Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

You know, I met not so few physics PhDs completely immersed in perpetual motion engine cult, PhD economists claiming "endless money" through monetary manipulations, and MFin graduates claiming discovering "a new ingenious super duper trading strategy" which turn to be banal spread trading when you undo the math bullshit.

All of them took great insult when I point to banal arithmetic errors in their "innovations" down to taking the dispute to tvitter and press.

It's impossible to get through to such people. The more obvious is their folly, the bigger extremes they go to self-convince themselves that "they really can't be wrong, even if they are"

PhDs today may signify the level of knowledge, but not necessarily the level of intelligence.




I think intelligence is hardly the problem. It is something far more intangible that perhaps should be called 'wisdom'.

Your statement sounds a bit hard to believe, though. If you had met one physics PhD who was 'completely immersed in perpetual motion engine cult' I would say that this could be true. But 'not so few' really stretches credibilty.


I think you are both correct. For the frequency of such interactions here is a simple experiment (that I know to work): Follow a couple of hand picked accounts on Twitter. Over time Twitter will suggest who to follow, follow these accounts as well. Within the next 2 months or so, your Twitter feed will almost completely fill up with that cult. It feels like a completely different world, it's scary.


>> PhDs today may signify the level of knowledge, but not necessarily the level of intelligence.

> I think intelligence is hardly the problem. It is something far more intangible that perhaps should be called 'wisdom'.

It can actually be the problem. Intelligence often manifested as an increased ability for self-deception and rationalization.


Not so fridge they are.

The cold fusion clowns go around TED events, collect research grants, and VC investments though they withdrew the only paper they published for a glaring arithmetics "mistake."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Fusion

Those are not the only ones on my memory. Charles Chase with his "vortex fusion," and very sketchy Tri Alpha.

Samely, the perpetual motion cranks like Salvatore Pais were always hanging around those events popular with tech bohemia.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: