Douglas Roberts wrote:
I suppose that when the RWRDDA movement (Right Wing Religious Dumbing
Down of America) movement becomes sufficiently intolerable to more of
our scientific community, additional folks will begin to speak out on
the subject. Perhaps if we get a Creationist Vice President the
process will accelerate!
Speaking of Mavericks, there's an entertaining Nova called "Hunting the
Hidden Dimension" starring among others Benoit Mandelbrot, and SFI's
Geoffrey West, James Brown, and Brian Enquist. In particular, the
program notes how the mathematics establishment regarded Mandelbrot's
research as not being an important contribution.
There are other sources of dogma besides from religious folks. Dogma
also can be advanced when scientists have their prominence threatened by
competing approaches...
Marcus
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