3 ms·
It's easy to say "Epicycles! Epicycles!", but people are going to continue using their epicycles until a Copernicus comes along.
by edflsafoiewq 2y ago
It's easy to say "Epicycles! Epicycles!", but people are going to continue using their epicycles until a Copernicus comes along.
- jampekka 2y agoThere will be no Copernicus if everybody just studies epicycles. E.g. there are massive resources put into the desperate WIMP hunt that could be used for finding new theories.
- Dylan16807 2y agoI don't see how those resources are fungible with each other.
- jampekka 2y agoResearch funding is very competitive and scarce.
- Dylan16807 2y agoBuilding a physics machine, and thinking about how the equations might work, are so very different. Does the latter even get funding?
- jampekka 2y agoOf course. It's called theoretical physics.
- fiddlerwoaroof 2y agoWell, the funny thing is Copernicus posits just about as many epicycles in his theory as previous geocentric theories. Only Kepler’s discovery of the equal area law and elliptical orbits successfully banishes epicycles.
- aeneasmackenzie 2y agoThe history of these discoveries is fascinating and shows that Kuhn’s scientific revolutions idea is wrong but it’s always rounded off to “Copernicus and Galileo” and doesn’t even get them right