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A 2024 Ig Nobel was awarded to work debunking Blue Zones. IMO the whole concept is one of those Occam’s razors that proves especially sharp. https://www.ucl.a

A 2024 Ig Nobel was awarded to work debunking Blue Zones. IMO the whole concept is one of those Occam’s razors that proves especially sharp. https://www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/news/2024/sep/ucl-demographers-work-debunking-blue-zone-regions-exceptional-lifespans-wins-ig-nobel-prize https://www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/news/2024/sep/ucl-demographers-wor...

mbac32768 5mo ago
> Dr Newman showed that the highest rates of achieving extreme old age are predicted by high poverty, the lack of birth certificates, and fewer 90-year-olds. Poverty and pressure to commit pension fraud were shown to be excellent indicators of reaching ages 100+ in a way that is ‘the opposite of rational expectations’. Blue Zones absolutely destroyed.
Paracompact 5mo ago
I can't tell if it's a feature or a flaw of academia that some topics can so be thoroughly proven/disproven, and yet so many researchers continue to devote their careers to it. Should more effort be given to enforcing existing knowledge and consensus, or is preserving intellectual freedom more important? Granted, I understand Blue Zone stuff is mostly due to marketing incentives...
- hnfong 5mo ago
  I can't tell if you think academia is "enforcing existing knowledge and consensus" or "preserving intellectual freedom"... My personal take is that academia is doing very well on the former, and not much on the latter.
  - Paracompact 5mo ago
    It depends on how you think the limited resources to perform research should best be allocated, and whether scientists should become more like doctors or lawyers so far as centralization of credentialing and professional gatekeeping goes. Doctors and lawyers have boards that can actually revoke your ability to practice for falling outside accepted standards. Science deliberately doesn't. Is that good or bad?
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    - hnfong 5mo ago
      My point is that the scientific establishment is already basically like those boards that can limit your ability to do research unless you have a license. The "license" is a PhD (from a reputable institution) and publications in a select list of high profile journals. I'm very curious why you'd think otherwise.
      - Retric 5mo ago
        Independent research by non PhD’s does occasionally get published, but it’s really difficult to meet the appropriate standards without a lot of very specific training. There’s many objects discovered by amateur astronomers for example.
      - Paracompact 5mo ago
        > The "license" is a PhD (from a reputable institution) Maybe I'm biased as someone who has attained a PhD, but a PhD or master's is definitively not a license. It's almost necessary to have an advanced degree to be taken seriously, but that's not for reasons of normativity, but rather basic competence and a signal of investment. Your degree will not be revoked for the same reasons a doctor's or lawyer's license may be revoked (Francesca Gino lost her tenure, but not her degree). And IMO, your alma mater matters only as a proxy for your academic network; few in the academic world care if you went to MIT per se, but for the connections you made there. I don't think there's an argument that the scientific establishment rejects many high-value contributions from uncredentialed/undercredentialed individuals. > publications in a select list of high profile journals Yeah, this is a serious issue. Although I don't know what it has to do with the question of whether the body of scientists proper should deliberate to establish consensus and distribute resources and prestige. If anything, Elsevier et al. have demonstrated that it can't be worse than letting the free market insert itself so insidiously.
- loeg 5mo ago
  It seems like Buettner in particular had a bunch of for-profit business ventures tied up in blue zone marketing bullshit, so that is a sort of non-academic motivation to keep the music going.
3RTB297 5mo ago
The most amazing part of Blue Zones, IMO, is the staying power of a few mythological health Shangri-La places. Debunked or not, people will repeat this idea for a generation or two until, ironically, anyone that's read the book has shuffled off this mortal coil.

mbac32768 5mo ago

> Dr Newman showed that the highest rates of achieving extreme old age are predicted by high poverty, the lack of birth certificates, and fewer 90-year-olds. Poverty and pressure to commit pension fraud were shown to be excellent indicators of reaching ages 100+ in a way that is ‘the opposite of rational expectations’. Blue Zones absolutely destroyed.

Paracompact 5mo ago

I can't tell if it's a feature or a flaw of academia that some topics can so be thoroughly proven/disproven, and yet so many researchers continue to devote their careers to it. Should more effort be given to enforcing existing knowledge and consensus, or is preserving intellectual freedom more important? Granted, I understand Blue Zone stuff is mostly due to marketing incentives...

hnfong 5mo ago
I can't tell if you think academia is "enforcing existing knowledge and consensus" or "preserving intellectual freedom"... My personal take is that academia is doing very well on the former, and not much on the latter.
- Paracompact 5mo ago
  It depends on how you think the limited resources to perform research should best be allocated, and whether scientists should become more like doctors or lawyers so far as centralization of credentialing and professional gatekeeping goes. Doctors and lawyers have boards that can actually revoke your ability to practice for falling outside accepted standards. Science deliberately doesn't. Is that good or bad?
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
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  - hnfong 5mo ago
    My point is that the scientific establishment is already basically like those boards that can limit your ability to do research unless you have a license. The "license" is a PhD (from a reputable institution) and publications in a select list of high profile journals. I'm very curious why you'd think otherwise.
    - Retric 5mo ago
      Independent research by non PhD’s does occasionally get published, but it’s really difficult to meet the appropriate standards without a lot of very specific training. There’s many objects discovered by amateur astronomers for example.
    - Paracompact 5mo ago
      > The "license" is a PhD (from a reputable institution) Maybe I'm biased as someone who has attained a PhD, but a PhD or master's is definitively not a license. It's almost necessary to have an advanced degree to be taken seriously, but that's not for reasons of normativity, but rather basic competence and a signal of investment. Your degree will not be revoked for the same reasons a doctor's or lawyer's license may be revoked (Francesca Gino lost her tenure, but not her degree). And IMO, your alma mater matters only as a proxy for your academic network; few in the academic world care if you went to MIT per se, but for the connections you made there. I don't think there's an argument that the scientific establishment rejects many high-value contributions from uncredentialed/undercredentialed individuals. > publications in a select list of high profile journals Yeah, this is a serious issue. Although I don't know what it has to do with the question of whether the body of scientists proper should deliberate to establish consensus and distribute resources and prestige. If anything, Elsevier et al. have demonstrated that it can't be worse than letting the free market insert itself so insidiously.
loeg 5mo ago
It seems like Buettner in particular had a bunch of for-profit business ventures tied up in blue zone marketing bullshit, so that is a sort of non-academic motivation to keep the music going.

3RTB297 5mo ago

The most amazing part of Blue Zones, IMO, is the staying power of a few mythological health Shangri-La places. Debunked or not, people will repeat this idea for a generation or two until, ironically, anyone that's read the book has shuffled off this mortal coil.