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I know it's not an excuse but Sabine definitely "starts it". Just look at her wording in the blog post? She is always combative at the outset. She does not seem

I know it's not an excuse but Sabine definitely "starts it". Just look at her wording in the blog post? She is always combative at the outset. She does not seem to have the kind of people skills required to harshly (and you can't deny it's harsh) and publicly criticise an entire field without upsetting everyone in that field. It takes skill to do that in a good way. Unfortunately for her, the only people who are really strongly swayed by her arguments are her following of lay people, because the physicists are either 1) enough into theoretical particle physics that they immediately reject her undiplomatic comments (even if they may be right) or 2) like me a physicist who knows they know so little about theoretical particle physics that they should not have an opinion on it. Physics twitter is very cordial and positive if you simply ignore Sabine.

PeterStuer 4y ago
I have no horse in this race, but ... 1) 'undiplomatic' and 'truth' aren't mutually exclusive. While science is highly social in it's game, it is not in its object. Otherwise the discipline is scientism, not science. 2) even if I knew nothing about the intricacies of counting angles on the head of a pin, I can still have an opinion on its usefulness, lack of verifiability or predictive power. In a software analogy: A black box test still reveals errors even when it doesn't show how the errors are produced.
- bowsamic 4y ago
  1) If you aren't diplomatic while telling people their work is stupid and pointless then no one will listen to you. If no one will listen to you you may as well not talk. 2) No, you can't, or at least, your uninformed "opinion" is worthless. To clarify, Sabine's is not worthless, since she is actually a theoretical particle physicist. A lay person's opinion on the matter is worth nothing.
  - iopq 4y ago
    A lay person like a politician can complain they get no return on their investment, for example
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Thankfully politicians don't think of science in terms of "return on investment" Obviously it must be justified as scientifically important, but they do not expect "something back". Government agencies generally take a more blurry and general approach to R&D, since you cannot predict what comes out of a given experiment. No one predicted an absolute revolution in squeezed light from gravitational wave detection for example. Einstein Telescope and Cosmic Explorer will probably both get funded even though the science case is very minimal and they will cost many billions
      - boltzmann-brain 4y ago
        After fifty years and $x T of investment you can easily tell that something's a waste of money. I say that as someone with background in physics. This is another "industry for its own sake", just like the nasa/aerospace/boeing industrial complex, which was clearly so terrible that people decided to overthrow it, and in 10 years we've reached more progress than those people did since the 70s.
        bowsamic 4y ago
        But no one who actually controls any money thinks that LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA or LHC or whatever were wastes of money
        boltzmann-brain 4y ago
        Which is a fair observation because that's exactly the crux of the problem.
        bowsamic 4y ago
        I don't understand why you think it's a problem
      - User23 4y ago
        Politicians think of Big Science in terms of appropriations and sending cash to their principals, who are neither the electorate nor scientists. They don’t consider any money that buys their re-election a waste. They don’t give a rat’s ass if you discover anything and it sounds like you know it. So-called science these days is little different from military spending. As usual, follow the money.
  - vishnugupta 4y ago
    Well said. As objective as science is it is humans who are doing science, who have emotions, vested interests and so on. So if someone criticises a whole body of people then be prepared -- best case they are completely ignored, worst case they are retaliated. No surprises there. About opinion; yes sure we all can have it. But please when you offer it then be nice, be open to feedback, be curious. Don't go out all guns blazing.
  - Ygg2 4y ago
    Being diplomatic doesn't guarantee results either. Guy that noticed people handling corpses should wash hands before doing medical operation got declared a nutcase and died in an asylum. People going after Sabine aren't that much better. It's obvious particle physicists are stuck in a rut, their best theories can't unify gravity and QM or explain dark matter/energy.
    - perihelions 4y ago
      (For those unfamiliar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis )
  - JackFr 4y ago
    > A lay person's opinion on the matter is worth nothing. And yet they still want my money. Weird.
    - bowsamic 4y ago
      Well that's not your choice to make, that's how taxation works. The government choose how to manage and spend a portion of your money. Do you think your opinion matters in deciding if a hospital should be built? Or if we should pay for a new vaccine? No, because you don't know anything about those things. And neither do I. So yes, I will take your money and build my big experiment, and I don't feel bad about it, because I am the expert.
      - User23 4y ago
        This comment will be a wonderful exhibit in the letter I write to my congressman about waste, fraud, and abuse. Thank you!
        bowsamic 4y ago
        Where is the waste, fraud, and abuse in my comment?
lewispollard 4y ago
Well, I agree, unfortunately. Sabine is smart and knowledgeable, but when people try to engage with her in ways that push the boundaries of her knowledge, and especially when that may be some uncomfortable "unknown" position that we have no certainty on, Sabine will usually (in my observations) double down on her position and refuse to even entertain an outside idea, often in a derisive and short way that cuts off any form of dialogue about the issue. I don't have examples to hand as it's early and I can't be bothered, those are merely my observations based on a handful of interactions I've seen with her on twitter and adjacent spaces (such as podcasts), and should be taken as such.
- fsh 4y ago
  Her blog posts criticizing LIGO were based on a series of papers with very obvious flaws. She never addressed that it might have been a mistake to blog about it without talking to experts before.

PeterStuer 4y ago

I have no horse in this race, but ... 1) 'undiplomatic' and 'truth' aren't mutually exclusive. While science is highly social in it's game, it is not in its object. Otherwise the discipline is scientism, not science. 2) even if I knew nothing about the intricacies of counting angles on the head of a pin, I can still have an opinion on its usefulness, lack of verifiability or predictive power. In a software analogy: A black box test still reveals errors even when it doesn't show how the errors are produced.

bowsamic 4y ago
1) If you aren't diplomatic while telling people their work is stupid and pointless then no one will listen to you. If no one will listen to you you may as well not talk. 2) No, you can't, or at least, your uninformed "opinion" is worthless. To clarify, Sabine's is not worthless, since she is actually a theoretical particle physicist. A lay person's opinion on the matter is worth nothing.
- iopq 4y ago
  A lay person like a politician can complain they get no return on their investment, for example
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    Thankfully politicians don't think of science in terms of "return on investment" Obviously it must be justified as scientifically important, but they do not expect "something back". Government agencies generally take a more blurry and general approach to R&D, since you cannot predict what comes out of a given experiment. No one predicted an absolute revolution in squeezed light from gravitational wave detection for example. Einstein Telescope and Cosmic Explorer will probably both get funded even though the science case is very minimal and they will cost many billions
    - boltzmann-brain 4y ago
      After fifty years and $x T of investment you can easily tell that something's a waste of money. I say that as someone with background in physics. This is another "industry for its own sake", just like the nasa/aerospace/boeing industrial complex, which was clearly so terrible that people decided to overthrow it, and in 10 years we've reached more progress than those people did since the 70s.
      - bowsamic 4y ago
        But no one who actually controls any money thinks that LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA or LHC or whatever were wastes of money
        boltzmann-brain 4y ago
        Which is a fair observation because that's exactly the crux of the problem.
        bowsamic 4y ago
        I don't understand why you think it's a problem
    - User23 4y ago
      Politicians think of Big Science in terms of appropriations and sending cash to their principals, who are neither the electorate nor scientists. They don’t consider any money that buys their re-election a waste. They don’t give a rat’s ass if you discover anything and it sounds like you know it. So-called science these days is little different from military spending. As usual, follow the money.
- vishnugupta 4y ago
  Well said. As objective as science is it is humans who are doing science, who have emotions, vested interests and so on. So if someone criticises a whole body of people then be prepared -- best case they are completely ignored, worst case they are retaliated. No surprises there. About opinion; yes sure we all can have it. But please when you offer it then be nice, be open to feedback, be curious. Don't go out all guns blazing.
- Ygg2 4y ago
  Being diplomatic doesn't guarantee results either. Guy that noticed people handling corpses should wash hands before doing medical operation got declared a nutcase and died in an asylum. People going after Sabine aren't that much better. It's obvious particle physicists are stuck in a rut, their best theories can't unify gravity and QM or explain dark matter/energy.
  - perihelions 4y ago
    (For those unfamiliar: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis )
- JackFr 4y ago
  > A lay person's opinion on the matter is worth nothing. And yet they still want my money. Weird.
  - bowsamic 4y ago
    Well that's not your choice to make, that's how taxation works. The government choose how to manage and spend a portion of your money. Do you think your opinion matters in deciding if a hospital should be built? Or if we should pay for a new vaccine? No, because you don't know anything about those things. And neither do I. So yes, I will take your money and build my big experiment, and I don't feel bad about it, because I am the expert.
    - User23 4y ago
      This comment will be a wonderful exhibit in the letter I write to my congressman about waste, fraud, and abuse. Thank you!
      - bowsamic 4y ago
        Where is the waste, fraud, and abuse in my comment?

lewispollard 4y ago

Well, I agree, unfortunately. Sabine is smart and knowledgeable, but when people try to engage with her in ways that push the boundaries of her knowledge, and especially when that may be some uncomfortable "unknown" position that we have no certainty on, Sabine will usually (in my observations) double down on her position and refuse to even entertain an outside idea, often in a derisive and short way that cuts off any form of dialogue about the issue. I don't have examples to hand as it's early and I can't be bothered, those are merely my observations based on a handful of interactions I've seen with her on twitter and adjacent spaces (such as podcasts), and should be taken as such.

fsh 4y ago
Her blog posts criticizing LIGO were based on a series of papers with very obvious flaws. She never addressed that it might have been a mistake to blog about it without talking to experts before.