They may certainly have a point, but many Nobel Prize winners do have a track record of going off the deep end which is something to keep in mind when an article tries to justify their points using Noble Prizes
edit: I'm just trying to say that "Having a Nobel Prize" doesn't mean they are an authority on subjects they talk about since many wen't on to promote homeopathy, aliens, believed aids wasn't caused by HIV, don't believe in climate change, etc."
Reminds me of Roger Penrose more recently. When Nobel Prize winners start making YouTube rounds, you have a good indicator of someone going of the deep end. Thank God, Eric Weinstein doesn't have a Nobel Prize...
Penrose published “The Emperor’s New Mind” some 16 years before YouTube existed as a website, so you may need to clarify which particular theories about quantum consciousness you’re referring to.
If even getting a Nobel Prize isn't enough to protect someone from being accused of deviating from orthodoxy and therefore ipso facto "off the deep end", then the entire claim the science apparatus makes about being all about ideas and not about orthodoxy is falsified, and all subsequent beliefs in a belief net based on that proposition need to be updated accordingly.
I think this is a misunderstanding of the underlying issue.
It isn't about protection from straying from some level of orthodoxy. It's about people who are incredibly brilliant in one area of their life - and yet be incredibly dumb in another. I've always seen Linus Pauling as an interesting example of this. Brilliant in some ways, but going all in on Vitamin C is just weird.
I see the basic claim as - sometimes these prizes - well intentioned as they are - may lift critical guard rails that unintentionally let them drive off into their weeds. They go deeper and harder into the weeds because the prestige that comes with these prizes creates a halo effect that blunts or hides critical criticism that can no longer reach them.
"Being all about ideas" implies that whether someone has a Nobel prize should play a very small role when evaluating an idea. If the idea sounds implausible, it's OK to say so, no matter whose idea it is. Some people will still look into it.
Someone getting the Nobel Prize and then being assumed correct from then on would be approximately the opposite of science.
They can put their ideas out there, and people can evaluate them on their merits just fine, with maybe a bias towards the ideas being interesting due to the source. What's wrong with that?
I mean some of these are just easily problematic and wrong, so its better to take their good ideas and not the rest.
Like these are just 2 cases of a number of examples
1993 chemistry doesn't believe AIDS is caused by HIV, doesn't believe in Climate Chiange, believes in astrology, thinks he talked to talking alien racoon
2008 medicine founded their own journal and claimed viruses emitted radio waves to arrange water in nanostructure that let you teleport DNA though Homeopathy and also claims vaccines cause autism.
Eh, I think that is just the result of more attention/funding. Plenty of scientists have wacky ideas (very much encouraged!) that do not pan out upon further investigation. If you are a no name lab that tries a novel idea that fails, nobody knows or cares. “Celebrity” scientist with a failed idea and now you are off the deep end.
The blaming of cliques of scientists for rejecting alternate ideas was cliche and kind of a red flag.
That does happen, of course. Science is conservative because if we have a theory that is a good fit to the data it should take a lot of evidence to unseat that theory and the new one must also fit all the data the old one did. (Unless some data was wrong, but that also takes evidence.)
But this is also something every crank says, and loudly. The more obsessed and loud someone is with a conspiracy against them the more they sound like a crank.
Was Einstein or quantum theory instantly rejected and held down forever by a conspiracy? Not really. There were skeptics but I seem to recall these ideas taking hold pretty fast because they fit a lot of anomalous data very well.
Having hesitancy of any new theory that directly conflicts with the known/accepted theories is not a bad thing. Telling someone that their theory is so different than what everyone else thinks that they might want to go back and double/triple check just in case someone forgot to carry a one or something else simple/embarrassing is just a CYA bit of advice. Other quotes like "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" would also be apropos.
Agreed. People point to the edge cases where orthodoxy and conformity crushed the brilliant innovator but for every one of those there are 1000 cranks or embittered dead end researchers claiming that only a conspiracy prevented their genius from being recognized.
It’s related to why famous celebrities and billionaires often lose their minds. Human success is self limiting. It begets failure by convincing people they are “special.” Pride comes before a fall is not because god punishes people for pride or something. It’s a statement of cause and effect. Pride causes a fall.
edit: I'm just trying to say that "Having a Nobel Prize" doesn't mean they are an authority on subjects they talk about since many wen't on to promote homeopathy, aliens, believed aids wasn't caused by HIV, don't believe in climate change, etc."