Later that evening at the local tavern.
“So then when it fails for the third time, he drinks a cup of acid, tips his hat to the crowd, and then collapses.”
“Haha! That’s gold!”
The tavern falls silent.
There are a couple great video essays by Bobby Broccoli on YouTube where they dive into the history of people who faked human cloning and discovering a new element
Link for those interested:
I love bobby broccoli. For me, one of the very few instant-click long format channels.
The video on Jan Hendrick Schön was what I thought of on opening the thread
Mercury to silver is an easy transformation. You just take a vial of quicksilver, and make it run laps until it’s really tired.
See, replication isn’t a problem if your entire field is vibes-based. A lot of economics papers I come across are like that (so much so that I am close to writing off the entire decipline as unscientific). The diff in the level of rigour you would see in e.g. particle physics versus in economics is baffling.
It used to be psychology as well but I am noticing they are more than aware of their replication crisis lately. Whereas economics feels pseudoscience with a maths clothing.
I see the same issues also in computer science especially when looking into recent trends such as AI or blockchain/NFTs before that. There are definitely areas that are more rigorous than others but the replication crisis is a problem in many many scientific fields. If your results are not completely outlandish and don’t go against the vibe, no one will ever bother to check your results.
There are so many different areas of computer science though… Everything from pure mathematics (e.g ‘we found a new algorithm that does X in O(logx)’) to the absurdly specific (‘when I run the load tests with this configuration it’s faster’). The former would get published. The latter wouldn’t. And the stuff in the middle ranges the gamut from ‘here’s my new GC algorithm that performs better in benchmarks on these sample sets’ to ‘looks like programmers have fewer bugs when you constrain them with these invariants’. All the way over on the other side, NFT/Blockchain/AI announcement crap usually doesn’t even have a scientific statement to be expressed, so there’s nothing to confirm or deny. There are issues with some areas, but I’m not sure that replication is really the big one for most of these. Only one it commonly applies to IMO are productivity or bug-frequency claims which are generally hella suss
The problem is that a lot out economics relies on “models” that estimate the price of milk by assuming a frictionless cow on an infinite plane. There’s a distinct lack of attempts to actually test the models against reality, or simply study reality itself (the reason likely being that when people do study reality instead of models, the progressive economists most often turn out to be right)
Economics is tarot card reading for right wing pseudointellectuals, just like The Stock Market being the same as astrological horoscopes for the same crowd
Not all of it. But that’s what a lot of the mainstream has become.
For a better analysis than I can give, check out Unlearning Economics on YouTube. He’s an econ PhD doing a lot of excellent work dissecting the problems with the field as a whole.
The problem is that a lot out economics relies on “models” that estimate the price of milk by assuming a frictionless cow on an infinite plane
Reminds me of a great sarcastic comment I heard in a “Well, there’s your problem” podcast. It was along the lines of “Turns out that, if gas was free, contrary to what economists would have you believe, people wouldn’t be consuming infinite amounts of it”
where’s that SMBC comic that says economic models suck so bad because they’re created by the sort of person who gets a business degree
That’s pretty much all of them
The real issue is that anyone can come up with an economic model, but politicians and public figures get to pick and choose the one that fits their beliefs most closely. The model can be crap and barely hold up beyond an ELIF narrative about why it’s true, and people will base their careers around believing it
I think there are good economic models out there, it’s just the convenient ones that are spread… Ones that don’t generally hold up against actual observation
Also the fact that the economy is managed can mean things aren’t always testable. If you think there’s going to be a recession based on models and you prevent that by using policy, did you really prevent the recession or was it never going to happen?
Yeah no economics is absolutely a fake science
Economists are just maths/stats nerds that like gambling, don’t bother to cmv.
The level of rigour you would see in e.g. particle physics versus in economics is baffling.
There’s no economic equivalent of a LHC, though. For a while, the high end physics really was confined to a blackboard and predicated on people’s faith in mathematics. And you can build convincing economic models rooted in a reliable mathematical formula. You can even back your way into a convincing mathematical model by compiling economic data and building a model around that.
Whereas economics feels pseudoscience with a maths clothing.
The economist Richard Wolff often comments on the curious distinction between Economics and Business as fields of study.
Na mate, you can’t replicate a single study. There’s never a chance to control all your environment and redo everything exactly the same. Even if you did, people get older and arguably wiser so they behave difference under the same situation.
In the mean time, all electrons are interchangeable and you can pick as many as you want and put in the condition that you want.
Yeah, I read about the Stanford prison experiments being widely cited, and it likely has influenced our culture in some way.
isn’t there a problem with lack of replication in the scientific world though? i feel like replication experiments don’t get grants easily so people are more likely to pursue one time experiments.
Just do experiments that confirm the bias of your peers and grant review boards.
Someone knows the Master’s thesis trick.
It counts as long as p < 0.05
In January 1783, Price returned to his laboratory in Guildford, ostensibly to start production of the miraculous powders. In fact, he set about the distillation of laurel water (which contained hydrogen cyanide, commonly known as prussic acid). He wrote his will at the same time, but it was another six months before he returned to London to invite members of the Royal Society to witness the experiment on 3 August in his laboratory in Guildford.
Despite the claimed successes of his initial demonstrations and the furor they had caused, only three members turned up in Guildford on the appointed day. Although clearly disappointed by the poor turnout, Price welcomed the three men and then, stepping to one side, ended his life by drinking the flask of laurel water he had prepared. The three men immediately noticed a change in his appearance, but before they could do anything, Price had died of cyanide poisoning.
…he invited them in to watch him die? I mean, that’s probably the ultimate “Walks in, makes claim, refuses to elaborate” move, but also, it’s kinda twisted and petty.
White mode screen shots nooo my eyes !
