🚀 go-pugleaf

Beautiful dead science:

http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/hutchison/080616
"Like bronze idols that are hollow inside, Einstein built a cluster of
"Potemkin villages," which are false fronts with nothing behind them.
Grigori Potemkin (17391791) was a general-field marshal, Russian
statesman, and favorite of Empress Catherine the Great. He is alleged
to have built facades of non-existent villages along desolate
stretches of the Dnieper River to impress Catherine as she sailed to
the Crimea in 1787. Actors posing as happy peasants stood in front of
these pretty stage sets and waved to the pleased Empress. (...) The
science establishment has a powerful romantic desire to believe in
Einstein. Therefore, they are not only fooled by Einstein's tricks,
they are prepared to defend his Potemkin villages. A Potemkin village
is a pretty picture to fool the gullible romantic. Einstein was
romantically infatuated with pretty pictures. He deliberately sought
theories that were aesthetically beautiful in their harmony, symmetry,
and simplicity. He romantically believed something akin to Keats'
famous poetic summation: "Beauty is truth and truth, beauty."

Beautiful dead science institutionalized (but "no longer getting the
kind of support it needs"):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqhlQfXUk7w
Silly Walks Applicant: "Well sir, I have a silly walk and I'd like to
obtain a Government grant to help me develop it....I think that with
Government backing I could make it very silly." Silly Walks Director:
"Mr Pudey, the very real problem is one of money. I'm afraid that the
Ministry of Silly Walks is no longer getting the kind of support it
needs. You see there's Defence, Social Security, Health, Housing,
Education, Silly Walks ... they're all supposed to get the same. But
last year, the Government spent less on the Ministry of Silly Walks
than it did on National Defence! Now we get 348,000,000 a year, which
is supposed to be spent on all our available products."

Selling beautiful dead science:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vuW6tQ0218
Owner: Oh yes, the, uh, the Norwegian Blue...What's,uh...What's wrong
with it?
Mr. Praline: I'll tell you what's wrong with it, my lad. 'E's dead,
that's what's wrong with it!
Owner: No, no, 'e's uh,...he's resting.
Mr. Praline: Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I'm
looking at one right now.
Owner: No no he's not dead, he's, he's restin'! Remarkable bird, the
Norwegian Blue, idn'it, ay? Beautiful plumage!

Mourning:

http://plus.maths.org/issue37/features/Einstein/index.html
John Barrow: "Einstein restored faith in the unintelligibility of
science. Everyone knew that Einstein had done something important in
1905 (and again in 1915) but almost nobody could tell you exactly what
it was. When Einstein was interviewed for a Dutch newspaper in 1921,
he attributed his mass appeal to the mystery of his work for the
ordinary person: Does it make a silly impression on me, here and
yonder, about my theories of which they cannot understand a word? I
think it is funny and also interesting to observe. I am sure that it
is the mystery of non-understanding that appeals to themit impresses
them, it has the colour and the appeal of the mysterious."

http://www.buckingham.ac.uk/news/newsarchive2006/ceer-physics-2.html
"PHYSICS IN TERMINAL DECLINE? In CEER's latest report, published 11
August 2006 and funded by the Gatsby Charitable Foundation, Professor
Alan Smithers and Dr Pamela Robinson show that the decline in physics
as student numbers fall and university departments shut is more
serious than is generally appreciated."

http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig6/ingdahl2.html
"But there has been a marked global decrease of students willing to
study physics, and funding has decreased accordingly. Not only that,
the best students are not heading for studies in physics, finding
other fields more appealing, and science teachers to schools are
getting scarcer in supply. In fact, warning voices are being heard
about the spread of a "scientific illiteracy" where many living in
technologically advanced societies lack the knowledge and the ability
for critical thinking in order to function in their daily
environment."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2005/nov/22/schools.g2
"We are nearing the end of the "World Year of Physics", otherwise
known as Einstein Year, as it is the centenary of his annus mirabilis
in which he made three incredible breakthroughs, including special
relativity. In fact, it was 100 years ago yesterday that he published
the most famous equation in the history of physics: E=mc2. But instead
of celebrating, physicists are in mourning after a report showed a
dramatic decline in the number of pupils studying physics at school.
The number taking A-level physics has dropped by 38% over the past 15
years, a catastrophic meltdown that is set to continue over the next
few years. The report warns that a shortage of physics teachers and a
lack of interest from pupils could mean the end of physics in state
schools. Thereafter, physics would be restricted to only those
students who could afford to go to posh schools. Britain was the home
of Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday and Paul Dirac, and Brits made world-
class contributions to understanding gravity, quantum physics and
electromagnetism - and yet the British physicist is now facing
extinction. But so what? Physicists are not as cuddly as pandas, so
who cares if we disappear?"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2008/nov/27/science-easier-exams
"Pupils of today struggle with science questions of the 60s. Evidence
shows standards are slipping as comparison is made of exam papers
through the decades. There has been a "catastrophic slippage" in
standards of science taught in schools, leaving children with a
superficial understanding of chemistry, biology and physics, according
to the Royal Society of Chemistry."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/may/22/highereducation.education
Harry Kroto: "The wrecking of British science....The scientific method
is based on what I prefer to call the inquiring mindset. It includes
all areas of human thoughtful activity that categorically eschew
"belief", the enemy of rationality. This mindset is a nebulous mixture
of doubt, questioning, observation, experiment and, above all,
curiosity, which small children possess in spades. I would argue that
it is the most important, intrinsically human quality we possess, and
it is responsible for the creation of the modern, enlightened portion
of the world that some of us are fortunate to inhabit. Curiously, for
the majority of our youth, the educational system magically causes
this capacity to disappear by adolescence.....Do I think there is any
hope for UK? I am really not sure."

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090316/deresiewicz?rel=hp_picks
"The most striking thing about the way we talk about science these
days is just how little we talk about it at all. No large fundamental
question focuses our attention on the adventure of discovery; no grand
public project stirs our reflection on the perils of technological
control. Nothing for decades has approached the imaginative impact of
relativity or the double helix, the moon landing or the bomb."

http://mneaquitaine.wordpress.com/2008/11/26/loccident-face-a-la-crise-des-vocations-scientifiques/
"L'Occident face à la crise des vocations scientifiques. Le mal
s'accroît, mais le diagnostic s'affine. Les pays développés, qui
souffrent, sans exception, d'une désaffection des jeunes pour les
filières scientifiques, pointent du doigt la façon dont les sciences
sont aujourd'hui enseignées. Trop de théorie, pas assez de pratique ;
des enseignements qui n'invitent pas au questionnement......tandis que
les sciences physiques, grandes victimes de ce rejet collectif des
jeunes Européens, dégringolent (- 5,5 %)."

http://archives.lesechos.fr/archives/2004/LesEchos/19077-80-ECH.htm
"Physicien au CEA, professeur et auteur, Etienne Klein s'inquiète des
relations de plus en plus conflictuelles entre la science et la
société. (...) « Je me demande si nous aurons encore des physiciens
dans trente ou quarante ans », remarque ce touche-à-tout aux multiples
centres d'intérêt : la constitution de la matière, le temps, les
relations entre science et philosophie. (...) Etienne Klein n'est pas
optimiste. Selon lui, il se pourrait bien que l'idée de progrès soit
tout bonnement « en train de mourir sous nos yeux ». (...) Cette
perception d'une « science mortifère » se double d'une « culture du
ressenti », sorte de sésame passe-partout utilisé pour justifier
l'acquisition, l'évaluation ou le rejet des connaissances. « J'ai eu à
faire récemment à un jeune étudiant en sciences qui n'était pas
d'accord avec la théorie de la relativité d'Einstein pour une raison
étonnante : il m'a dit qu'il ne la sentait pas », indique-t-il en
riant à moitié. Au bout du compte, ce soupçon d'imposture permanente
débouche sur une idée simple qui fait des ravages : « En sciences
comme ailleurs, tout est relatif. » Dans ce contexte, la vulgarisation
est d'un maigre secours car « la pédagogie ajoute du bruit et augmente
la confusion »."

Pentcho Valev
pvalev@yahoo.com