Swans on Tea

After More Advice for the Physicslorn
Weird Science
Sure, if your neighbor claims he was abducted by aliens, and spent some time on Alpha Centauri learning the mysteries of that highly advanced civilization, it’s easy to conclude that maybe it’s time he upped his meds. But in an era when modern theoretical physicists are routinely batting around [...]

How to identify real science, the better to filter out antiscience.
What is REAL science?
REAL science…
Recognizes its limits - Science only works with phenomena that can be independently verified by observations or empirical tests. This is a practical approach to the study of the natural world that has proven to be extremely conducive to the advancement [...]

This is the kind of post I start reading, and I begin to furrow my eyebrows as phrases and sentences pop up that don’t seem right or are obviously wrong. I though it was just bad science journalism, but realized it’s a rant-y agenda piece, with the supposed “science” reporting as a [...]

A couple days back, Chris Anderson at Wired posted some junk about large volumes of data making the scientific method obsolete, misapplying George Box’s quote, “All models are wrong, but some are useful.” I was a little too distracted to respond, but it didn’t exactly escape the notice of the science and skeptic blog-o-icosahedron.
Bee [...]

I remember reading about this last January, and now I see via Bee at Backreaction that it’s in the news again.
Floating banana’s appeal for funding slips
Despite getting about $105,000 from Quebec and federal art-funding agencies, Canadian artist Cesar Saez’s flying-banana project appears to be meeting turbulence. According to his project’s webpage, the Geostationary Banana Over [...]

Over at Cectic
Confirmed by Science

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via Pharyngula

What neo-creationists get right
[I]n the debate over evolution, I also think creationists’ doggedness has to do with the fact that they make a few worthy points. And as long as evolutionists like me reflexively react with ridicule and self-righteous rage, we may paradoxically be adding years to creationism’s lifespan.
I think that the creationists’ doggedness [...]

Still catching up from more than a day (and more than a blog-cycle) without power. Guide for the Amateur Physicist, which (if I were to have input) might be subtitled “This is why your missive isn’t science,” or, if I were Mike Myers in an SNL sketch, it might be “If it’s not physics, [...]

via Respectful Insolence

Outsider Science
To merit their attention, professionals say, an outsider would have to show that he’s done his homework. Serious contenders have to understand the language of physics and get their math right. Most importantly, any new theory must agree with past experiments.
[...]
Frustrated amateurs can be aggressive, clamoring to have their ideas heard. Not surprisingly, physicists [...]

It happens in science blog comments, and more so in discussion boards where you get some crank with their pet theory of some science subdiscipline, and how it’s the new paradigm ready to emerge and topple the orthodoxy. And it’s almost formulaic like a Hardy Boys mystery (or even a Robert Ludlum novel) with [...]