At 02:13 PM 6/22/2010, Jed Rothwell wrote:
Someone responded in the Shermer article with a number of
intemperate remarks, calling the cold fusion researchers a "ragtag
band of washed up, senile, incompetent, and/or deceptive losers."
When people say that sort of thing they usually lose a debate by default.
I posted one brief response.
Well, "Kemo Sabe"'s comments inspired me to create a seminar on
Wikiversity to deconstruct, er, examine the skeptical arguments. Lots
of people believe the crap he was putting up.
http://en.wikiversity.org/wiki/Cold_fusion/Skeptical_arguments
This is the problem. People who know alittle about the field, and who
are the kind of "skeptic" represented by Kemo Sabe, know twenty
impossible things before breakfast. That is, they hold a series of
self-reinforcing beliefs, that are radically disconnected from
present reality. Since they believe that anyone who accepts the
possibility of cold fusion must be delusional, any argument you
present must be cherry-picked, misinterpreted, unlike what someone
sober like them will understand.
And then if he actually looks at some of the evidence, he will pick
up on whatever phrases or elements he can use to reinforce his
belief. I.e, he will cherry-pick it. You can tell he's doing this
because he's often got some element of truth in what he writes... but
it's all interpreted within the fixed view.
Now, there is an approach that can be used to deal with this kind of
behavior. It is quite unlikely to work with him, personally, but it
may help others who come across it. It is to take each one of the
arguments and examine it in detail, collecting the evidence and
analyzing it. It helps very much if there are multiple participants.
Jed, hint. If you can restraint your very understandable tendency to
blurt out what an idiot the person who is arguing with you obviously
is, even if you are right, but just focus on the evidence, which you
know very well, you could be very helpful on Wikiversity. I'd even
list you as an expert, which you are. You could help even if you make
the "idiot" comments, I just wouldn't be able to protect you.
Wikiversity is a WMF project, but it is not Wikipedia. There is also
a new wiki that was started by refugees from Wikiversity, when there
were certain unfortunate interventions by the founder of Wikipedia in
Wikiversity business. The result of that was the the founder lost his
ability to directly interfere, he'd gone too far. Nevertheless, these
people, which includes administrators from Wikiverity, at least one
very highly respected administrator from Wikipedia, and one very
seriously banned editor from Wikipedia (a scientist), are setting up
an alternative to Wikiversity, just in case. See, the wikis are
portable and the content is under a free license. Anyone can set up a
mirror or parallel site, and then take it where they want.
In any case, original research is allowed on Wikiversity, and that's
what I've started there, a seminar to do this. All are invited. I'm
going to try to get some skeptics to participate, that will be the
hardest part. But "believers" are welcome too! Be aware, I respect
the genuine skeptical positions, and believe that they require sober
and careful response. What I really want to attract are people who
want to learn, I want to help them gain access to the literature and
the field. I expect these people to start arriving in droves, over
the next few years.
The present problem is the pseudoskepticism that is utterly
unconcerned with evidence and fails to be skeptical of itself.
