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Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
101–110 of 121 posts
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#102I really don't like this growing implication of scientists with political struggles orthogonal to their expertise.
This article criticizes Musk for spreading misinformation that goes against scientific views, in particular on climate change.
DISCLAIMER: I've worked 2 years on climate insurance, as a data scientist tasked with measuring the risks of extreme weather events and how they change with global warming. I've worked on Hurricanes (general name is Tropical Cyclones), Frost, and River flooding.
What are the damning examples of Musks's misinformation cited in the article?
The worst I can find (except for having a jet, which all billionaires do) is under the title "Downplaying the climate emergency", where the article quotes a Guardian article. In there, the most damning thing Musk has said is: "Musk has praised Vivek Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and GOP presidential hopeful, as “a very promising candidate” despite Ramaswamy calling the climate change agenda a hoax. Musk responded to Ramaswamy on X about the climate crisis saying: “It is possibly overstated in the short term, but we should be concerned about it long term.”"
Does that warrant a witch hunt? Is it even false?
Many media like the Guardian (cited many times in her article) like to announce short-term climatic Ragnarok, for instance increased risk of hurricanes[0].
And they cite short-term "limits" like reaching the threshold of 1.5°C additional average global temperature compared to pre-industrial era.
But these media mix up all climate risks in their Ragnarok, which makes their prophecies invalid. For instance on hurricanes: the risk of hurricanes could be REDUCED because of global warming [2] (frequency goes down, intensity goes slightly up).
In fact, as we're nearing the 1.5°C "limit" [1], most of the doom warnings seem to have been invalid, except for precise heat-related risks like droughts and wildfires.
At least until 2024, Musk has been less wrong than the Guardian cited so often by this article. So should we remove this scientist from the Royal Society because she spreads misinformation? Oh well, it's already done.
My point is PLEASE ONLY TRY TO CANCEL PEOPLE UNDER GOOD REASONS, because the perception by Republicans/Right-wingers that Democrats/Ecologists are hysteric is what truly undermines the West's response to climate change.
[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/08/global-w... [1]: https://wmo.int/news/media-centre/global-temperature-likely-... [2]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-022-01388-4
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#103Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does it? My conservative hypothesis is: it requires a good nose for good thinkers.
Having a good nose for good thinkers typically requires thinking.
I'm not so sure. I think there are people who can recognise talent by gut feel, without having much themselves.
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#105To quote him "Whereas previously he seemed to agree with mainstream scientific opinion" Can someone please explain to me how we managed to get a whole generation of the western scientific thinkers who think the scientific method is consensus of scientific opinion? The author lists Isaac Newton, Hooke, Boyle . All of these prominent minds made scientific breakthroughs that didn't stick to the consensus views of the ti…
The difference is that Elon Musk has not challenged scientific consensus by publishing revolutionary studies or conducting risky experiments, but rather by republishing inflammatory statements online. His actual achievements (including super-heavy rockets and electric cars) are largely independent from his unconventional views on vaccines, for instance. You can't compare him to figures like Newton and Hooke, who made…
Elons success is in very large part due to challenging the status quo
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#106To quote him "Whereas previously he seemed to agree with mainstream scientific opinion" Can someone please explain to me how we managed to get a whole generation of the western scientific thinkers who think the scientific method is consensus of scientific opinion? The author lists Isaac Newton, Hooke, Boyle . All of these prominent minds made scientific breakthroughs that didn't stick to the consensus views of the ti…
The difference is that Elon Musk has not challenged scientific consensus by publishing revolutionary studies or conducting risky experiments, but rather by republishing inflammatory statements online. His actual achievements (including super-heavy rockets and electric cars) are largely independent from his unconventional views on vaccines, for instance. You can't compare him to figures like Newton and Hooke, who made…
> You can't compare him to figures like Newton and Hooke, who made both their names and their living from science.
Not disagreeing with the rest of your post, just making a minor nitpick - didn't Newton actually spend most of his time on alchemy and at the Royal Mint? He definitely made his name from science (or math & science as I prefer to think of it). But his living? I don't know about that.
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is the salient point. Musk is not a "science" person. He is no Einstein or Newton. He has many good qualities, amongst them a broad appreciation of engineering, commerce and motivating people. He is ambitious. But Musk neither holds a PhD (I imagine he'd lack the patience and focus) nor has any notable specialism. Like Gates and Zuckerberg who both dropped out of their computer science degrees to make money, Mus…
> This is the salient point No it's not lol. you just decided to ignore the criteria for membership and invent your own, like a phD being requisite (it is not.) Also, to call Musk a "businessman" is reductive as hell. I know a lot of people have pressure to hate him because of political reasons, but be real for once.
> hate him because of political reasons,
I was purposefully avoiding politics. You brought that up.
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#108Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having a good nose for good thinkers typically requires thinking.
I'm not so sure. I think there are people who can recognise talent by gut feel, without having much themselves.
Well, the ability to identify talent is itself a talent. The skills for identifying talent may be relatively unaligned with demands of the field in which one is identifying talent, but I figure it's helpful to be at least competent in the domain where you're trying to pick winners. In "star driven" fields like music, film, or sports, you can make a good living off the ability to identify (and perhaps nurture) talent which you yourself don't have.
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
> ...you're not elite enough to be able to tell if either of them is scientific elite. No, that is not a logical axiom. It can be possible you'd be able to evaluate things to be false, even though you don't know what the actual truth precisely is. To demonstrate this obvious point, I can fairly easily make an educated guess on the author's relative contribution to Isaac Newton and I don't need to be an FRS to do so o…
> It can be possible you'd be able to evaluate things to be false, even though you don't know what the actual truth precisely is Only as a general statement, not when predicated on "this person is already in the Royal Society". New members are evaluated by the existing group; unless you're good enough to be in it, you literally can't tell who is good enough to be in it. Those on the outside are no better than Dilbert…
I can't take this rant seriously so let's agree to disagree. I see most of it as red-herring, including comparative analysis of other figures like Newton v Leibneiz (both of whom I know without Googling, mind you). I guess I just let my previous statement stand as you suggest as "a public record for your own sanity to avoid gas-lighting, or to be able to say later "I told you so"" without further engaging into why. Just leaving it as a wager, 50 years from now if people read this they can adjudicate my prediction of who would have been more relevant in overall metrics that a circle like RS cares about. My money is on Musk, and not even close, and to the extent the author is remembered, it'll be as in the context of disparaging Musk more than their scientific achievements. I'm outta here; .
Re: Why I have resigned from the Royal Society
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
The difference is that Elon Musk has not challenged scientific consensus by publishing revolutionary studies or conducting risky experiments, but rather by republishing inflammatory statements online. His actual achievements (including super-heavy rockets and electric cars) are largely independent from his unconventional views on vaccines, for instance. You can't compare him to figures like Newton and Hooke, who made…
> You can't compare him to figures like Newton and Hooke, who made both their names and their living from science. Not disagreeing with the rest of your post, just making a minor nitpick - didn't Newton actually spend most of his time on alchemy and at the Royal Mint? He definitely made his name from science (or math & science as I prefer to think of it). But his living? I don't know about that.
I'm no scholar of Newton's life, but I am aware that Newton became a professor soon after attaining his master's degree at Cambridge. I believe he kept this role for the rest of his life in addition to the later posts at the Royal Mint (which were supposed to be merely sinecures, but jobs that he nonetheless took rather more seriously on his own initiative). As for the alchemy, I think one can reasonably consider that science, as the modern principles of chemistry were still a couple of centuries off - Newton did at least conduct proper experiments, which is basis of the natural sciences.
All in all, I think that he certainly made his living from his success in science at first, even if he could have later maintained himself simply on his esteem and lofty networks at Cambridge.