[HN Gopher] How Darwin Thought (2016)
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       How Darwin Thought (2016)
        
       Author : Vigier
       Score  : 11 points
       Date   : 2021-01-04 01:16 UTC (1 days ago)
        
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 (TXT) w3m dump (fs.blog)
        
       | ncmncm wrote:
       | Modern science favors the opposite of Darwin's method. Papers
       | noting results dispredicted by the prevailing consensus theory
       | are harder to publish, and much harder to get discussed. Calling
       | attention to them is considered career-limiting (although it
       | makes good copy in the popular press).
       | 
       | Even today, the large majority of papers on Alzheimer's assume
       | amyloids are the root cause, despite decades of utter failure.
       | Magnetic-confinement fusion draws more money than ever -- now,
       | even VC money -- despite break-even and practical power
       | generation being predicted no less distant than 50 years ago;
       | difficulties known of back then but not considered worthy topics
       | stall progress today; others, their equals, remain unpopular.
       | Causal theory was understood a century ago, but suppressed by the
       | Statistics mandarinate, apparently in large part because it
       | supported the claim that smoking caused cancer. It is discussed
       | today largely as a result of Judea Pearl's revival of those
       | century-old results, after its opponents' death.
       | 
       | Nature doesn't have a consensus; a minority alternative that
       | accounts for the same phenomena is equal, in nature's eye, to an
       | older model, and it and the older model can both be equally
       | wrong. Often both alternatives are contradicted by evidence, so
       | which prevails depends on which evidence is systematically
       | ignored. The expression, "Extraordinary claims demand
       | extraordinary evidence" is most usually used to suppress the
       | ordinary, dispredicted evidence that Darwin's method would place
       | front and center.
       | 
       | Max Planck is quoted, "Science advances one funeral at a time".
       | Modern institutions seem designed to enforce it.
        
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       (page generated 2021-01-05 23:02 UTC)