ http://alexander-unzicker.com/
nixtaken 6y ago
I just don't understand why when he (a neuroscientist) writes about gravitational wave scepticism, he gets tons of upvotes on Medium and here, but when a woman PhD in physics writes about it first and with much more background knowledge, she gets nothing. https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirsten-Hacker/answers/Laser-Interferometer-Gravitational-wave-Observatory-LIGO https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirsten-Hacker/answers/Laser-I... https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/ghostly-gravitational-waves/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/ghostly-gravi...
- Gravityloss 6y ago
  Maybe it was because the Kirsten Hacker article's tone was a bit annoying to read. I upvoted your submission anyway as it might be a valuable question to ask.
- acqq 6y ago
  Translating Wikipedia entry about him: "He works as a high school teacher in Munich" Before: "studied physics and law" ... "and in 1993 obtained a diploma in physics and a state examination in law. In 2001 he received his doctorate in neuroscience from the Institute of Medical Psychology at LMU Munich." Investigating more, he is just the guy that writes books claiming "science bad" and of course there are enough who like to buy that. He also "maintains presence" in the electronic media, for the same purpose (of selling his "work"). But no real science is done by him. LIGO, VIRGO etc are real science, in spite of what he writes. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2017/press-release/ https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2017/press-release... The real scientists are celebrating the achievement, but one German high school teacher who never contributed to physics somehow "sees the light"? If his arguments were even valid, he would be recognized too.
- robocat 6y ago
  Edit 2: You are Kirsten, right? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22083351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22083351 If so using third person is extremely deceptive writing in my opinion. Change it to first person: “When I, with a PhD in physics, writes about it first and with much more background knowledge...“. “Writes about it first” is also plain wrong, it’s not like the physicists aren’t arguing and articles already exist https://www.heise.de/tp/features/Fake-News-from-the-Universe-4464599.html https://www.heise.de/tp/features/Fake-News-from-the-Universe... Rest of my comment was written before I thought nixtaxen was Kirsten. I think your comment is disingenuous: you are the only submitter of articles from Kirsten Hacker: https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=kirstenhacker.wordpress.com https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=kirstenhacker.wordpre... It takes some effort to get banned on HN (and ban is clearly removed now): https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/ive-been-blacklisted/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/ive-been-blac... and personally I think her recent article is a pointless rant: https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/evolution-of-group-delusion/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/evolution-of-... I had looked through her site earlier today - lots of skepticism without good follow-through reasoning that can be evaluated. Examples: “I don’t really believe that black holes exist because I think that theorists got drunk on general relativity and invented them.“ - https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/08/24/signs-of-the-times/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/08/24/signs-of-the-... It is science to question everything, but it is also science to look for flaws in ones own guesses. https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/09/05/blue-skies/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/09/05/blue-skies/ questions Raleigh scattering, but it then seems to accept those questions as equals (her article reads like bad journalism, or evolution vs intelligent design.) Finally, you are framing this as sexism, which I think will usually give you a poor response. Sexism exists, and it is hard to find effective ways to fight it, but some approaches do more harm than good. Edit: PS: I do think Kirsten Hacker’s articles are interesting, and a bit of her scepticism seems reasonable and valid to my ignorant eyes: hopefully scientists can use her criticism when it has value. Also if Kirsten wishes to be able to say “I was right” then I think her targets need to be more focused and well argued — if she is sceptical about everything and cherry picking her supporting material, then there is no signal in the noise, and there will be zero recognition for any “predictions”.
  - 6y ago
jti107 6y ago
https://www.quantamagazine.org/studies-rescue-ligos-gravitational-wave-signal-from-the-noise-20181213/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/studies-rescue-ligos-gravitat...
- mturmon 6y ago
  Thanks. This is a better explanation of what has happened with GW observations than the OP, which seems to be garbage.
- deng 6y ago
  From the article: > But Green and Moffat inferred that the Copenhagen physicists had not “windowed” the two sets of noise data. If that is true, that would be a rookie mistake.
mhh__ 6y ago
As far as I can see Unzicker seems like a crank. He seems to have the mentality of physics as a community backwards - it would be extremely productive if LIGO came back with a negative result - not a disaster. Wave equations drop out of general relativity (and general relativity works almost everywhere else), if they weren't there what gives?

20 points by nixtaken 6y ago

This article does not come across as especially credible. I'm not a physicist, but my bullshit detector is indicating that the main thing desired here is attention There's a nice photo of the author on his website: http://alexander-unzicker.com/ http://alexander-unzicker.com/

nixtaken 6y ago

I just don't understand why when he (a neuroscientist) writes about gravitational wave scepticism, he gets tons of upvotes on Medium and here, but when a woman PhD in physics writes about it first and with much more background knowledge, she gets nothing. https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirsten-Hacker/answers/Laser-Interferometer-Gravitational-wave-Observatory-LIGO https://www.quora.com/profile/Kirsten-Hacker/answers/Laser-I... https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/ghostly-gravitational-waves/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/05/11/ghostly-gravi...

Gravityloss 6y ago
Maybe it was because the Kirsten Hacker article's tone was a bit annoying to read. I upvoted your submission anyway as it might be a valuable question to ask.
acqq 6y ago
Translating Wikipedia entry about him: "He works as a high school teacher in Munich" Before: "studied physics and law" ... "and in 1993 obtained a diploma in physics and a state examination in law. In 2001 he received his doctorate in neuroscience from the Institute of Medical Psychology at LMU Munich." Investigating more, he is just the guy that writes books claiming "science bad" and of course there are enough who like to buy that. He also "maintains presence" in the electronic media, for the same purpose (of selling his "work"). But no real science is done by him. LIGO, VIRGO etc are real science, in spite of what he writes. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2017/press-release/ https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/2017/press-release... The real scientists are celebrating the achievement, but one German high school teacher who never contributed to physics somehow "sees the light"? If his arguments were even valid, he would be recognized too.
robocat 6y ago
Edit 2: You are Kirsten, right? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22083351 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22083351 If so using third person is extremely deceptive writing in my opinion. Change it to first person: “When I, with a PhD in physics, writes about it first and with much more background knowledge...“. “Writes about it first” is also plain wrong, it’s not like the physicists aren’t arguing and articles already exist https://www.heise.de/tp/features/Fake-News-from-the-Universe-4464599.html https://www.heise.de/tp/features/Fake-News-from-the-Universe... Rest of my comment was written before I thought nixtaxen was Kirsten. I think your comment is disingenuous: you are the only submitter of articles from Kirsten Hacker: https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=kirstenhacker.wordpress.com https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=kirstenhacker.wordpre... It takes some effort to get banned on HN (and ban is clearly removed now): https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/ive-been-blacklisted/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/ive-been-blac... and personally I think her recent article is a pointless rant: https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/evolution-of-group-delusion/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2020/04/29/evolution-of-... I had looked through her site earlier today - lots of skepticism without good follow-through reasoning that can be evaluated. Examples: “I don’t really believe that black holes exist because I think that theorists got drunk on general relativity and invented them.“ - https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/08/24/signs-of-the-times/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/08/24/signs-of-the-... It is science to question everything, but it is also science to look for flaws in ones own guesses. https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/09/05/blue-skies/ https://kirstenhacker.wordpress.com/2019/09/05/blue-skies/ questions Raleigh scattering, but it then seems to accept those questions as equals (her article reads like bad journalism, or evolution vs intelligent design.) Finally, you are framing this as sexism, which I think will usually give you a poor response. Sexism exists, and it is hard to find effective ways to fight it, but some approaches do more harm than good. Edit: PS: I do think Kirsten Hacker’s articles are interesting, and a bit of her scepticism seems reasonable and valid to my ignorant eyes: hopefully scientists can use her criticism when it has value. Also if Kirsten wishes to be able to say “I was right” then I think her targets need to be more focused and well argued — if she is sceptical about everything and cherry picking her supporting material, then there is no signal in the noise, and there will be zero recognition for any “predictions”.
- 6y ago

jti107 6y ago

https://www.quantamagazine.org/studies-rescue-ligos-gravitational-wave-signal-from-the-noise-20181213/ https://www.quantamagazine.org/studies-rescue-ligos-gravitat...

mturmon 6y ago
Thanks. This is a better explanation of what has happened with GW observations than the OP, which seems to be garbage.
deng 6y ago
From the article: > But Green and Moffat inferred that the Copenhagen physicists had not “windowed” the two sets of noise data. If that is true, that would be a rookie mistake.

mhh__ 6y ago

As far as I can see Unzicker seems like a crank. He seems to have the mentality of physics as a community backwards - it would be extremely productive if LIGO came back with a negative result - not a disaster. Wave equations drop out of general relativity (and general relativity works almost everywhere else), if they weren't there what gives?