Posted by
michael
on from the not-a-fox-special dept.
FortKnox writes: "The two Jovians on the planet Jupiter have been 'arguing' for a while, and are about to collide. The article is descriptive and explains what happened the last time something like this happened, plus pictures. Time to get out your telescopes..."
Like when You introduce a small spinner to a large stable pattern in the game of life, the white spot could destroy the red spot. This interaction is governed by chaos theory, and as such, any predictions about the end result are useless. Better to lay odds than make blanket predictions. Clay Sherrod's lack of objectivity or lack of knowledge of the laws of physics marks him as an amateur. Science by press release. Perhaps that is why he is in Arkansas and not Tucson, Arizona.
This post is mean spirited and might be considered a flame. But if the sientific community has nothing but fawning press, how is sience to advance? Breathy exclamations about perpetual motion energy sources and cloned human kidneys are not good science. They are modern day snake oil salesmen taking reaserch dollars away from real science.
If the conventional press will not place a critical eye on psuedo science, perhaps we should. Perhaps we are the only ones who can.
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If voting were effective, it would be illegal by now.
Re:game of life
by
CheshireCatCO
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
For starters, you might want to be aware that there are several top-of-their-fields planetary scientists in Arkansas right now. So trying to blast a guy about living there, vs. in Tucson, AZ, is silly.
What's even weirder for me is that I don't see his "lack of objectivity." He made a prediction. No, he didn't give odds. You'd need hundreds of simulations to lay odds. I don't know that anyone has those simulations in place right now, let alone an observer. So he made a reasonable prediction based on physics (bigger storm should well be expected to swollow the smaller one, at least at first examination) and previous observations. That's fine science reporting by me.
Trying to tout Chaos theory as the be-all and end-all and claiming that no one should be allowed to make predictions about things because Choas theory exists is some of the worst sophistry. Chaos theory has its uses, but don't think it negates all other ways of looking at the universe.
Slashdot Mirror
Like when You introduce a small spinner to a large stable pattern in the game of life, the white spot could destroy the red spot. This interaction is governed by chaos theory, and as such, any predictions about the end result are useless. Better to lay odds than make blanket predictions. Clay Sherrod's lack of objectivity or lack of knowledge of the laws of physics marks him as an amateur. Science by press release. Perhaps that is why he is in Arkansas and not Tucson, Arizona.
This post is mean spirited and might be considered a flame. But if the sientific community has nothing but fawning press, how is sience to advance? Breathy exclamations about perpetual motion energy sources and cloned human kidneys are not good science. They are modern day snake oil salesmen taking reaserch dollars away from real science.
If the conventional press will not place a critical eye on psuedo science, perhaps we should. Perhaps we are the only ones who can.
If voting were effective, it would be illegal by now.