"Surfing is simply the most fun I know how to have on this planet. And physics, and science in general, is the best way of understanding how everything works. So this is what I spend my time doing. I do what I love, and follow my interests. Shouldn't everyone?"
The insightful part is doing it. Everybody is talking about it and agreeing that it is a great idea. This guy puts his surfboard and his brains where his mouth is.
"The non-technical version is that it makes for a great news story and all, but this is the sort of idea that most high-energy physicists come up with sometime during grad school, think about for a few minutes, and then realize why it doesn't work."
I read about Kerry Black in Wired a while back. Another fascinating surfer-physicist who is well on his way to delivering perfect surf waves on demand to bored teens at indoor land-locked malls.
"It's evening, and Black is hosting a dinner party with his girlfriend and a few guests at his house just blocks from ASR. As he throws a couple of fresh red snapper on the grill, Black talks about his quest to decipher the physics of surfing. It's one that's taken him more than 30 years, most of which had more to do with mundane coastal dynamics and oceanography than with surfing per se."Before you can understand surfing reefs," he says, "there's so much other knowledge you need. Wave dynamics. Sediment transport. Computer modeling. I was really in a long process to get those things before I could start on surf breaks."
Physics is like it's own religion with it's own priests, and a social caste. Ideas matter only depending who they come from. This guy, is basically nobody, hence he will face a lot of this backlash from the estabilishment.
There are so many theories out there, that are just madeup mathematic formulas with lot's of wholes, and new concepts being invented just to fill those gapping wholes, from which those theories wouldn't make sense.
Gravitron, dark mass, dark energy, gravitational waves, all made up. They may or may not exist. Until there if concrete proof, they just exist just as god exist for religious people. You can't prove they exist, but you can't really prove they don't exist.
I am still counting the number of "dimensions" comming out from the string theorists, from 9 to 10, to 11, and now the brane theory...things that just we cannot test with our current technology.
This guy's theory, should be partially testable, especially with the new particle accelerator comming out of Cern. But the problem, he is not in the establishment. He is not an insider of the religion.
The problem with this theory is that it's factually false. Physicists simply do not behave that way. A handful do, but physicists in general are much more principled than most other specialists in other fields, which is why physics has been so successful.
PS you don't have to attack science to defend religion
I am not defending religion, as I am an atheist. I think god doesn't exist, but I just can't prove it, as there is no rational way to do it. Hard core atheists just "know" that god doesn't exist.
The fact is that a theory, is just a mathematical proof based on assumptions (which may be wrong), which need to be proven in real life by testing.
Testing some of these proofs is very very expensive and usually done by goverment grants, or in brand name universities with lots of money from private donors. So, if you are a no name scientist, it will be harder for your theory to be taken in consideration. And some of these theory, such as string theory, are almost impossible to proove, with our current technology.
Almost like it is impossible to prove that good doesn't exist, yet you can't really prove that good exists.
Physicist, are human, just like everybody else, jealousy, competition, wanting of fame are all part of a normal human being. Saying physicist are beyond that, is simple false. As a physics minor, who has friends doing phd programs, I can say that the competition for grant money is fierce.
One striking porperty of physicts: They know they are right, and that they are better than you. (assuming you didnt' do physics). It is just like that. Once you hang our with some of them, you will know.
i know physicists, but i don't know any physicists who act like that. there is a reason physics has been so successful. you haven't explained an alternative for how that happened, besides physicists actually doing something right.
though certainly i agree universities and their grant money setups are good at corrupting people, and it happens sometimes.
regarding religion: whether you are an atheist or not, you gave a defense of religion by claiming it's no worse than science. but perhaps what i should say to you is: you don't have to defend religion, to attack science. leave religion out of it.
> but physicists in general are much more principled than most other specialists in other fields
have a look at "empire of the stars" to see how this is not true. briefly it talks about how arthur-eddington stymied subramanya-chandrashekar's theories (on black holes). calling it "stellar buffoonery" , he ended up hindering the progress of astrophysics for almost 4 decades.
I don't say it is false, but there is a huge camp on the physics community saying, as long as all those theories are not testable in any way with our current techonology, then they are just philosophical theories, and not science.
Remember, hard science is based on observation, and testing. When I say testing, means that they are proven correct for some kind of settings.
Just as Newton's Gravitational Law, is correct for most human (small, or large scale), but it is incorrect for the very very tiny (quantum scale), or it may be incorrect for the very very large.
The first sentence misuses the word "revolutionary".
The second sentence misuses the term "all aspects".
The third sentence misquotes the general position of string theorists (I think) by misusing the term "explanation". Either way, it's making a reductionist mistake.
The fourth sentence (second paragraph) suggests that the biggest obstacle to acceptance of string theory is that it's weird, not whether it's true. This is false. If there was no case that string theory were true, then it's adherents would give it up, and it would never be able to gain acceptance.
The fifth sentence misuses the word "detect".
The sixth sentence (third paragraph), which I think was your point, is ... well let's see how they support it in the remaining sentences.
The seventh sentence makes both inductivist and justificationist mistakes before the semi-colon. Then misuses the word "suggests" after the semi-colon.
The eighth sentence restates the claim from the sixth.
The ninth (last) sentence badly misuses the word "explains" and the term "scientifically valid". It's also terrible English.
some things some physicists do aren't empirically-based, yes that's correct. whether you call that "science" is a matter of terminology, but the important thing is whether it's high or low quality thinking, and the atmosphere and ethos has high or low quality discussion and criticism.
i would say it is science, because the most important part of science is not the experiments, but the attitudes associated with science. do all the experiments you want, and without "scientific rigor" you will not get anywhere.
i wouldn't call string theory factually false yet -- that's too controversial, and one shouldn't use the word 'fact' except when it's quite clear. the data about whether physicists act like priests is not controversial so using 'fact' is ok there. further, i was emphasizing the problem with the 'physicists are like priests' theory is not the explanation -- it's plausible in the abstract and has a certain kind of appeal -- the only problem is that the factual data doesn't support it.
FYI my best theory is that string theory is false.
Now that is truly insightful.