4 ms·

Michio Kaku is a smart guy, but I wouldn't call him a "Top Physicist"

mrguyorama 3y ago
He's a "futurist", who's explicit job is to make hand wavey, big, shocking claims. Historically, futurists have a less than random chance at being right about the future. Also I would not consider him an expert in anything ML, though he probably has enough of the underlying math to get some things.
- momirlan 3y ago
  do you have anything to say about the points he's making, or just here to judge the person ?
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    I'm saying explicitly that the words that come out of Mr Kaku's mouth are noise, not signal. If he is right about something, it is in the way a broken clock is occasionally right. I agree with most of what he is saying personally, but that's not relevant.
- algon33 3y ago
  Kaku is a media sensationalist; that class of person has a terrible track record. Futurists, that is, people like Aasimov, have an ok track record at predicting the future. Interestingly, early futurist predictions about digital tech were pretty good. For "physical" goods? Not so much. A plausible explanation of this discrepancy is that they didn't predict the breakdown in the historial trend of increasing energy usage. See the Henry Adams curve.
momirlan 3y ago
a "co-founder of string field theory" (citation from Britannica) sounds like a top physicist. What are your contributions ?
- spott 3y ago
  He might have been a “top physicist”, but it appears he has long since started phoning it in. See the link to Aaronsons blog elsewhere in the thread for an example of the kind of drivel Kaku puts out, and why he shouldn’t be taken seriously.
- dekhn 3y ago
  string field theory is a a "field" of physics which is entirely theoretical and has no experiment data to back it up.... hard to imagine how even the top person in that field would be a top physicist given the large number of top physicists who are doing useful stuff like LIGO, CERN, etc.
Terr_ 3y ago
And especially not in an article where he's presented as being against "media sensationalism"... Compare the feeling of: "Top financial advisor Elon Musk warns against cults of personality, stresses importance of finance fundamentals."
jdkee 3y ago
Scott Aaronson agrees. See https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=7321 https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=7321
- Terr_ 3y ago
  That reminds me of giving your kids The Quantum Computing Talk... Which now that I look at it, Aaronson was involved in too: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3 https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3

He's a "futurist", who's explicit job is to make hand wavey, big, shocking claims. Historically, futurists have a less than random chance at being right about the future. Also I would not consider him an expert in anything ML, though he probably has enough of the underlying math to get some things.

momirlan 3y ago
do you have anything to say about the points he's making, or just here to judge the person ?
- mrguyorama 3y ago
  I'm saying explicitly that the words that come out of Mr Kaku's mouth are noise, not signal. If he is right about something, it is in the way a broken clock is occasionally right. I agree with most of what he is saying personally, but that's not relevant.
algon33 3y ago
Kaku is a media sensationalist; that class of person has a terrible track record. Futurists, that is, people like Aasimov, have an ok track record at predicting the future. Interestingly, early futurist predictions about digital tech were pretty good. For "physical" goods? Not so much. A plausible explanation of this discrepancy is that they didn't predict the breakdown in the historial trend of increasing energy usage. See the Henry Adams curve.

momirlan 3y ago

a "co-founder of string field theory" (citation from Britannica) sounds like a top physicist. What are your contributions ?

spott 3y ago
He might have been a “top physicist”, but it appears he has long since started phoning it in. See the link to Aaronsons blog elsewhere in the thread for an example of the kind of drivel Kaku puts out, and why he shouldn’t be taken seriously.
dekhn 3y ago
string field theory is a a "field" of physics which is entirely theoretical and has no experiment data to back it up.... hard to imagine how even the top person in that field would be a top physicist given the large number of top physicists who are doing useful stuff like LIGO, CERN, etc.

Terr_ 3y ago

And especially not in an article where he's presented as being against "media sensationalism"... Compare the feeling of: "Top financial advisor Elon Musk warns against cults of personality, stresses importance of finance fundamentals."

jdkee 3y ago

Scott Aaronson agrees. See https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=7321 https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=7321

Terr_ 3y ago
That reminds me of giving your kids The Quantum Computing Talk... Which now that I look at it, Aaronson was involved in too: https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3 https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/the-talk-3