Science Memes
Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!
A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.
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- Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
- Keep it rooted (on topic).
- No spam.
- Infographics welcome, get schooled.
If you are here asking: "Is this a science meme?"
Probably, yes. We use the Dawkins definition of meme: a replicating idea, not just an image macro with a fact on it. A good post here doesn't need to teach you something. It needs to make you ask something: who, what, where, when, and especially why or how.
Science isn't a filing cabinet of facts, it's a conversation. For example, a photo of an eel or other localized wildlife counts because most people never see one, and wonder is the first step of inquiry. A car meme counts if it makes you curious about what's under the bonnet. If you want to talk about something you noticed in the world, chances are someone else wants to talk about it too.
We moderate for vibe, not category. Pruning is light, especially where a post creates interesting discussion. Experimenting is encouraged.
See the pinned paper on Shitposting as Public Pedagogy if you want the academic case for why this works.
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/c/pseudoscience_memes
You do know that he's heavily published professor of theoretical physics, right?
Or did you not understand the words and throw shade at a physicist simply because you don't know much about theoreticial physics?
He is a really interesting case. He is a real, actual, published theoretical physicist. But his popular science persona made him a bit weird. For example, in this video, alongside Roger Penrose and Sabine Hossenfelder, he looks like a sci-fi hype-man.
Yeah, I remember him on Art Bell back in the 90s and early 2000s. He's never shied away from trying to inject real science into the pseudoscience crowd. Just because he's willing to be brave enough to keep a discussion grounded in reality doesn't mean other guests invited to some event he didn't organize necessarily color his character. It's the risk of being a science communicator - you want to communicate real science to people that normally don't want to hear about it.
To be fair to a counterpoint, string theory hasn't panned out mathematically as he probably expected, so he has a bit more time to get into all sorts of things these days. I'm more so surprised he hasn't retired yet.
Sabine Hossenfelder isn't really a good foil for someone that likes to portray that they are an expert on topics that are actually outside their expertise. Here's a good video on why she is more similar to him than you would think: Youtube.
From my perspective, her takes on anything outside of undergrad physics are pretty shit, so forgive me if I don't see having her involved as a good thing.
Yeah. I stopped watching her long ago. But I really like Penrose, so I watched that video for him.
So isn't Steven Pinker. Doesn't mean academics can't be idiots.
Sure, but he's also not a random kook.
theoretical physics is is a lot of pseudo science.
most of it is pure mathematics.
it's only science strictly, when it's hypothesis are verified by experimental evidence.
there are still particles in the standard model that are purely theoretical.
So.... Math is pseudoscience?
yes. it's not a science anymore than painting is.
you can certainly make mathematical models and paint pictures of theoretical concepts though.
science is the method of empirical verification. math is about as empirical as metaphysics is.
there can only be one!
i can do you one better. i was in philosophy.
nothing more fun that the bitterness of various academics getting pissy about whose work is 'most essential' or 'primary' or 'pure' or 'foundational'.
best thing i did in life was leave academia and it's pissing contests of legitimacy. or worse, how much money they could bring it by wooing the donors. funny how a lot of academic pretension just boils down to who can get the most money.
Wanna hear my theory about dark matter being ghosts?
I hear you should do cocaine about those.