[HN Gopher] Profile of Sabine Hossenfelder
___________________________________________________________________
Profile of Sabine Hossenfelder
Author : rntn
Score : 162 points
Date : 2023-09-23 13:21 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.npr.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.npr.org)
| fsh wrote:
| I really like Hossenfelder's physics videos. However, once she
| leaves her area of expertise, the quality drops off a cliff. Most
| of these videos are just summaries of random articles with no
| critical thought.
| hkwerf wrote:
| ... and bad stock photos, like the one about microchips, where
| for a long time all the imagery is photos of PCBs, sometimes
| without any component that would resemble an integrated
| circuit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QFO_SXOcYM.
| timmytokyo wrote:
| I agree. I enjoy anything she produces that is physics-related
| but the social commentary and science topics outside her area
| of expertise are hit-or-miss. I also think she opens herself up
| to audience capture, especially now that she's being funded
| directly by viewers, and that concerns me.
| Retric wrote:
| She also made some significant errors in physics videos.
|
| One example is she calculated the power output of fusion
| reactions as energy created by fusion * heat to electricity
| conversion efficiency. However, energy that's heating the
| plasma should also recoverable at the same conversion
| efficiency. Largely irrelevant a Q=1,000 but it plays a major
| role in what Q is breakeven and what Q is economically
| useful.
|
| Not on the surface such a big deal, but a sign she should
| reach out more to actual experts in these fields.
| tobiasSoftware wrote:
| Unfortunately, her physics videos are worse than people realize
| too, at least the quantum physics ones.
|
| I've been learning a lot of quantum physics and she's a mixed
| bag. On the one hand, most people's (and even textbooks')
| understanding of quantum observation and the quantum eraser
| experiment are incorrect, and Sabine is one of the few voices
| on Youtube that calls them out instead of joins them, which is
| why I suspect why she is so popular.
|
| On the other hand, she embraces the very niche superdeterminism
| hypothesis. This hypothesis basically says that cause and
| effect and reversed for any Bell's Inequality related
| experiment in that using uncorrelated data as inputs into the
| experiment causes them to become correlated because you used
| them for the experiment. In other words, she believes that the
| universe is puppeteering Bell's Inequality experiments so that
| we can't trust results from those experiments. This has serious
| issues related to non-falsifiability, where we could
| technically do this with any experiment we don't like the
| results of.
|
| However, that's not even the worst part of it. The worst part
| is that she does not explain her niche viewpoints in her
| videos. If any of the more popular hypotheses about
| entanglement are correct, then Einstein's hidden variables
| hypothesis where entanglement acts like a pair of gloves will
| be disproven. However, in her videos about entanglement, she
| constantly refers to entanglement acting like a pair of gloves
| like it is a fact, because her niche viewpoint is the single
| viewpoint where it is not disproven.
| nobodyandproud wrote:
| We have enough physicists that teach the Copenhagen
| interpretation as fact to layman and college students.
|
| Why the double standard?
| nimish wrote:
| Super determinism is a perfectly valid interpretation of
| quantum mechanics no less valid than Copenhagen.
|
| It's a bigger shame most students aren't taught that
| Copenhagen is not the only interpretation consistent with
| experiment and are often thought it as absolute truth.
|
| Let's not get into the compatibility with free will
| philosophical issues, because that'd need physics to
| recognize metaphysics once more.
| Lemmi wrote:
| Any examples?
|
| Because she still gives good statistical overviews/analysis.
| 0xcde4c3db wrote:
| Her "capitalism is good" video is _remarkably_ bad. I noticed
| that takedowns of it were making the rounds in left-ish
| online spaces recently, and figured it would be one of her
| worse videos, but even with that bias I was shocked at how
| bad it is. Hardly any real-world history or economics, and
| zero engagement with actual critiques of capitalism. She
| name-drops Adam Smith and Karl Marx, but doesn 't really
| quote or integrate the ideas of either. Overall, it's a
| disorganized mess of pro-capitalism cliches, hypothetical
| examples, and eliding discussion of key issues with phrases
| like "that's another story". I'd honestly expect better from
| PragerU, let alone someone whose tagline is "science without
| the gobbledygook".
| nosefurhairdo wrote:
| She provides a basic description of fiat money and the
| process by which capitalists allocate resources, taking on
| risk in the hopes that their investment produces
| goods/services that consumers value more than the price to
| produce them. It should be uncontroversial to state that
| that arrangement has facilitated extraordinary increases in
| global prosperity.
|
| The many "that's another story" caveats are important
| because there are many ways in which the interaction
| between markets and governments can cause bad outcomes; far
| too many to be covered in a 20 minute video.
|
| I'd like to hear just one example of a society which does
| not have capitalism (as defined by the ability to risk
| capital in hopes of future profits) which is a nice place
| to live.
| 0xcde4c3db wrote:
| While I disagree with the video's framing of the
| question, I didn't find her position within that framing
| surprising at all. In that sense it's a pretty standard
| center-left embrace of capitalism with
| caveats/regulations. What surprised me is just how
| scattershot and circular the argument was, and the near-
| total dismissal of any kind of critique of capitalism
| (which I consider kind of a problem for someone arguing
| "capitalism is good" in light of a ~150-year tradition of
| "capitalism is bad" commentary).
| brabel wrote:
| It would be interesting for me to understand why you
| believe she should give more weight to critiques of
| capitalism when there's practically zero alternatives in
| the world today, and that's been the case for decades
| now. Yes, it's cliche to say "capitalism is the worst
| economic system, except for all the others", but that's
| absolutely true as far as anyone today can claim without
| completely losing sight of reality... and I say this as
| someone who really wished human nature didn't make this
| true.
| 0xcde4c3db wrote:
| It's not clear to me what the point is, or what it even
| means, to say that "capitalism is good" without any
| substantial reference point for what it would mean for an
| economic system to be bad.
| stale2002 wrote:
| > It's not clear to me what the point is
|
| The point of the video was to give a basic explanation of
| completely uncontroversial concepts covered in an
| economics 101 class.
|
| Econ 101 is taught to people, and not "non capitalist
| systems that doesn't have money 101" because the experts
| have studied the topic extensively and the conclusions in
| her video are uncontroversial.
|
| Of course she is going to listen to the experts on how
| economics works.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| You appear to have defined a universal practice as
| "capitalism", a person in a commune walks to a field,
| they "risk capital" (their very person) as they could be
| killed _en route_. Everytime you plant a crop (build a
| factory, launch a satellite, write a program,...) you
| risk capital in hopes of future gains, I 'm struggling to
| see how a human society can proceed without doing that.
|
| In short, your definition of capitalism seems
| extraordinarily deficient.
|
| To attempt to get a little closer:
|
| Capitalism is the funding of an activity by people who
| are otherwise uninvolved in order to take some of the
| gains without direct application of work/effort.
|
| Society could collaboratively endorse actions, eg through
| democratic choices, but instead those who have inherited
| power, acquired through past violence, get to decide on
| the application of resources and cream off the benefits
| of the workers whom they have used to action their (the
| Capitalists) chosen activities.
|
| Many actions (in a just society) would have been chosen
| in any case, things like delivery of water to each
| person; now the Capitalist gets to make delivery of water
| something for which they claim the right to profit from,
| ultimately extracting worth from the inherent nature of
| people's needs.
| nosefurhairdo wrote:
| Let's work with your definition of capitalism.
|
| > Society could collaboratively endorse actions, eg
| through democratic choices...
|
| There is nothing about capitalism which prevents this
| from occuring. People can be allowed to invest while
| simultaneously participating in a democracy which elects
| to provide all sorts of publicly funded goods and
| services.
|
| What has never existed (to the best of my knowledge) is a
| society which prevents "the funding of an activity by
| people who are otherwise uninvolved in order to take some
| of the gains without direct application of work/effort,"
| which is not also a terrible place to live.
| mordae wrote:
| > It should be uncontroversial to state that that
| arrangement has facilitated extraordinary increases in
| global prosperity.
|
| No it did not. Market economy combined with the positive
| feedback loop between science and productivity were the
| key components. They helped bring about prosperity for at
| least several thousand years. Recent fad of factory
| owner(s) hiring other people, paying them wages and
| skimming the difference is actually a net drag.
|
| > I'd like to hear just one example of a society which
| does not have capitalism (as defined by the ability to
| risk capital in hopes of future profits) which is a nice
| place to live.
|
| And if there is none because our societies co-evolved and
| at the present moment in history it is the universally
| dominant economical and political model? You sound like a
| person who would ask for an example of a non-feudal state
| in medieval Europe to prove the point that having a king
| is the best arrangement ever.
|
| You can risk something else than capital ("time of people
| who do what I tell them to"), for example your own time.
| With that, everyone can risk something important to them
| to try to build something better and we don't even need a
| special social class to bravely take on the risk ("of
| wasting time of people who have to listen to them or
| starve"). Wooooot?!
|
| Maybe we would have some such societies, if fascists in
| Europe and then fascists in US did not take great care to
| crush them.
|
| http://www.george-orwell.org/Homage_to_Catalonia/0.html
| stale2002 wrote:
| > And if there is none because our societies co-evolved
|
| Or maybe, instead of that that, those other societies
| just sucked.
|
| Given that lots of societies have attempted and failed at
| non capitalist systems, how about instead of inventing
| excuses we can just use that as evidence that those other
| non capitalist systems are bad.
| Lemmi wrote:
| I have the feeling this might be a video were she gives
| more of some type of overview with her view without
| imposing a too strong opinion.
|
| But I could be wrong this particular video I haven't seen
| yet.
| runarberg wrote:
| That was my final straw. Her video about rabid onset gender
| dysphoria (ROGD) was bad. While she correctly (sorta)
| dismissed the theory of ROGD she was appallingly
| sympathetic to many of the ROGD talking points. Her worst
| offend was being skeptical of gender affirming care because
| of some vague and unproven long term-effects and because
| "the mental health of the treated kids didn't improve, so
| much as the mental health of the kids that _didn't_ get
| treated declined".
|
| This kind of misunderstanding of the science is suspect
| when coming from a scientist famous for her skeptical take
| in her own field. Her sorta dismissal of ROGD is also
| suspect, because she seems to sorta believe the anecdotal
| "evidence" for it why also noting the lacking of actual
| evidence. This is the opposite of the kind of skeptical
| take she is known for. I call it suspect because here we
| have a social issue surrounding a minority where she flips
| her philosophy. I wonder why she did that.
| Lemmi wrote:
| I remember that one and thought she had quite a neutral
| view on it.
|
| The only concern she mentioned was a statistical point of
| a few more girls potentially being / having a little bit
| too much rogd.
| runarberg wrote:
| The thing is, ROGD is not a scientific theory, it is a
| misdirection--or rather a debate tactic--by people with
| an interest in trying to discredit the existence of trans
| people. A true scientist would not have a "neutral take"
| on ROGD, just like a true scientist would not have a
| neutral take on the chemtrail conspiracy, or the theory
| that vaccines cause autism.
|
| There are no evidence for ROGD other than very bad and
| highly suspicious anecdotal evidence. There isn't even a
| statistical evidence for it. A scientist would know that,
| and would quickly dismiss this theory _and_ all the
| talking points of those advocating for it.
|
| btw. she raised more "concerns" than just the population
| skew in favor of trans people assigned female at birth--
| which btw. is not a concern, but at most a curiosity. She
| also had concerns about the efficacy and the long term
| health affects of gender affirming care. The concerns
| were without merit, and a true scientist with a neutral
| take would not find the long term health impacts
| "concerning" given the evidence we have, and as for the
| efficacy... well... see my parent post.
| cigcig wrote:
| It's a reasonable hypothesis that happens to be
| politically inconvenient, as if it turns out to be the
| one that best explains the available data, this is
| another nail in the coffin of an ideology that is already
| severely weakened by significant challenges in many
| areas, despite so many of its acolytes having already
| gone all-in.
| runarberg wrote:
| It is not any more reasonable as a theory--or even a
| hypothesis--than the theory that vaccine causes autism or
| that fossil fuel usage does not contribute to global
| warming. If there is no evidence to back up a theory--or
| a hypothesis--it is unreasonable to push it as a
| possibility.
|
| What is reasonable is to assume that people are pushing
| these theories (or hypotheses) because they have an
| agenda. What ROGD is stating is basically that
| transgender people are contagious. This is a very
| disgusting thing to believe so they decorate it with
| science sounding terms and provide compelling--and
| suspicious--anecdotes to support it. This isn't science
| and it is definitely not reasonable. I'm gonna call it
| what it is, this is hate speech, and it is not reasonable
| by any definition of that word (not even political
| convenience).
| gandalfgeek wrote:
| Hossenfelder is a technical person able to read technical
| literature, follow chains of argument and decipher statistical
| analysis. If such a person reads the literature in a field new
| to her, summarizes it, and then you disagree with it (oh but
| the papers really meant something else), then the problem is
| with the literature, not the reader.
| kortilla wrote:
| Every field is filled with technical literature that is
| complete bullshit. The entire point of consulting an expert
| who has been in the field is they have spent enough time to
| sift through that.
|
| There is significant literature on functioning perpetual
| motion machines in physics as well. If you were to read it
| and report on it, that would make your reporting shit.
| mhh__ wrote:
| Or it's because she is often fishing for a contrarian
| position to take. I can't remember the specifics but when
| discussing electric cars for example she just comes across as
| whinging to own the eco people.
| yawaramin wrote:
| You only need a few minutes of thought to understand why
| electric vehicles will never be able to replace internal
| combustion engines as things stand today. They are little
| more than a way for rich people to demonstrate how green
| they are.
| scubbo wrote:
| > You only need a few minutes of thought to understand
| why electric vehicles will never be able to replace
| internal combustion engines as things stand today.
|
| Well, no, you absolutely need some data, axioms, or facts
| to support your thoughts, too. Pure thought only works
| for mathematics and some areas of philosophy.
|
| So, please - what are some of the facts from which that
| few minutes thought would proceed? Is it the case that
| there is a hard upper-limit on the range (imposed by
| constraints in battery technology), or that some road
| surfaces are unsuitable for EVs, or that electric engines
| are unsuitable for some chassis types (e.g. heavy
| haulage), or...?
| 8note wrote:
| Weight -- electric car vs electric bike
|
| Distance -- electric cars promote building places
| inefficiently. The car and the commute are synonymous
|
| Drop the constraint of needing cars, and you can make
| much better solutions
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Weight -- electric car vs electric bike
|
| Adoption of each isn't exclusive of the other, so that's
| irrelevant.
|
| > Distance -- electric cars promote building places
| inefficiently
|
| No, they don't, as a replacement for ICE vehicles. If
| anything, they promote building things _more_
| efficiently.
|
| > Drop the constraint of needing cars, and you can make
| much better solutions
|
| Replacing some share of ICE cars with electric cars does
| not require active maintenance of a constraint of needing
| cars. Reconfiguring cities to not need cars is a slower
| process than replacing what cars are used, so there is a
| role for the latter even if the former is the main long-
| term solution (and even if it is and reduces the scope of
| pervasiveness of the need for cars, it is unlikely to
| replace all need.)
| amanaplanacanal wrote:
| If it only took a few minutes, perhaps you could take a
| few more minutes and enlighten the rest of us. As it sits
| this comment adds nothing.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > You only need a few minutes of thought to understand
| why electric vehicles will never be able to replace
| internal combustion engines as things stand today.
|
| You only need a little thought to see that each increment
| of electric vehicle adoption shifts the market context
| and incentives away from "as things stand today" in a way
| which makes your claim, to the extent its true as
| written, irrelevant in practice.
| phyzome wrote:
| << then the problem is with the literature, not the reader >>
|
| That... sure is an interesting position to take.
| the-alchemist wrote:
| No one's perfect, but I'm a fan because she'll tell you if
| something is her-possibly-unpopular opinion (see particle
| physics), well-accepted scientific fact, or her pet opinion. You
| know where she stands, and tells you her agenda, if any. Or, if
| she's trying really hard to stay away from _any_ bias (see her
| video on trans).
|
| More generally, I don't like the "stay in your lane" opinion. To
| more forward as a society, we need _more_ interdisciplinary work,
| not less. Mathematicians need to work with engineers and
| architects, psychologists with economicists, etc.
|
| Of course, let's call out bad science or bias, but let's not
| ignore valuable insights because they came from the wrong lane.
|
| I like her videos because I'm generally curious what a fairly
| unbiased intelligent person thinks about trans issues, economics,
| etc. Even if I don't agree with them on everything, not should
| you.
| MrJohz wrote:
| Fwiw, the only video of hers that I remember watching is the
| economics one because of the discussion it sparked, but I
| didn't get the impression there that she was communicating her
| ignorance or bias well at all. Rather, she made a bunch of
| dubious claims with all the appearance of authority and
| knowledge.
|
| She also doesn't seem particularly unbiased to me. Like, I
| don't think one can ever be unbiased, but someone with a lot of
| knowledge about a subject can do a good job of identifying the
| biases they have in that area and try and approach things more
| objectively, or at least indicate where they're speaking for
| themselves and where they're describing beliefs in the field.
| For example, I'm a frontend developer with a bunch of biases
| for certain technologies and styles of development, because
| those are the ones I'm used to and invested in. But I know the
| field well enough to - I hope - be able to recognise those
| biases and tell you that you don't _need_ SolidJS for your next
| project, even though I think it 's really cool and want more
| people to get involved there.
|
| Rather, Hossenfelder feels like she just doesn't know what her
| biases are in the first place, at least when discussing
| something like economics. Based on your comment, I'm sure
| that's not true for the subjects that she is knowledgeable in -
| you bring up particle physics as an example of an area where
| she knows her opinions aren't necessarily standard. But in the
| video I watched, she presented herself as this neutral figure
| telling you only the facts, and then said things that ranged
| from being out-of-date or untrue, to things that didn't even
| really make much sense.
|
| I agree with you that "stay in your lane" is a bad counter to
| these sorts of videos, because collaboration between fields is
| good. But good collaboration takes a lot of humility - you need
| to come to the table knowing that you know almost nothing about
| the other field, and accepting that you're going to have to
| learn a lot of stuff. At least from the stuff I've watched, I
| don't get the impression that Hossenfelder has put the work in
| to understand what she doesn't understand. And that, to me, is
| pretty much the definition of wilful ignorance - she knows she
| is not an expert in this field, but she doesn't seem to want to
| put the effort in to get the opinions and feedback from real
| experts. Instead, she's assumed her own knowledge is enough.
| stale2002 wrote:
| > Rather, Hossenfelder feels like she just doesn't know what
| her biases are in the first place, at least when discussing
| something like economics
|
| She is biased in favor of what the experts say on a topic.
|
| Her video was a bog standard explanation of topics that are
| covered in econ 101. They were completely uncontroversial.
|
| Yes, the profession of economics, which are the experts on
| the topic, are all strongly biased in favor of the scientific
| opinion which is that economics is real and that capitalism
| is good.
| mal-2 wrote:
| Sabine seems to believe any intellectual darkweb-esque argument
| she hears as long as it makes her feel heterodox. Her coverage of
| autism, transgender issues and capitalism were embarrassing.
| nosefurhairdo wrote:
| What specifically did you disagree with?
| hsavit1 wrote:
| I only saw some of the "capitalism is good, actually" video and
| was horrified at how ideological it was. It was Prager-U level
| propaganda. She seems to fall in line with a few popular
| physicists (like Neil Tyson) who display chauvinist tendencies
| in their knowledge of everything that is.
| pollux66 wrote:
| [flagged]
| kbelder wrote:
| All of those are prone to highly emotionally charged reactions.
| Whether she is right or wrong, there would have been strong
| reactions, and therefore (in a bayesian sense) the strong
| reactions give you no information about whether she's right or
| wrong.
| willis936 wrote:
| It gives you information about what she's optimizing for, and
| it isn't solely truth communication.
| heliumcraft wrote:
| Funny you mention this because I have a child with (severe)
| Autism and with so much misinformation out there about Autism I
| was blown away that her video about this topic was so spot on
| and incredibly well researched. In particularly she nailed the
| so called "neurodiversity movement" and its many problems it
| causes quite well.
| leckpo wrote:
| It sounds like she upset you by challenging views that you hold
| emotionally rather than rationally.
| mal-2 wrote:
| We can tell an argument is rational when it upholds existing
| power structures and diminishes people who are already
| marginalized. They're probably just complaining because being
| marginalized upsets their emotions.
| leckpo wrote:
| Can you make your point less obliquely, please?
| ksey3 wrote:
| How many didnt get famous? Thats what no one reports.
|
| If the UN report on the attention economy is saying 0.5% of
| content produced is consumed and dropping, then how are people
| getting views? It doesnt make any sense. Unless the game is
| rigged.
|
| People have limited attention to give anything but unlimited
| capacity to receive attention. The platforms are taking full
| advantage of that fact to keep this ponzi scheme running.
| permo-w wrote:
| as long as you approach this kind of thing with knowledge of
| how Youtube works, I actually think there's a pretty high
| chance of success
|
| if you have a good mic and camera, show your face, speak
| clearly, consistently upload, and - most importantly - you
| broadly make one-off videos about common denominator subtopics
| - never going too deep or numbering your videos - then I
| wouldn't bet against you. there really aren't that many
| successful science Youtubers
| yorwba wrote:
| The UN report on the attention economy actually said:
|
| _By the 2000s, so much information was being generated
| worldwide that only a small fraction (0.5% in 2015) of the
| digital data generated was being analyzed at all._
|
| https://www.un.org/sites/un2.un.org/files/attention_economy_...
|
| Where "analyzed" probably means something other than "got any
| views". In any case, the claim is unsourced, so I wouldn't put
| much stock in it.
|
| The way I see it, people's ability to give attention is
| limited, but the ability to do something worth paying attention
| to is even scarcer, so even the most trivial feat (like writing
| a comment on HN) is likely to garner at least a few views.
|
| Becoming famous is much harder than getting any views at all,
| because now you need to do something so attention-grabbing that
| some of your few initial viewers will tell others about it and
| your audience size snowballs from there.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Do you happen to know the publication date of that report?
|
| Internet Archive's first capture is April 2023.
|
| The most recent references _within_ the report are for 2021.
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| Can we un-click-bait this by replacing "she" with "Sabine
| Hossenfelder"? Yes, the article itself uses the title as used but
| there is no reason to not clarify who this is about.
| eh_why_not wrote:
| Such an annoying trend of click-bait too, and it's all over
| news sites.
|
| "Click here to know who this _woman_ is who did something so
| great"... As if being a woman, to the author and their target
| readers, supersedes in importance what the person actually
| achieved or had to say.
| dang wrote:
| The whole title is clickbaity, not just by lack of name, so
| I've replaced it with something boring and straightforward.
|
| (This is in the site guidelines: " _Please use the original
| title, unless it is misleading or linkbait_ " -
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)
| eh_why_not wrote:
| Thank you! Straightforward. Wish all titles were written like
| this.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Thanks!
|
| The original submitted title (from NPR) was "She got famous
| on YouTube. Now it helps fund her research in quantum
| gravity".
|
| I'd pinged HN mods about this, though dang ended up dong a
| wholesale replacement rather than s/She/Sabine Hossenfelder/.
| eh_why_not wrote:
| Contrary to many of the opinions in these comments, I actually
| appreciate Sabine's videos that are not in her area of expertise.
|
| Not because I think they're accurate, or fully informed, or
| anything like that.
|
| But because usually they're a decent attempt at grokking
| important information from another field, which is a challenge we
| face nowadays in this sea of conflicting information about
| everything.
|
| When she gets something wrong, it's another indicator of how even
| a trained scientist can still make mistakes in these
| interpretations, and so brings me to a more realistic expectation
| of what myself, or any other person, could do on their own.
|
| Her latest video on how to do your own research puts this
| challenge in perspective.
| johnklos wrote:
| I think it's interesting to hear how some people are upset with
| her non-physics videos and how that compares with how her videos
| are received by experts in those fields. Her videos are generally
| well received, whereas people complaining rarely have more to say
| than some form of "stay in your own lane". When people have a
| hard time coming up with complaints that are actually about the
| subject matter, you're probably doing a good job :)
|
| I like the quote in the article from Patricia Rankin:
| "[challenging] people's assumptions ... because that's really
| what science is all about."
|
| I have much more respect for someone who disagrees with me, with
| whom I can discuss differences reasonably, than with someone who
| agrees with me, but does so dogmatically. The latter is
| unfortunately more common than the former, and I think that's why
| Sabine holds a special place in my heart.
| onetimeuse92304 wrote:
| I think scientists (and actually people of other trades) are
| best when they talk about stuff they actually know.
|
| Sometimes people start thinking that because they got
| successful in one area it gives them blanket check to talk
| about everything. Usually, the end result is they greatly
| overestimate their capability.
|
| This is how many youtube channels die. The authors think they
| exhausted the topic and are looking to talk about other stuff
| and they start alienating their fan base because not only they
| are much less knowledgeable about those other topics, but also
| because the fan base just did not expect/appreciate those other
| topics. They came here because they liked the original videos
| and now the channel became something else which is unlikely to
| be what they wanted.
|
| As for Sabine, I watched some of her videos on quantum physics
| and they were very interesting. Then I stumbled on one or two
| newer videos on other topics she started adding later and they
| were jarring, on the verge of misinformation/pseudoscience.
| paulpauper wrote:
| She has 1 million subscribers , most of whom of also
| interested in the non-physics stuff. You don't get that many
| followers by only talking about technical physics stuff.
| 3seashells wrote:
| Science as a method is a universal tool though. And if one
| branch needs protection from intruders by the other critical
| scientist.. Maybe it just ain't science, but a religion
| performing cargo cult mimicry for clout.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Sometimes called 'engineer's disease.'
| rokkitmensch wrote:
| [dead]
| maxlamb wrote:
| | on the verge of misinformation/pseudoscience.
|
| Can you cite an example?
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| > verge of misinformation/pseudoscience.
|
| Yeah one was 5G. I did not like she didn't cut off
| speculation and stopped watching her videos afterwards. But
| ultimately she is correct - there just isn't evidence that
| microwave heating is safe. I wanna roll my eyes as much as
| next guy, but need to respect objective reporting.
| [deleted]
| jjoonathan wrote:
| > people have a hard time coming up with complaints that are
| actually about the subject matter
|
| Do they? That's not what I've seen. The criticism of her most
| recent video "Capitalism is good, let me explain" [1] is
| surprisingly concrete and substantive for a subject that
| usually degrades into a vitriolic dunk-fest within seconds. In
| particular, the popular reply videos [2] and [3] raise the
| criticism that:
|
| * She opens with the "money emerged to fix barter" origin
| story, which fell out of favor a while ago [2]
|
| * The focus on money as opposed to credit and ownership isn't
| just ahistorical, it avoids the core of what is usually meant
| by "capitalism" [2]
|
| * She handwaives the problems of the industrial revolutions and
| _the_ capitalism critic by saying "that's another story." Is
| it? [2]
|
| * She botched the Penicillin example [3]
|
| * Her discussion on externalities absentmindedly missed the
| problems with positive externalities [2]
|
| * She attributes successes to markets and failures to
| regulation without justifying why [2]
|
| ... and more. Regardless of what you think about the underlying
| debate or whether you agree with these points, it seems pretty
| clear to me that they are substantive. Not only that, a few of
| them pretty clearly seem to be the result of an expert leaving
| their lane and speaking authoritatively on a subject they don't
| have deep knowledge of. Do you disagree?
|
| [1] SH Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRPHp2EjNR8
|
| [2] Reply 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfGgBfpD-Ao
|
| [3] Reply 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7XAxiJGJdg
| Aunche wrote:
| >she opens with the "money emerged to fix barter" origin
| story
|
| This is a misrepresentation of Sabine's video. It should be
| obvious from the generic contemporary products that she chose
| that she wasn't talking about the history of money, but of
| course anti-capitalists can't help but smugly inject the
| ideas of their favorite pop-anthropologist everywhere they
| can.
|
| A gift economy may work in a tribe 100,000 years ago, but
| most of the goods and services that we rely on today comes
| from strangers who won't give you anything unless if you give
| them something that they consider at least equivalent in
| return. Sabine's point is that money is the most efficient
| medium of exchange for this sort of equivalent exchange.
|
| I didn't bother to investigate most of the other criticisms,
| but I feel like they're going to be just as bad faith. For
| example, the penicillin video criticizes Sabine because her 1
| minute history of penicillin wasn't as nuanced as a 20 minute
| explanation of the history of penicillin. Fair enough, and I
| did find the video interesting. However, judging that the
| title of the video is "Capitalism would've killed
| penicillin", I doubt author has the same standards of nuance
| towards people she agrees with.
| cage433 wrote:
| These are fair criticisms. No matter which side of the
| 'capitalism is good' debate you are on this video was so bad,
| with errors of history and even of definition, that I was
| left doubting how good a scientist she actually is.
| runarberg wrote:
| I don't think this is--nor should it be--a judgment on her
| quality as a scientist. Rather this should be a judgment on
| her as a person.
|
| Instead of questioning her as a scientist, rather ask your
| self, why she applies this non-scrutinizing philosophy to
| the field of economics and sociology (as well as health
| care; see video about gender affirming care), while she so
| well known and successful for her extreme skeptical takes
| on the field of her expertise. Like she must have a
| personal reason--not a scientific one--for this dissonance.
| phyzome wrote:
| Her non-physics videos tend to be a bit off, but not terrible;
| on the whole, they're still reasonably well-researched and
| educational.
|
| Where she really gets into trouble is farther out into the
| social sciences. I think she should be much more careful there.
| I don't want her to _stop_ , I just want her to be more
| careful!
|
| An interesting example is one of her two videos on
| transgenderism. It had an absolutely appalling both-sidesing
| intro that literally called people who crazy who are just
| concerned about suicide rates among trans people. The contents
| of the video were actually pretty reasonable, although she
| messed up a few key interpretations so that some parts ended up
| being misleading. I don't think she's transphobic, but on an
| issue like this I think a bit more care needs to be taken.
|
| More recently she had a piece on capitalism that was incredibly
| anemic. I think she tried to bite off more than she could chew
| (for a 20 minute video) and so she kind of missed the entire
| "what are the problems" side of the topic, even while laying
| out some reubttals to common statements. I feel like she'd have
| done better than that on a more close-to-home topic.
|
| (Her physics videos are of course fantastic.)
| grebel wrote:
| > An interesting example is one of her two videos on
| transgenderism. It had an absolutely appalling both-sidesing
| intro that literally called people who crazy who are just
| concerned about suicide rates among trans people.
|
| This was what she actually said in the introduction to that
| video:
|
| " _Should transgender teens transition? This rather personal
| question occupies a prominent place in the American culture
| war. One the one side you have people claiming that it's a
| socially contagious fad among the brainwashed woke who want
| to mutilate your innocent children. On the other side there
| are those saying that it's saving the lives of minorities
| who've been forced to stay in the closet for too long. And
| then there are normal people, like you and I, who think both
| sides are crazy and could someone please summarise the facts
| in simple words, which is what I'm here for. So what's going
| on?_ "
|
| What's objectionable about that? Sounds quite fair to me.
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| [flagged]
| howinteresting wrote:
| https://www.erininthemorning.com/p/new-randomized-trial-
| show...
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| [flagged]
| howinteresting wrote:
| Better to remain silent, etc.
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| If you are from very polarised place then just about
| everyone is called crazy because opinions are approaching
| boolean type.
| howinteresting wrote:
| _" On the other side there are those saying that it's
| saving the lives of minorities who've been forced to stay
| in the closet for too long. And then there are normal
| people, like you and I, who think both sides are crazy"_
|
| I think this fragment speaks for itself. It is not "crazy"
| to care about suicide rates or suicidal ideation. It is
| "crazy" to _not_ care about that.
| faeriechangling wrote:
| Which side cares about them? Those who are stigmatizing a
| population with high suicide rates? Or those who have
| successfully spearheaded a societal shift which has led
| more people to identify as trans, while trans people
| collectively still claim high rates of suicidal ideation.
|
| I don't see any evidence that mental health in the
| transgender or general population has actually improved,
| I've seen numbers suggesting societal wide mental health
| is on the decline, and I have seen a pretty large
| increase in the absolute numbers of people who say their
| gender dysphoria makes them suicidal. I can find research
| that suggests transgender people who receive more medical
| treatment and societal acceptance are less suicidal than
| those who do not, but that doesn't actually demonstrate
| that trans acceptance will lead to less suicidality and
| better mental health at the societal level. Or even
| really at the individual level, since correlation is not
| causation.
|
| On top of all that, most past research of this sort is
| potentially non-reproducible at this point because the
| trans population has expanded so rapidly. Three times as
| many trans men started visiting clinics in the course of
| a decade. So the research will have to be done all over
| again to discount this possibility but this has not been
| done.
|
| So I don't know, I'm with Hossenfelder and her radical
| centrism because I think nobody is actually acting
| scientifically re: trans people and they're just playing
| it by ear. What I detest is the unwarranted certainty and
| lack of scepticism people have on this topic; People are
| just guessing and are acting like they are not.
| grebel wrote:
| That first sentence is quite euphemistic though. There's
| a lot more to both sides that she quietly implies (by
| reference to "normal people" finding it "crazy") but
| doesn't outright mention.
| howinteresting wrote:
| The difference between the two sides is that one is
| correct and the other is not, and that what "normal"
| (uninformed lay) people think is not really relevant.
|
| edit: Your response has no actual content in it.
| grebel wrote:
| Funnily enough, that's what those on the other side say
| too.
|
| No matter what the topic, those at either end of strongly
| polarised collections of views do tend to believe that
| they are correct and everyone else is wrong and informed.
| howinteresting wrote:
| This is a plague among high-IQ people like physicists, quant
| people and engineers (speaking as someone who has
| consistently tested 2.5-3 standard deviations above the
| population average). They're good at pattern matching which
| is rewarding in those fields but think they can just think
| through areas outside their expertise without engaging with
| the literature.
| VirusNewbie wrote:
| Well, in terms of Covid-19, data scientists and programmers
| did a much better job than epidemiologists at predicting
| spread and infection rate.
| kiba wrote:
| I think it's important to increase our range on our
| knowledge. You aren't always going to have an expert's
| opinion to evaluate every piece of information coming at you,
| and there's only so much that an authoritative source can do
| for you.
|
| Now, making videos on topics outside of your expertise?
| That's a dangerous minefield, but there are ways to approach
| it.
|
| For example, there's whole youtube channels to taking on
| challenges and learning new stuff.
| Avshalom wrote:
| I would like to see the actual quote from Patricia Rankin
| because [challenging] people's assumptions is not at all what
| science is about. I mean, sure sometimes it turns out that
| people's assumptions don't actually line up with the natural
| world but science certainly doesn't have any particular focus
| on those cases.
| pbhjpbhj wrote:
| If you believe something because it is assumed, that is not
| science. When you challenge that assumption, it may
| ultimately be that your guess was right, but your
| _assumption_ has nonetheless been challenged.
|
| Some things seem _prima facie_ to be true, but turn out not
| to be consistent with the rest of our scientific
| understanding.
|
| If we're to be thorough then we should not just assume
| knowledge, we should put it to the test. This is scientific
| IMO.
|
| Did you assume that challenging an assumption meant opposing
| it?
| mistermann wrote:
| > like the quote in the article from Patricia Rankin:
| "[challenging] people's assumptions ... because that's really
| what science is all about.
|
| Depending on whether the person being challenged is a
| scientist, and the specific assumption/"fact".
| kbelder wrote:
| >Depending on whether the person being challenged is a
| scientist
|
| Has no bearing whatsoever.
| [deleted]
| cycomanic wrote:
| Many here see only problems with her technical videos, but what
| I find is that after initially talking about and criticising
| research in her areas of expertise it is very obvious she
| became popular with a certain "anti-scientific establishment"
| (for lack of a better word) crowd and now really peddles to
| that audience.
|
| In the process she has diverted from topics she knows to
| scientific areas where she has at best a undergraduate level
| understanding but still talks like she is a subject expert and
| always taking a contrarian stance. After seeing videos where I
| have significant expertise where she was clearly wrong (and
| again peddling the "anti-establishment" angle) I stopped
| watching. That she is now making videos about capitalism and
| other social science topics just illustrates the point.
| vegetablepotpie wrote:
| I agree that she absolutely is fostering an "anti-
| establishment" audience, she's also doing it in a
| lackadaisical way and that's harmful.
|
| A good example of this was on her video on free will, she
| made the argument that free will does not exist because human
| brains operate on principles that are deterministic. She
| followed that conclusion with a tirade on climate change and
| how people should stop trying to build the "political will"
| to do something on climate change, because free will does not
| exist. I have to wonder what the reasoning behind including
| that in a video was. It absolutely alienates anyone working
| on building coalitions for climate solutions, and she didn't
| even need to bring up the topic to make her point.
|
| You could say that she could be making that point to curry
| some favor with people who do not believe in climate change
| and would like to see content by a scientist, with
| credentials, indicating skepticism. However, she has videos
| that talk about the drivers behind climate change in detail
| that are in line with the scientific consensus on the issue.
| It makes zero sense to me from a messaging stand point why
| she takes contrarian views on social issues.
|
| I can appreciate the scientists who stay out of the limelight
| because, while many are smart, not all are "media trained"
| and are wise enough to know it. Scientists who drift into
| fame, but are not equipped to navigate it, are controlled by
| the whims of the public they serve.
| [deleted]
| ben_w wrote:
| I like her sense of humour. I respect her as a physicist. I
| respect her as a general science news reporter.
|
| These are however very different things, and "science reporter"
| is something where my expectations in general -- not just her,
| everyone doing this -- is that at best and when trying
| sincerely and with skill, they will _still_ misunderstand and
| misrepresent as per a game of telephone.
|
| This means I do still listen to what she has to say "out of her
| lane", but I don't rank it as highly as her videos in her own
| domain of expertise, instead treating them more like a Tom
| Scott video. (Tom, if you're reading this, that's still a
| decent standard).
|
| I do appreciate that she explained how she does the research
| for these: https://youtu.be/nD6hS8WV3ic?si=raJ3UySkXZOgZfIn
| varjag wrote:
| I like Sabine's work but in the areas where I do have
| substantial context or expertise she is sometimes subtly off.
| It tends to happen in feature videos more than in her weekly
| science summaries. To her credit, she does tend to issue
| corrections when it's pointed out.
| tobiasSoftware wrote:
| I have substantial layman's expertise in quantum physics and
| while she correctly points out many mistakes that are even in
| textbooks, she also follows the very niche Superdeterimistic
| viewpoint and then presents hypotheses that follow from that
| viewpoint (Hidden Variables and Einstein's gloves) as if they
| are facts. For a science educator, this is a massive problem,
| and so she's become my least popular quantum physics educator
| even though she explains many quantum physics concepts very
| well.
| vagab0nd wrote:
| Same. I appreciate her "hard" science videos very much, but
| dislike and skip the rest. Usually I have no problem
| switching to entertainment mode on YouTube, but her
| authoritative tone puts me off enough to not watch them.
| [deleted]
| Pat_Murph wrote:
| She's taken a weird and disturbing turn lately. She did a few
| videos about transgender and other lgbtq related topics. And well
| she had some seriously disappointing and eronious views on the
| subject. And was mostly regurgitatimg anti trans, terf talking
| points.
|
| It's sad and disappointing thatnshe has started using her
| credibility in one field to make propogandaish videos on other
| subject she either ignores or is lying to profit off the terf
| grift.
|
| It takes away from her well earned credibility in her field of
| expertise.
| sapiogram wrote:
| > And well she had some seriously disappointing and eronious
| views on the subject.
|
| You have to get specific if you want to convince anyone.
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| TERF is a slur, albeit one that's probably welcome on HN.
| jeh_noll wrote:
| Which is unfortunate, as those who would be most accurately
| described by that label, if it was taken literally and not
| used as a slur, actually have a sensible and thoughtful
| middle ground between the two extremes who are currently
| battling it out in the political arena.
| mrbungie wrote:
| Not saying I support her views especially if they are hateful
| in any way, but disappointing/erroneous according to who/what?
| thekevan wrote:
| I love watching Sabine. It's nice to be able to both get great
| science educational content from someone who isn't afraid to put
| their own personality in the mix as well.
|
| She also often refers back to where she was "wrong" about things
| in the past, mostly where she said one thing, further research
| came out and she updated her takes based on it.
| drt5b7j wrote:
| [flagged]
| fiforpg wrote:
| > If you're promoting research into quantum gravity that
| doesn't respect special relativity, you're a crackpot.
|
| Is there a short argument for why MOND cannot agree with
| relativity, at least on the relevant scales?
| importantstuff wrote:
| I don't have a quick explanation, but rather a quick
| anectode. The incompatibility of MOND with relativity used to
| be called "Bekenstein's Theorem", based on the idea that
| Bekenstein had tried to write down such a theory but failed
| to do so. Since Bekenstein was a very smart guy, if he
| couldn't do it, it couldn't be done. When he heard about
| this, he proceeded to write down an incredibly ugly theory
| called TeVeS, but, well, that theory's got fields too
| (Tensor, Vector, Scalar), so in the end it's just dark matter
| all the way down.
| markhahn wrote:
| hah - did you intentionally refer to ugliness there? I
| think one of her most cogent points is that theoreticians
| are often driven by "beauty", which is not a valid
| epistemological or metaphysical principle.
| edgineer wrote:
| She's said some of her views on theories are contentious. I'd
| like to hear from the other side. What claim does she make
| about quantum gravity, and how is it inconsistent with special
| relativity?
| prettyStandard wrote:
| She does seem to have a pretty compelling argument that the
| speed of light may not be the maximum speed. It's not that
| crack pot.
|
| https://youtu.be/9-jIplX6Wjw?si=nLokQYuvv2KRzCak
| jjoonathan wrote:
| Using gravity to "re-wind" the direction of time on a
| spaceship sounds considerably more speculative than she
| tries to pass it off.
| yieldcrv wrote:
| > I'd like to hear from the other side.
|
| side note: I just wish that everyone that was "trying to keep
| an open mind" wasn't so impressionable and susceptible to the
| most unsubstantiated theories
|
| one of my side projects just sells merchandise to conspiracy
| theorists, such a predictable lot
| jackmott wrote:
| Really misplaced negativity, her youtube channel is a treasure,
| almost nobody in the world manages to produce a breakthrough in
| physics research, that doesn't make them garbage.
| the__alchemist wrote:
| This attitude highlights an impediment to original research and
| discovery.
| woleium wrote:
| the same comment, but with valid credentials attached may not
| though.
| kingTug wrote:
| Major Eric Weinstein vibes.
| jjallen wrote:
| So every physics researcher should never challenge established
| theories and if you do you're a crackpot?
|
| Can you make a cogent argument against one bit of her research
| instead of calling her a crackpot for challenging things?
| noslenwerdna wrote:
| Special relativity is an article of faith now? So far it has
| survived all experimental tests, that doesn't mean it is
| guaranteed to do so in the future
| wtallis wrote:
| Any theory that would supplant special relativity must agree
| with special relativity on everything that has already been
| experimentally verified. So it's not the theory of special
| relativity that's an article of faith, it's the associated
| mountain of evidence that imposes requirements on new
| theories.
| hotstickyballs wrote:
| Doesn't mean that it needs to take the exact form of
| special reactivity though, especially when we know when it
| breaks down.
| wtallis wrote:
| Nobody said it has to take the _exact_ form of special
| relativity. The comment in question here only said that
| it needs to respect special relativity. A new theory can
| offer a wildly different explanation, as long is it
| _does_ explain all the correct predictions of special
| relativity. In mathematical terms, that does mean your
| theory will produce the equations of special relativity
| when some limit or restriction is applied, just as
| special relativity reduces to Newtonian mechanics in the
| limit of velocities being much less than c.
| noslenwerdna wrote:
| I would dispute that the comment in question said that,
| but now it is gone (deleted?). Your view is quite
| reasonable, the original post's was not.
| wtallis wrote:
| The comment has been flagged, so you can't see it without
| turning on the showdead option. The line in question is:
|
| > If you're promoting research into quantum gravity that
| doesn't respect special relativity, you're a crackpot.
|
| Using the word "crackpot" apparently went too far for
| some people, but it's not controversial to say that a
| theory of quantum gravity needs to respect special
| relativity: quantum gravity is about trying to unify
| quantum mechanics with general relativity, and general
| relativity is the generalization of special relativity to
| include gravity.
| fasterik wrote:
| I've never actually watched or listened to anything by Sabine
| Hossenfelder, so I don't have a particular opinion on her work.
| But...
|
| _> If you're promoting research into quantum gravity that
| doesn't respect special relativity, you're a crackpot._
|
| I think this statement is off the mark. Theoretical physics is
| often about simplifying a problem to a form that you know how
| to solve, even if it's not physically realistic. Once you have
| a solution in your toy domain, you might have a chance of
| modifying it to find a physically viable theory. A solution can
| also be useful in restricted domains, even if it's not true in
| the general case.
|
| If we look at the historical development of quantum theory, it
| wasn't modified to take relativity into account until 1928.
| Even then, the non-relativistic theory has independent value
| and makes many valid predictions.
|
| Another example is the AdS/CFT correspondence. We know we don't
| live in anti-de Sitter space, but study of it has led to a
| better understanding of black holes.
|
| I don't think we should rule out any line of research a priori.
| We should throw a bunch of different approaches at the problem
| and see which ones help us to make progress.
|
| Of course, crackpots are a real thing. In my mind, the
| definition of a crackpot is someone who claims to have a
| revolutionary theory without any track record of engaging with
| research-level ideas. Perusing Sabine's Google Scholar page
| shows that she has a respectable number of papers and
| citations, so it is worth taking her ideas seriously, even if
| you disagree with them.
| greatpostman wrote:
| Just by reading the title alone I figured this was the case
| agd wrote:
| I don't understand how alternative research makes you a
| crackpot. If she was presenting her theories as fact without
| evidence then perhaps, but I haven't seen her doing that.
|
| Overall, she comes across as a very clear communicator with
| criticisms (rightly or wrongly) of some current research.
| Avshalom wrote:
| I dunno if she's a crank yet but having a youtube fan base
| (really just a fan base at all) in part built on her
| disagreements with other physicists means she's probably going
| to end up as one.
| IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
| In the econtalk podcast, she does a really poor job (and is also
| somewhat rude with the host) in explaining why the periodic
| table, for example, is not analogous with supersymmetry or with
| grand unification. The question : One cannot have any expected
| prediction from supersymmetry (unlike say the periodic table)
| because ____________ (no explanation given)?
|
| Can someone expand?
|
| Transcript :
|
| Russ Roberts: I think that moment in science, and other related
| moments in physics, were things that were predicted--the Higgs
| boson being one example where things did show up. They just
| think, 'Well, it's just a matter of time; we don't have powerful
| enough colliders. We'll eventually develop them. And all these
| things have to be true.' They're holding onto that. And I get
| that. Because the history seems to encourage that viewpoint.
|
| Sabine Hossenfelder: No, it doesn't.
|
| Russ Roberts: Okay. Why not?
|
| Sabine Hossenfelder: That's a very sloppy look at the history (it
| continues)
|
| https://www.econtalk.org/sabine-hossenfelder-on-physics-real...
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I'm with her. If you're interviewing someone, you should do
| your homework. Especially for someone like her with _days_ of
| YT video out there, plus books to review, there 's no excuse
| for asking dumb questions.
|
| Terry Gross manages to do it right. So does Joe Rogan (sorry,
| you haters).
| sschueller wrote:
| If you want to experience a rude guest checkout Gene Simmons
| on Terry Gross. I think it was the only time Terry Gross
| almost lost her cool.
| dredmorbius wrote:
| There was also the O'Reilly episode, in which the guest
| left the interview.
|
| I think Gross handled both appropriately.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| Now I have two episodes to check out. Thanks!
| dredmorbius wrote:
| NB: Fresh Air has an excellent archive site:
| <https://freshairarchive.org/>
|
| Simmons: <https://freshairarchive.org/guests/gene-
| simmons> (2004-2-4)
|
| O'Reilly: <https://freshairarchive.org/segments/bill-
| oreilly> (2003-10-8)
|
| Though I'd argue there are many much-better interviews.
| Those two are instances of _combative_ subjects, well-
| handled IMO. Total archive has > 20k segments.
| AlbertCory wrote:
| https://freshairarchive.org/segments/gene-simmons
|
| somehow I'd avoided ever listening to this. But now, my
| take is a little different from this:
|
| https://www.insidehook.com/article/music/gene-simmons-
| terry-...
|
| which I gather is the establishment take. After 20 years,
| no one cares anymore. However...
|
| Leaving aside the fact that he IS a jerk and didn't do
| himself any favors: I don't think she handled it well at
| all. Her fixation on his makeup is weird. He gave her lots
| of openings at the beginning to make it an interesting
| interview, and she blew them off.
|
| He started with some philosophy on why KISS is successful,
| and there was plenty of dumb things to argue with there, if
| she wanted to pick them up.
|
| Instead she went on about his makeup, and how much money he
| had. Who, really, is going to answer that question?
| nvm0n2 wrote:
| Maybe it's a matter of interpretation but in that sort of
| context I don't interpret it as rudeness because she's not
| really arguing with the host. The host is just setting up
| questions so the listeners can understand her views. When she
| says "that's a very sloppy look at history", she is actually
| arguing with the other physicists that Roberts has set up in
| his question and is merely expressing her opinion on those
| views.
|
| You can't really be rude to views or ideas, only to people, so
| that matters.
|
| Now if she had been debating with someone who disagreed with
| her, and then she said "You're looking at history very
| sloppily" that might be rude, but that isn't the case here.
|
| Also this is a storm in a teacup compared to the other things
| she does and says. Hossenfelder pretty routinely names specific
| physicists and states openly that they're defrauding the public
| by lying about their research in order to gain grant funding.
| She states this politely but so what, it's obviously far more
| severe of an attack than using the word sloppy. If you want to
| pick on her style you'd really want to talk about that, but
| it's hard to abstractly criticize her for that because it
| immediately goes in the direction of whether she's telling the
| truth or not.
| hotdogscout wrote:
| The periodic table is a classification of the chemical elements
| based on their atomic number, electron configuration and
| chemical properties. It is a result of the empirical
| observation of the elements and their regular patterns. The
| periodic table does not depend on any particular theory of
| physics, but it can be explained by quantum mechanics and the
| structure of atoms.[1]
|
| Grand unification is a hypothetical scenario in which the
| electromagnetic, weak and strong forces are unified into a
| single force at very high energies. This would imply that the
| elementary particles of the Standard Model are composed of more
| fundamental particles, such as quarks and leptons, that
| interact through a single gauge group. Grand unification is
| motivated by the observation that the strengths of the three
| forces converge at high energies, suggesting a common origin.
| Grand unification also predicts the existence of new particles,
| such as magnetic monopoles and proton decay.[2]
|
| Supersymmetry is a theoretical framework that proposes a
| symmetry between fermions and bosons, two classes of particles
| with different spin properties. It implies that for every known
| particle, there exists a superpartner with the same mass and
| quantum numbers, but with a different spin. Supersymmetry is
| not based on any empirical evidence, but on mathematical
| aesthetics and theoretical convenience. Supersymmetry can solve
| some problems in the Standard Model, such as the hierarchy
| problem and the dark matter problem, but it also introduces
| many new parameters and complications. Supersymmetry has not
| been observed in nature, despite extensive searches at the
| Large Hadron Collider and other experiments.[3]
|
| The main difference between supersymmetry and the periodic
| table or grand unification is that supersymmetry is not a
| natural consequence of any observed phenomenon, but an ad hoc
| assumption that has no experimental support. The periodic table
| and grand unification are based on empirical data and physical
| principles, while supersymmetry is based on mathematical beauty
| and speculation. Therefore, supersymmetry does not make any
| expected predictions, unlike the periodic table or grand
| unification, because it is not constrained by any reality
| check. Supersymmetry can be adjusted to fit any observation or
| avoid any contradiction, making it unfalsifiable and
| arbitrary.[4]
|
| [1]Supersymmetry - Wikipedia.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersymmetry.
|
| [2] Supersymmetry and what it means for particle
| https://www.space.com/supersymmetry-particle-physics-
| string-....
|
| [3] The status of supersymmetry | symmetry magazine.
| https://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/the-status-of-super...
|
| [4] Supersymmetry: what? why? when? - Ohio University https://i
| npp.ohio.edu/~inpp/nuclear_lunch/archive/2005/kane_....
| hexane360 wrote:
| "The periodic table" in this case refers to the original idea
| of Mendeleev to arrange elements into eight columns. This was
| done emprically based on a few elements, but its predictions
| continued to hold after many more elements were discovered.
|
| I'm not familiar with high energy physics, but from your
| description of supersymmetry: "It implies that for every
| known particle, there exists a superpartner with the same
| mass and quantum numbers, but with a different spin.
| Supersymmetry is not based on any empirical evidence, but on
| mathematical aesthetics and theoretical convenience.", it is
| on the same basis as the periodic table was when Mendeleev
| first published in 1869. It was only later that additional
| elements were found to validate the arrangement.
|
| >The main difference between supersymmetry and the periodic
| table or grand unification is that supersymmetry is not a
| natural consequence of any observed phenomenon, but an ad hoc
| assumption that has no experimental support.
|
| Can you clarify this? I would argue the periodic table to be
| "natural consequence of any observed phenomenon", insofar as
| there was no evidence or only circumstantial evidence to
| support that grouping. Indeed, that grouping was chosen
| because of aesthetic reasons and speculation: "I saw in a
| dream a table where all elements fell into place as required.
| Awakening, I immediately wrote it down on a piece of paper,
| only in one place did a correction later seem necessary."
|
| >Therefore, supersymmetry does not make any expected
| predictions, unlike the periodic table or grand unification,
| because it is not constrained by any reality check.
| Supersymmetry can be adjusted to fit any observation or avoid
| any contradiction, making it unfalsifiable and arbitrary.[4]
|
| Your reference doesn't seem to agree with you here. It claims
| several predictions that supersymmetry has gotten correctly,
| and doesn't claim that supersymmetry can be adjusted to fit
| any observation.
| slau wrote:
| Interesting that you cut off your quote right where you did. I
| feel her explanation makes complete sense:
|
| > So, this is one of the points that I try to get across in the
| book, but I know that for someone who doesn't really know the
| math of the theories, it's hard to understand. So, let's take
| this example of the Higgs boson. If you have the standard model
| of particle physics without the Higgs boson, this theory just
| does not work at LHC [Large Hadron Collider] energies. You
| cannot make predictions with it. You get probabilities that are
| larger than 1; so this is obviously mathematical nonsense.
|
| This seems to me like one of those cases where a woman can't be
| confident or assertive without looking like an asshole. He was
| wrong, and wrong in a way she literally dedicated part of a
| book about, at that.
| IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
| That does not make sense to me.
|
| AS far as i know, both the standard model and the higgs boson
| are proven. Why would you caveat that predictions cannot be
| made, by taking out the Higgs Boson ?
|
| The analogy to what Russ Robers is making, is equivalent to
| her saying: "take radioactivity out of chemistry" "AHA! Now
| since atoms can't decay, then you cannot get certain
| elements, so now i can conclude that the periodic table is
| crap! it can't make predictions about atom size!"
|
| Why ?
| nico wrote:
| Just reading the transcripts above, she comes across as rude
| and condescending, not as confident and assertive
|
| Although without knowing the tone of the interviewer before
| the excerpts above, I don't know if it's warranted
|
| I don't think this has anything to do with being a woman
| PakG1 wrote:
| Academics in general can be rude and condescending if you
| look up all the stories on the phd subreddit about the
| experiences of phd students with their supervisors. There
| are lots of stories of academia being a toxic workplace. I
| would presume at this point that the academic researchers
| themselves are a core causal factor of that phenomenon.
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| It doesn't sound rude to me at all, just matter of fact. I
| would guess Sabine is ND in some way and this is a common
| misinterpretation of ND behaviours.
| GeorgeTirebiter wrote:
| ND?
| [deleted]
| kyldvs wrote:
| Neurodivergent probably
| trollerator23 wrote:
| So... it _is_ rude. Just under the justification of being
| ND
| [deleted]
| mongol wrote:
| I don't read many books these days, but I read her book "Lost in
| Math", and appreciated it. It provided a perspective to physics
| research that was enlightening to me as an outsider.
| woopsn wrote:
| I like Sabine and overall enjoyed her book Lost in Math, but I
| feel like her particular style of "snark" (mockery) is
| unproductive and kind of cheap. It makes some sense on YouTube,
| but not as much when she's interviewing colleagues for print.
|
| One of her recurring points is that physicists get to sort of
| make stuff up for their own gain now, because the public (and
| grant institutions, politicians etc) have become very interested
| in the field while being mostly illiterate in it. But she does
| this as well. Lay people aren't fit to judge whether eg the
| sampling algorithms used at the LHC detector are laughably
| stupid, nor compact dimensions of space, inflation, etc.
| renjimen wrote:
| Love Sabine. Great to have a news source that's geared to those
| with a scientific background. Reminds me a little bit of a time
| when news was created to standards rather than attention metrics.
| GenerocUsername wrote:
| These comments are so full of people who think she is wrong
| because they have different opinions.
| runarberg wrote:
| Those are not mutually exclusive. And in fact they most often
| coincide. If many people are of different opinion, it may be
| _because_ OP is simply wrong.
| [deleted]
| adontz wrote:
| I think there should be different types of channels for different
| types of viewers. While I appreciate VSause and Veritasium,
| Kurzgesagt as about equally informative, Sabine's quality humor
| makes her content very special.
| agumonkey wrote:
| I want to see a podcast co hosted by her and lawrence krauss.
| lacrimacida wrote:
| Sabine is fun to listen to, love her. But to be honest her snark
| is a bit too abundant for me so I check her videos from time to
| time
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| I love the snark. It's my favorite part
| sinuhe69 wrote:
| The text-only site is really a godsend!
| agumonkey wrote:
| godsend indeed
|
| here's more:
|
| https://github.com/localjo/awesome-text-only-news
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35313232
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17787816
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Freshnews is still live as well: <https://freshnews.org/>
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