sci.physics

PD wrote:

>There has been a rash lately, another in a periodic chain of rashes
>(kind of like herpes), of posters here making what I believe is a poor
>assumption: that everyone that frequents the group is an amateur.

[...]

>Moreover, it's wrong. There certainly are physicists who feel it is
>*part of their job* to participate in discussions with amateurs and
>hobbyists, both to encourage amateurs where they are right and to
>dissuade them where they are known to be wrong and wasting their time.

[...]

All very true and it is good to have this updated (I well remember this
topic from the early and mid 90s). Some of us are indeed professionals,
even if not in things like particle theory. The fact that time is
valuable does more to explain why some posters are infrequent than to
affect whether they post at all.

The presumption that "my opinion is as good as yours" plays well to the
US culture of legalistic persuasion in which debating tactics matter
more than logic or facts.

Also in this vein is the presumption by certain quarters that news
commentators or economists can trump scientists active in climate
research purely on how good they are at "catching someone out" on some
particular piece of minutiae, such as the thought that a minor
adjustment to a data base which changes recorded temperatures by
degree has anything to do with the status of research in the field.


--
ciao,
Bruce

drift wave turbulence: /~bds/