What is up with all the nonsensical quack threads?

C

CptBork

Valued Senior Member
Why are so many people coming on here with no physics or math background, not to learn what has been done already, but to instead speculate and contribute their own ideas? How can you expect to contribute anything useful until you know what's already been done? How can you expect to know what's been done when you haven't learned any of it yet?

Do any of you really think you're helping out laymen by coming here and putting in your 2 cents when you have no way of knowing whether your ideas are even valid in a scientific context? Do you think it's fair on those who can't differentiate between the scientific validity and applicability of one idea and another when you try to give the impression that you know your ideas are correct and true? I can see that serious mathematicians and physicists are starting to get tired of this forum, because it's just one crank after another with one useless idea after another. Physics and math is not a democracy, we go by evidence and proof from specific basic assumptions. Anything that doesn't comply with these assumptions does not belong in this section. There is a pseudoscience section, it was made specifically for you guys. I suggest you start using it.

I can't believe the arrogance when someone with little formal education in this subject, who hasn't even read the background material, comes in here and not only proposes an idea, which is ok at first, but then when told their idea doesn't apply here, insists that it is correct. This is not the place for it. The patience of our moderators has been exemplary as far as I can see it, tolerating people like Reiku who cuss and swear at them and make a damn circus of the whole thing. And when a guy like Reiku is banned for a day or has a post sent to the cesspool as is usually the norm, they are right back at it with another thread and the same spiel.

This place is losing its scientific credibility, and it's a damn shame. Imagine random people were free to walk in on university physics lectures whenever they pleased, and interrupt whatever class they wanted to, and disrupt the learning experience for those who genuinely are interested in learning real science and doing the work to show that they have learned. There are other sections on this board for you guys to do these things when you haven't got the background material, so why do you not use it?

It's bad enough when quantum flapdoodle is popularized in the media by gurus and people with no actual knowledge or research in the field. Cults are founded on this kind of stuff. Please do not come to a legitimate science forum with real scientists and waste time and space with this crap, there are plenty of more appropriate places where you can do it.
 
Ditto, there is also the redundancy factor, it just keeps reappearing. It never goes away. The lack of critical thinking and arguement bothers me.
 
Isn't this topic in the wrong forum, also, then.
I mean, if it should be reserved for hard science, why are you spouting your opinion here while asking others not to? Perhaps it belongs in "site feedback".
Also, every major scientific discovery comes from pushing the envelope, so take it easy on the 'crackpots'. Many of the most innovative discoveries were made by people who were thought of as "a little off".
 
hey CptBork you did just that...by making a thread not on physics/math but on the usual...ideas and personal thoughts
 
clusteringflux said:
Isn't this topic in the wrong forum, also, then.
I mean, if it should be reserved for hard science, why are you spouting your opinion here while asking others not to? Perhaps it belongs in "site feedback".
Also, every major scientific discovery comes from pushing the envelope, so take it easy on the 'crackpots'. Many of the most innovative discoveries were made by people who were thought of as "a little off".
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If someone comes in here with ideas that are "a little off" but they can demonstrate they've done the work and understand the concepts of mainstream physics, that's fine. Einstein knew classical physics like the back of his hand before he tried to push it further. I can't in any way say the same about most if any of the "out there" threads which have been posted here. It's one thing to ask questions, to ask if a certain level of speculation is allowed. When a whole bunch of people who've studied the stuff come and say it's not worth discussing, that should be respected, and if it's going to be challenged, there's a place for it. Furthermore, it may be a matter of personal opinion, but I think it needs to be said here, and the mods have been doing the dirty work of repeatedly moving threads started by the same certain individuals and banning them when they try to repost the same topics here yet again. If BenTheMan or any of the other mods here disagree, please let me know. But now that I've started to see knowledgeable people like Quarkhead lamenting how this place is turning into a circus, I feel it's time to speak out and be done with it once and for all.
 
It will, no doubt, come as no surprise to the "sock puppet" paranoids that I totally agree with CptBork.

So let me ask a question: can anyone give an historical example where "pushing the envelope" means rather more than extending existing knowledge in order to provide new insights?

This seems to me a tautology.

Can anyone give an example of new knowledge that resulted from tearing up all the established "rules" and starting over?

Would anyone care to speculate on the probability that this could ever be done by someone who hadn't even read the "rules" they were tearing up?

Would anyone care to speculate on the probability that, if this could be done, it would be done on an internet chat-room?
 
I will apologize after only having read the title of the thread.

This past week I have been ears deep in string theory (Princeton summer school), and last weekend I was in NYC with my girlfriend, so I only saw the damage on Sunday night.

Either way, I'l try to do a better job of nipping things in the bud in the future. I certainly don't want to lose the few of you who know what you're talking about, and I'd rather have a thousand quacks leave SciForums and never come back (an attitude which, to my knowledge, is shared by the admins) than to lose one of my lovely AlphaNumerics :)
 
Good move, Ben. This must rank as one of the least thought-out and poorly argued threads ever to appear in P&M.

Thank goodness some quality remains there, where we don't need this sort of irrational garbage.......
 
QuarkHead said:
Good move, Ben. This must rank as one of the least thought-out and poorly argued threads ever to appear in P&M.

Thank goodness some quality remains there, where we don't need this sort of irrational garbage.......
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I'm about to go through and gut a few threads. I will remind you that there's a Report Post function, in case you missed it...
 
Why are so many people coming on here with no physics or math background, not to learn what has been done already, but to instead speculate and contribute their own ideas?
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It makes them feel important. They imagine they have something to contribute.

How can you expect to contribute anything useful until you know what's already been done? How can you expect to know what's been done when you haven't learned any of it yet?
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It's a kind of self delusion.

I can see that serious mathematicians and physicists are starting to get tired of this forum, because it's just one crank after another with one useless idea after another.
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There are other very good forums dedicated entirely to physics, maths and "hard" science. sciforums deliberately does not aspire to be so restrictive. Personally, I do not want to discourage people who are just starting to learn or who have a layman's interest by intimidating and one-upping them with "expert knowledge".

Physics and math is not a democracy, we go by evidence and proof from specific basic assumptions. Anything that doesn't comply with these assumptions does not belong in this section. There is a pseudoscience section, it was made specifically for you guys.
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My feeling is that anything which generates real discussion of real science should stay in Physics & Math, even if the original post is a bit "out there" or even perhaps wrong. If we shift every "wrong" idea to Pseudoscience, how will anybody new to science see how the scientific method works, or learn about peer review?

Pseudoscientific trolling, of course, is a different matter.

This place is losing its scientific credibility, and it's a damn shame.
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I still think sciforums has good scientific credentials. People coming in here posting rubbish are very quickly taken to task. And there's a lot of good science posted.
 
CptBork said:
This place is losing its scientific credibility, and it's a damn shame.
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No, it lost credibility some time ago. This is not a science forum, and you're dead wrong if that was your expectation. There are very few members here left who know something about science, the rest have left for exactly the same reasons you prescribe here.

Sciforums is a glorified chat room, and little more.

I mean, what idiot would place an Islamic propagandist in charge of a science board? Nuff said.

Please do not come to a legitimate science forum with real scientists and waste time and space with this crap, there are plenty of more appropriate places where you can do it.
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This place isn't a legitimate science forum. Not to worry, there are others. Have you tried Greg's forum? You'll probably find what you're looking for there:

http://www.physicsforums.com/
 
I disagree with Q, I think there are alot of really good science contributions to this site. At the same time there is an abundance of pseudo / para / believer / or otherwise delusional posts on the board.

On one hand they could be considered a nuisance, but on the other hand they are a great source of psychological study.
 
It doesn't me any longer, it's too much hard work.....
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Of course I'm sad to see you go.

From my point of view, I have tried to come up with a "Standards of posting in the Physics Forum" in the past, but was never really successful. The problem is that I don't want to alienate the people who actually ARE well-informed, but I can't apply some level of rigor that is too strict. Not everybody, afterall, is a physicst or mathematician.

If there are any suggestions to this end, I would love to hear them.
 
yo people...before you decide to commit sciforumical-suicide...pm me or say here what scientific forums are out there that you think are more science oriented and are frequently visited by many people...
 
BenTheMan said:
Of course I'm sad to see you go.

From my point of view, I have tried to come up with a "Standards of posting in the Physics Forum" in the past, but was never really successful. The problem is that I don't want to alienate the people who actually ARE well-informed, but I can't apply some level of rigor that is too strict. Not everybody, afterall, is a physicst or mathematician.

If there are any suggestions to this end, I would love to hear them.
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How about applied technical subforums. For example, C++ / Java off of computer science. Assay's and Gene Seq in Biology & Genetics. You get the point.
 
yeah lets make technical sub-forums of sub-forums of the forum...like neutrino emissions' study enthusiasts.....
 
BenTheMan said:
I think that'd be TOO specific.
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Using computer science as an example, I've seen many successful sites that have technical subforums (usually based on language). What often happens is that people come by to solve real life problems and share code. I think there are probably equivalents in any field.
 
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