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I have a physics degree and continue to learn about math, but in one talk I saw, Eric started off using math I'd never heard of, and didn't bother to introduce

I have a physics degree and continue to learn about math, but in one talk I saw, Eric started off using math I'd never heard of, and didn't bother to introduce it or even motivate it's use. If he's looking for popular support, that is not the way to go about it, IMHO. But frankly it seems to me that he'd rather get the juice from claimed persecution than actually advance the field.

loceng 3y ago
Re: "I have a physics degree and continue to learn about math, but in one talk I saw, Eric started off using math I'd never heard of, and didn't bother to introduce it or even motivate it's use" So what you're saying is you don't even have the ability to start to understand if what he's saying is true, as you've not been willing to put the effort into learning the math he's referencing - that you've never heard of - and instead essentially doing high-level ad hominem saying "he'd rather get the juice from claimed persecution than actually advance the field"? Sounds to me like Eric is right about what he says about the field in general, and why there's been little to no uptake in the indoctrinated-seemingly ideological field of physics studies. I agree his tactics may be lacking, and that clearly he'll have to do a better job eventually - to handhold for people who have the capability to understand but your comment here supports the difficulties Eric states he's encountered with academia. Did you try sending him an email to ask him for more guidance? That would not only help you - whether that leads to believe he's just a charlatan or helps you learn new math - but it would be an opportunity for him to learn to be a better teacher too. Arguably the most efficient path for Eric as well, since everyone has limited time and resources, is to work with people who actually show and put in an minimally adequate effort to understanding - where connecting with him directly is perhaps the first necessary barrier to breach, so that you can have a productive conversation and at least a chance to be on the same page; and if you don't even know the math he's referencing, and can't talk his lingo, then you'd have to begin to learn the language he's speaking as a prerequisite - especially before judging him - the irony here is your ad hominem is in fact an example of persecution - and from the physics' community's mouth itself.
- wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
  People have overfit on a formalized dialect of math, because we dont practice on anything else. If you beleive there are an infinite number of functions, youd probably also believe there to be an infinite number of notations for those functions. All math in the formalized language has come from randoms making up their own symbols and arrangement rules, often times for fun. (see Newton) Sometimes theres equivalent notations for the same concept. (see leibnitz). Just like you can say the same sentence in chinese, english, and spanish, you can express the same concept in different math. Even within the same language you can say the same thing ten different ways. Believing dogmatically in only one notation system would be silly. Put a modern calculus textbook, a 1920s boolean logic textbook, and principia next to eachother on the table. If you had only ever seen one before you'd think the others came from space. If Eric is making up math you would need to translate it to the dialect you understand. (Which would probably result in you understanding it, and then he might stick with the more colloquial translation.)
- javajosh 3y ago
  We all make judgements about what is worth pursuing. I'm not a fan of string theory because the sub-field over-promised and under-delivered for decades. I'm content to let others who know more get excited if the field is going to be saved by EW or anyone else. Spending time is a zero-sum, and the cost/benefit does isn't worth it to me. But this is neither evidence of prosecution or an ad hominem. It's true that his other statements about politics and the world in general, particularly his propencity to accept and promulgate conspiracy theories without evidence, make me doubt his honesty and his moral fabric, but that's a relatively minor part of why I won't spend time on this.
  - loceng 3y ago
    "But frankly it seems to me that he'd rather get the juice from claimed persecution than actually advance the field." This is absolutely ad hominem. You're insinuating he's a fraud - without even knowing the math he's referencing - and then saying he's trying to milk a victimhood stance; eloquent ad hominem, ad hominem nonetheless. And the rest of what you said is fine - but throwing unsubstantiated shade/ad hominem as you walk away from the challenge is something else. I'm curious though also, what "conspiracy theories" are you claiming he propagates - and without referencing evidence? That term is often thrown away as as ad hominem to be dismissive and demonizing as well.
senderista 3y ago
Did you take GR in your physics coursework? If not, why would you expect to be able to follow a talk about gravity?
- javajosh 3y ago
  I can follow Susskind's lectures about gravity. I understand metrics and tensors. Have you seen EW's talks? What was your take? I found them impenetrable and impossible to follow. Perhaps it's just me and my ignorance. But I happen to believe that a real expert in a field can explain it to a non-expert. By that measure, EW has not demonstrated expertise.
  - senderista 3y ago
    Sorry, at first I read "EW" as "Edward Witten" and was like "of course I wouldn't expect to follow any of his talks!" :) But no, I haven't seen any of Weinstein's talks. TBH I don't have a real physics education (just did independent study of GR as an undergrad), so my knowledge of QM/QFT is far too weak to really follow pretty much any technical talk on quantum gravity.
    - empiricus 3y ago
      The funny part is that the beginning of the EricW talk mentioned by the grand-parent comment is just a summary of the another EdwardW talk, so of course it was hard to follow :) Well, it was nothing controversial, just a super high level description of the current physics theories (general relativity and quantum field theory).
wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
I went into a technical interview once and started solving a word search problem with a btree. I started with p-lists, and assembled the tree with tuples of tuples, assuming this was a starter data structure implementation that, after they added some constraint that would eliminate it as an option, i would easily modify. Well, my interviewers didnt know what p-lists were because they only knew javascript. They thought I was retarded and I didnt get the job.
- loceng 3y ago
  Sounds like you should start your own company, at least technically then you'd be hiring better people - maybe even start competing in the same field of the company you were applying for?

loceng 3y ago

Re: "I have a physics degree and continue to learn about math, but in one talk I saw, Eric started off using math I'd never heard of, and didn't bother to introduce it or even motivate it's use" So what you're saying is you don't even have the ability to start to understand if what he's saying is true, as you've not been willing to put the effort into learning the math he's referencing - that you've never heard of - and instead essentially doing high-level ad hominem saying "he'd rather get the juice from claimed persecution than actually advance the field"? Sounds to me like Eric is right about what he says about the field in general, and why there's been little to no uptake in the indoctrinated-seemingly ideological field of physics studies. I agree his tactics may be lacking, and that clearly he'll have to do a better job eventually - to handhold for people who have the capability to understand but your comment here supports the difficulties Eric states he's encountered with academia. Did you try sending him an email to ask him for more guidance? That would not only help you - whether that leads to believe he's just a charlatan or helps you learn new math - but it would be an opportunity for him to learn to be a better teacher too. Arguably the most efficient path for Eric as well, since everyone has limited time and resources, is to work with people who actually show and put in an minimally adequate effort to understanding - where connecting with him directly is perhaps the first necessary barrier to breach, so that you can have a productive conversation and at least a chance to be on the same page; and if you don't even know the math he's referencing, and can't talk his lingo, then you'd have to begin to learn the language he's speaking as a prerequisite - especially before judging him - the irony here is your ad hominem is in fact an example of persecution - and from the physics' community's mouth itself.

wegfawefgawefg 3y ago
People have overfit on a formalized dialect of math, because we dont practice on anything else. If you beleive there are an infinite number of functions, youd probably also believe there to be an infinite number of notations for those functions. All math in the formalized language has come from randoms making up their own symbols and arrangement rules, often times for fun. (see Newton) Sometimes theres equivalent notations for the same concept. (see leibnitz). Just like you can say the same sentence in chinese, english, and spanish, you can express the same concept in different math. Even within the same language you can say the same thing ten different ways. Believing dogmatically in only one notation system would be silly. Put a modern calculus textbook, a 1920s boolean logic textbook, and principia next to eachother on the table. If you had only ever seen one before you'd think the others came from space. If Eric is making up math you would need to translate it to the dialect you understand. (Which would probably result in you understanding it, and then he might stick with the more colloquial translation.)
javajosh 3y ago
We all make judgements about what is worth pursuing. I'm not a fan of string theory because the sub-field over-promised and under-delivered for decades. I'm content to let others who know more get excited if the field is going to be saved by EW or anyone else. Spending time is a zero-sum, and the cost/benefit does isn't worth it to me. But this is neither evidence of prosecution or an ad hominem. It's true that his other statements about politics and the world in general, particularly his propencity to accept and promulgate conspiracy theories without evidence, make me doubt his honesty and his moral fabric, but that's a relatively minor part of why I won't spend time on this.
- loceng 3y ago
  "But frankly it seems to me that he'd rather get the juice from claimed persecution than actually advance the field." This is absolutely ad hominem. You're insinuating he's a fraud - without even knowing the math he's referencing - and then saying he's trying to milk a victimhood stance; eloquent ad hominem, ad hominem nonetheless. And the rest of what you said is fine - but throwing unsubstantiated shade/ad hominem as you walk away from the challenge is something else. I'm curious though also, what "conspiracy theories" are you claiming he propagates - and without referencing evidence? That term is often thrown away as as ad hominem to be dismissive and demonizing as well.

senderista 3y ago

Did you take GR in your physics coursework? If not, why would you expect to be able to follow a talk about gravity?

javajosh 3y ago
I can follow Susskind's lectures about gravity. I understand metrics and tensors. Have you seen EW's talks? What was your take? I found them impenetrable and impossible to follow. Perhaps it's just me and my ignorance. But I happen to believe that a real expert in a field can explain it to a non-expert. By that measure, EW has not demonstrated expertise.
- senderista 3y ago
  Sorry, at first I read "EW" as "Edward Witten" and was like "of course I wouldn't expect to follow any of his talks!" :) But no, I haven't seen any of Weinstein's talks. TBH I don't have a real physics education (just did independent study of GR as an undergrad), so my knowledge of QM/QFT is far too weak to really follow pretty much any technical talk on quantum gravity.
  - empiricus 3y ago
    The funny part is that the beginning of the EricW talk mentioned by the grand-parent comment is just a summary of the another EdwardW talk, so of course it was hard to follow :) Well, it was nothing controversial, just a super high level description of the current physics theories (general relativity and quantum field theory).

wegfawefgawefg 3y ago

I went into a technical interview once and started solving a word search problem with a btree. I started with p-lists, and assembled the tree with tuples of tuples, assuming this was a starter data structure implementation that, after they added some constraint that would eliminate it as an option, i would easily modify. Well, my interviewers didnt know what p-lists were because they only knew javascript. They thought I was retarded and I didnt get the job.

loceng 3y ago
Sounds like you should start your own company, at least technically then you'd be hiring better people - maybe even start competing in the same field of the company you were applying for?