3 ms·

Sure, but there's a huge difference between the targeted "hey I read your latest paper and I had a few questions about section 2.4" and "Dear Entire Physics Dep

by dguest 3y ago

Sure, but there's a huge difference between the targeted "hey I read your latest paper and I had a few questions about section 2.4" and "Dear Entire Physics Department: Einstein is Wrong! Here's my book". I honestly don't think I've ever received the former from a non-scientist (I'm not famous, so go figure) but we definitely got a lot of the later. We also had some of the later case dropping into our seminars. For the most part people found them kind of entertaining.

kristopolous 3y ago
of course. Unfortunately many decent people don't feel welcome. Pre-covid I used to attend many academic seminars out of sheer curiosity for the subject material. I didn't have any pet project or theories, just a quest for academic rigor in a subject. I of course had questions, but I guess that's the differentiation between crank and non-crank: the crank believes they know the answers and the non-crank isn't even confident they really know the question. I will readily accept that I'm some rare outlier ... I didn't really meet anyone like myself.
- dguest 3y ago
  Yeah it's too bad if people don't feel welcome, attending academic seminars outside your field can be so much fun, all the more so if you ask some questions! People look at you funny when you ask e.g. "what is an M-class star?" in an astronomy lecture, but as long as you have a friend who can say "oh, he's just a physicist" they get over it.
aleph_minus_one 3y ago
> Sure, but there's a huge difference between the targeted "hey I read your latest paper and I had a few questions about section 2.4" and "Dear Entire Physics Department: Einstein is Wrong! Here's my book". I honestly don't think I've ever received the former from a non-scientist (I'm not famous, so go figure) but we definitely got a lot of the later. Well, I know quite some people who left academia because they became victims of academic politics, or just had enormous difficulties getting their employment contracts extended, despite doing great research. I get research papers from this kind of people somewhat regularly. All of them look at least very plausible to me. When I was still in academia, I honestly only know these "crackpot stories" from narrations (dark fairy tales); I never got any "crackpot papers", even though the particular research area is said to be prone to crackpots (perhaps the reason was that crackpots need some basic knowledge about the respective research area to realize that the colleagues of the institute actually do research in an area that is very related to their crackpot papers, so they never sent their crackpot papers to my colleagues).
- kristopolous 3y ago
  I'd also imagine it depends on where you're stationed. Physics at Princeton probably would see more of this than physics at, say UIUC Both excellent academic institutions but one is you know, mentioned in James Bond and superhero movies.

by dguest 3y ago

kristopolous 3y ago

of course. Unfortunately many decent people don't feel welcome. Pre-covid I used to attend many academic seminars out of sheer curiosity for the subject material. I didn't have any pet project or theories, just a quest for academic rigor in a subject. I of course had questions, but I guess that's the differentiation between crank and non-crank: the crank believes they know the answers and the non-crank isn't even confident they really know the question. I will readily accept that I'm some rare outlier ... I didn't really meet anyone like myself.

dguest 3y ago
Yeah it's too bad if people don't feel welcome, attending academic seminars outside your field can be so much fun, all the more so if you ask some questions! People look at you funny when you ask e.g. "what is an M-class star?" in an astronomy lecture, but as long as you have a friend who can say "oh, he's just a physicist" they get over it.

aleph_minus_one 3y ago

> Sure, but there's a huge difference between the targeted "hey I read your latest paper and I had a few questions about section 2.4" and "Dear Entire Physics Department: Einstein is Wrong! Here's my book". I honestly don't think I've ever received the former from a non-scientist (I'm not famous, so go figure) but we definitely got a lot of the later. Well, I know quite some people who left academia because they became victims of academic politics, or just had enormous difficulties getting their employment contracts extended, despite doing great research. I get research papers from this kind of people somewhat regularly. All of them look at least very plausible to me. When I was still in academia, I honestly only know these "crackpot stories" from narrations (dark fairy tales); I never got any "crackpot papers", even though the particular research area is said to be prone to crackpots (perhaps the reason was that crackpots need some basic knowledge about the respective research area to realize that the colleagues of the institute actually do research in an area that is very related to their crackpot papers, so they never sent their crackpot papers to my colleagues).

kristopolous 3y ago
I'd also imagine it depends on where you're stationed. Physics at Princeton probably would see more of this than physics at, say UIUC Both excellent academic institutions but one is you know, mentioned in James Bond and superhero movies.