Physics Lournal

Introduction to New Edition

Since the industrial revolution/early 20th century, the progress of science has been tantamount to inevitable.

Lately however, this has changed, as science requires research, which requires funding, and the decider of the distribution of these funds, is largelyPeer Review and consensus among peers.

Thus, science depends on well supported research(ers).

Nobel prize winner Albert Szent-Györgi, takes a dichotomous perspective on scientists:

Apollonians tend towards optimizing existing science.

Dionysians tend to explore new and untested areas of science- to create new science.

Around the world, the agencies that allocate funding to research, believe that the best method is to concentrate resources on the areas deemed to be bestor of the highest priority.

This however, unevenly favors Apollonian research, because new and unexplored areas of science can not be judged from the outset.

The effect of this is that research has become narrowed, focused on a small set of ideas, and tinged with competitiveness (corporate as opposed to intellectual).

There's no way to guarantee that any given epistemological system (way of knowing) that is pre-scribed is the best system that can be found and applies.
.

Generally, all rules posited as epistemological truth, run into, or generate contradictions with other rules posited as equally true.

The constraints on funding, if constrained, should be based on the quality of ideas, as assessed by an impartial and universal standard.

This will allow for widespread understanding of subsequent research as well as a higher tolerance for diversions from normative scientific thought.

Instead, we have a situation where the decisions about research are made by people who are competing for the same resources those decisions afford.

Well this is pretty clearly an issue of misaligned incentives, what a conflict of interest.

Funding success rates are around 20%, meaning a large number of good ideas are lost, and there are strict rules around resubmission.

Thinking about the Pareto rule here. Generally the 20% that gets you 80% is assumed to be the top 20%. However if you happen to select the bottom 20%, then you lose 80%.

The universe is apparently infinitely complex and our understanding of it does not necessarily (have to) increase linearly.

We currently understand very little, and some of that understanding was accidental. The best way for increasing this understanding has shown itself to be allowing scientist the freedom to wander. This is a process that can not be successful while centralized or beholden to objectives.

“The external conditions which are set for [the scientist] by the facts of experience do not permit him to let himself be too much restricted, in the construction of his conceptual world, by the adherence to an epistemological system. He, therefore, must appear to the systematic epistemologist as a type of unscrupulous opportunist.…”
- Albert Einstein

The space we want to explore is largely unknown, leaving no room for assumptions, and pre-emptive restrictions.

Creation of a thing, and creation plus full understanding of a correct idea of the thing, are very often parts of one and the same indivisible process and cannot be separated without bringing the process to a stop.

One of the few thinkers to understand this feature of the development of knowledge was Niels Bohr: “…he would never try to outline any finished picture, but would patiently go through all the phases of the development of a problem, starting from some apparent paradox, and gradually leading to its education. In fact, he never regarded achieved results in any other light than as starting points for further exploration. In speculating about the prospects of some line of investigation, he would dismiss the usual consideration of simplicity, elegance or even consistency with the remark that such qualities can only be properly judged after [my italics] the event.…” - L. Rosenfeld

If we think about the fact that the goal of science largely is to increase the station of humanity, anything that limits the opportunity of science to do so, is detrimental to our station.

If we then force the people who carry out science, to fit into neatly labeled boxes, and do the same to history, and theory, then we are taking one step back in the system, and beginning our limitations of humanitarian goals even closer to the source.

Since the rejection rate for funding is 80%, and preparing the requests for this funding is time-consuming and intensive work, scientists are incentivized to lean toward safer, more known problems and areas of research.

The damage this does is that it removes the opportunity for bold, radical exploration and experimentation at the fringes of scientific knowledge.

The source of this stems from a few, largely political reasons:

The global quest to increase the number of universities and attendants.

Universities have become much less elitists, and the resulting increase in the number of scientists has stretched funding thin, leading to much more stringent measures and standards around funding proposals.

Honestly, I don't think funding is actually actually thin, I think a far more important factor is without a doubt the fact that people who hold the purse strings at the highest levels, unfortunately have made their purse from industries that would be consumed as a result of them opening their purses for research.

The watershed of physical knowledge from the early 20th century would have been stopped short if funders of research had of taken this approach to research.

Definitely need to pull in some quotes from Wheeler's Geons, Black Holes and Quantum Foamuantum Foam]], his work with Niels Bohr, and Werner Heisenberg, and Gregory Breit are great examples of the benefits of scientific freedom.

Scientific opinion held weight back then, with Max Planck stating that "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."

This dashes the idea that peer review would be useful to accessing the new and potentially revolutionary ideas, very much in the same way that having proposals for research reviewed by people who are competing for the funding does.

Due to the nature of funding issues, it would be almost impossible for people as young as the members of the Planck Club were, to get the funding they need for their experiments, let alone the necessary freedom.

What does a young researcher need at the beginning of a career? ...freedom to experiment, freedom to try new directions, freedom to make mistakes, freedom to think without distraction. - John Wheeler, Geons, Black Holes and Quantum Foam.

A lot of the discoveries back then were either unexpected, or accidental, and were eschewed by peers even then, with Rutherford, one of the discoverers of fission, being rather skeptical of the idea that it could be a source of energy generation.

Another example, the discovery of hemoglobin, was the result of work done in a Physics laboratory (and this is reminiscent of Watson & Crick's work on DNA), and generated the fields of protein crystallography.

The benefit of the scientific freedom of the early 1900's returned an economic bounty to the tune of 100T, which is a bounty that would not be accessible today, due to the red tape around scientific research.

Particularly, peer review stands as a large obstacle, having been presented as a gold standard, leaving itself entrenched in the minds of the people who hold the purse strings and the yea's and nay's.

One method for getting past this is to simply make way for the brightest and most highly potentialed scientists to put forth their ideas, despite the fact that pickings may be slim.

It should be noted that there was a time when the social structures of science allowed for such ideas and scientists to make their way to the top, we found Einstein in a patent clerk office.

Referenced in

Scientific Freedom

Introduction to New Edition

Introduction to New Edition

Since the industrial revolution/early 20th century, the progress of science has been tantamount to inevitable.

Lately however, this has changed, as science requires research, which requires funding, and the decider of the distribution of these funds, is largelyPeer Review and consensus among peers.

Thus, science depends on well supported research(ers).

Nobel prize winner Albert Szent-Györgi, takes a dichotomous perspective on scientists:

Apollonians tend towards optimizing existing science.

Dionysians tend to explore new and untested areas of science- to create new science.

Around the world, the agencies that allocate funding to research, believe that the best method is to concentrate resources on the areas deemed to be bestor of the highest priority.

This however, unevenly favors Apollonian research, because new and unexplored areas of science can not be judged from the outset.

The effect of this is that research has become narrowed, focused on a small set of ideas, and tinged with competitiveness (corporate as opposed to intellectual).

There's no way to guarantee that any given epistemological system (way of knowing) that is pre-scribed is the best system that can be found and applies..

There's no way to guarantee that any given epistemological system (way of knowing) that is pre-scribed is the best system that can be found and applies.

Generally, all rules posited as epistemological truth, run into, or generate contradictions with other rules posited as equally true.

Generally, all rules posited as epistemological truth, run into, or generate contradictions with other rules posited as equally true.

The constraints on funding, if constrained, should be based on the quality of ideas, as assessed by an impartial and universal standard.

This will allow for widespread understanding of subsequent research as well as a higher tolerance for diversions from normative scientific thought.

Instead, we have a situation where the decisions about research are made by people who are competing for the same resources those decisions afford.

Well this is pretty clearly an issue of misaligned incentives, what a conflict of interest.

Funding success rates are around 20%, meaning a large number of good ideas are lost, and there are strict rules around resubmission.

Thinking about the Pareto rule here. Generally the 20% that gets you 80% is assumed to be the top 20%. However if you happen to select the bottom 20%, then you lose 80%.

The universe is apparently infinitely complex and our understanding of it does not necessarily (have to) increase linearly.

We currently understand very little, and some of that understanding was accidental. The best way for increasing this understanding has shown itself to be allowing scientist the freedom to wander. This is a process that can not be successful while centralized or beholden to objectives.

The space we want to explore is largely unknown, leaving no room for assumptions, and pre-emptive restrictions.

The space we want to explore is largely unknown, leaving no room for assumptions, and pre-emptive restrictions.

Creation of a thing, and creation plus full understanding of a correct idea of the thing, are very often parts of one and the same indivisible process and cannot be separated without bringing the process to a stop.

Creation of a thing, and creation plus full understanding of a correct idea of the thing, are very often parts of one and the same indivisible process and cannot be separated without bringing the process to a stop.

If we think about the fact that the goal of science largely is to increase the station of humanity, anything that limits the opportunity of science to do so, is detrimental to our station.

If we think about the fact that the goal of science largely is to increase the station of humanity, anything that limits the opportunity of science to do so, is detrimental to our station.

If we then force the people who carry out science, to fit into neatly labeled boxes, and do the same to history, and theory, then we are taking one step back in the system, and beginning our limitations of humanitarian goals even closer to the source.

Since the rejection rate for funding is 80%, and preparing the requests for this funding is time-consuming and intensive work, scientists are incentivized to lean toward safer, more known problems and areas of research.

The damage this does is that it removes the opportunity for bold, radical exploration and experimentation at the fringes of scientific knowledge.

The source of this stems from a few, largely political reasons:

The global quest to increase the number of universities and attendants.

Universities have become much less elitists, and the resulting increase in the number of scientists has stretched funding thin, leading to much more stringent measures and standards around funding proposals.

The watershed of physical knowledge from the early 20th century would have been stopped short if funders of research had of taken this approach to research.

Scientific opinion held weight back then, with Max Planck stating that "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."

This dashes the idea that peer review would be useful to accessing the new and potentially revolutionary ideas, very much in the same way that having proposals for research reviewed by people who are competing for the funding does.

Due to the nature of funding issues, it would be almost impossible for people as young as the members of the Planck Club were, to get the funding they need for their experiments, let alone the necessary freedom.

A lot of the discoveries back then were either unexpected, or accidental, and were eschewed by peers even then, with Rutherford, one of the discoverers of fission, being rather skeptical of the idea that it could be a source of energy generation.

Another example, the discovery of hemoglobin, was the result of work done in a Physics laboratory (and this is reminiscent of Watson & Crick's work on DNA), and generated the fields of protein crystallography.

The benefit of the scientific freedom of the early 1900's returned an economic bounty to the tune of 100T, which is a bounty that would not be accessible today, due to the red tape around scientific research.

Particularly, peer review stands as a large obstacle, having been presented as a gold standard, leaving itself entrenched in the minds of the people who hold the purse strings and the yea's and nay's.

One method for getting past this is to simply make way for the brightest and most highly potentialed scientists to put forth their ideas, despite the fact that pickings may be slim.

Referenced in

Scientific Freedom

Introduction to New Edition

There's no way to guarantee that any given epistemological system (way of knowing) that is pre-scribed is the best system that can be found and applies.
.