On Thu, May 26, 2011 at 4:48 PM, Jason Van Patten <[email protected]> wrote:
> If the fear of being wrong deters us from searching for truth then it
> probably not the truth we are seeking, but the acceptance of our peers
> we value most. I like to look under improbable rocks for fun. All the
> same it is good to know that there are several centuries of documented
> failures searching for what may not and probably is not a valid
> assumption on my part.
It's good to not be too afraid of being wrong, but it's not so good to
just randomly grasp at ideas without much regard to investigating
whether they're likely to be wrong. Especially when dealing with a
well-established field like physics, you really need to become an
expert at the current status quo before you start challenging it.
There are usually pretty good reasons for the experts to hold the
views that they do, even if they are ultimately wrong about some
things.
What would you think of some physicist who had never used or studied
Linux in-depth before who suddenly started spouting off about they way
the kernel scheduler worked? Or, despite having never written a
program, started telling you how some other way of writing your
program that he came up with would be far superior to the way you're
doing it?
The willingness of some people on the list to make bold pronouncements
about how the universe works and what's wrong with current theories
while apparently not even understanding those theories very well is
mind-boggling to me.
--Levi
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