Thread: Science vs Pseudoscience

Originally Posted by AussiePostie

Sometimes it,s not easy, but basically if you find that the "reseacher" has a barrow to push on the subject it will be a flawed study.
Example-The anti tobacco movements statement that "even 30 seconds exposure to second hand tobacco smoke will harm you"
But when you look at every scientific study done on this, even the study done by the world health organization, this statement is not true. But this statment is peddled as if it is a scientific fact, when the only fact associated with this statment is that it is a blatant lie.
They did take junk science to new heights with "third hand smoke" Even they couldn,t make that one swim.

It sounds to me like the only difference you are citing is that a scientist does not have an agenda while a pseudo scientist does. That does not seem correct, to me. Bias may be one thing that interferes with "science," but that can't be the only thing. Is the only thing that makes the 'scientific studies' "scientific" that they are not run by anti-tobacco movements?

Originally Posted by Pete_S

Yeah, I researched that. They had studies for years that couldn't prove anything about second had smoke, then they had one that might have proven something, and the whole anti-smoking movement ran with it the best they could. I haven't looked in depth at the study, but I have a feeling it was something like they did with marijuana to prove it was harmful-namely force the rat to inhale what would be the human equivalent of several tons at once.

There's a good example of psuedo science for you, alot of these studies to keep drugs like LSD and marijuana illegal.

I can niether confirm, nor deny any allegations, that in my misspent youth I may, or may not have inhaled several tons of marijuana smoke.

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

Here's the first example google brought me to:

"Although theory predicts that microscopic black holes decay rapidly, even hypothetical stable black holes can be shown to be harmless by studying the consequences of their production by cosmic rays."

From The safety of the LHC

I searched Google with: black hole cosmic ray earth atmosphere

I'd make a video, but I'm not as cool as X.

It would seem that microscopic black holes only exist in theory, and that theory would also extend to say that they would rapidly decay. Not that they actually do exist.

Micro black holes are tiny hypothetical black holes, also called quantum mechanical black holes or mini black holes, for which quantum mechanical effects play an important role.^[1]

Wiki


Another interesting bit of propaganda in that link to the LHC:

Nature forms black holes when certain stars, much larger than our Sun, collapse on themselves at the end of their lives. They concentrate a very large amount of matter in a very small space. Speculations about microscopic black holes at the LHC refer to particles produced in the collisions of pairs of protons, each of which has an energy comparable to that of a mosquito in flight. Astronomical black holes are much heavier than anything that could be produced at the LHC.

They try to placate you by saying "look at these little protons....each has no more enrgy than a mosquito in flight..."

But in reality, they want to accelerate those cute little protons to close to the speed of light and smash them together, per another portion of their website:

Inside the accelerator, two beams of particles travel at close to the speed of light with very high energies before colliding with one another.

Well the definition of momentum is

p = mv

p= momentum
m= mass
v= velocity

When the velocity is as high as close to the speed of light (300,000,000 m/s) the mass of whatever you are moving at that velocity is really a rather insignificant part of the equation.

A weak analogy:
A bullet does not weigh very much, but when you accelerate it down the barrel of a gun, it aquires alot more *oomph* doesn't it?


Scientists play it "cute" with crap like that, just like we all do. But when they make a statement, it comes from Scientists "trust us".

Critical thinking must be applied to all fields.

I'm not saying anything against the LHC, or think it's a doomsday device.

But I do find it intereting the way they presented the information above. I think it illustrates rather well that scientists quite often "cook the books" to present the information how they want it to be seen.

Originally Posted by Seraphim

It would seem that microscopic black holes only exist in theory, and that theory would also extend to say that they would rapidly decay. Not that they actually do exist.

Very close to the truth. First let's remember that scientific theories are not the same as colloquial theories. They are based on the physical laws of the universe, so it's a little dishonest to say they 'only' exist in theory. It is truer to say they haven't been detected ... yet. Just like quarks were solidly theorised for many years before we were able to detect them.

Personally, I suspect that quantum singularities will be created before dark matter is directly observed.

Gravitational lensing has actually allowed cosmologists to make maps of dark matter in the universe!

Originally Posted by Seraphim

It would seem that microscopic black holes only exist in theory, and that theory would also extend to say that they would rapidly decay. Not that they actually do exist.


Wiki


Another interesting bit of propaganda in that link to the LHC:



They try to placate you by saying "look at these little protons....each has no more enrgy than a mosquito in flight..."

But in reality, they want to accelerate those cute little protons to close to the speed of light and smash them together, per another portion of their website:



Well the definition of momentum is

p = mv

p= momentum
m= mass
v= velocity

When the velocity is as high as close to the speed of light (300,000,000 m/s) the mass of whatever you are moving at that velocity is really a rather insignificant part of the equation.

A weak analogy:
A bullet does not weigh very much, but when you accelerate it down the barrel of a gun, it aquires alot more *oomph* doesn't it?


Scientists play it "cute" with crap like that, just like we all do. But when they make a statement, it comes from Scientists "trust us".

Critical thinking must be applied to all fields.

I'm not saying anything against the LHC, or think it's a doomsday device.

But I do find it intereting the way they presented the information above. I think it illustrates rather well that scientists quite often "cook the books" to present the information how they want it to be seen.

I must be missing something. Where did you make a calculation of the energy of a particle inside the LHC or of a mosquito in flight?

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

I must be missing something. Where did you make a calculation of the energy of a particle inside the LHC or of a mosquito in flight?

It was on that page you linked previously;

Microscopic black holes

Nature forms black holes when certain stars, much larger than our Sun, collapse on themselves at the end of their lives. They concentrate a very large amount of matter in a very small space. Speculations about microscopic black holes at the LHC refer to particles produced in the collisions of pairs of protons, each of which has an energy comparable to that of a mosquito in flight. Astronomical black holes are much heavier than anything that could be produced at the LHC.
According to the well-established properties of gravity, described by Einstein’s relativity, it is impossible for microscopic black holes to be produced at the LHC. There are, however, some speculative theories that predict the production of such particles at the LHC. All these theories predict that these particles would disintegrate immediately. Black holes, therefore, would have no time to start accreting matter and to cause macroscopic effects.
Although theory predicts that microscopic black holes decay rapidly, even hypothetical stable black holes can be shown to be harmless by studying the consequences of their production by cosmic rays. Whilst collisions at the LHC differ from cosmic-ray collisions with astronomical bodies like the Earth in that new particles produced in LHC collisions tend to move more slowly than those produced by cosmic rays, one can still demonstrate their safety. The specific reasons for this depend whether the black holes are electrically charged, or neutral. Many stable black holes would be expected to be electrically charged, since they are created by charged particles. In this case they would interact with ordinary matter and be stopped while traversing the Earth or Sun, whether produced by cosmic rays or the LHC. The fact that the Earth and Sun are still here rules out the possibility that cosmic rays or the LHC could produce dangerous charged microscopic black holes. If stable microscopic black holes had no electric charge, their interactions with the Earth would be very weak. Those produced by cosmic rays would pass harmlessly through the Earth into space, whereas those produced by the LHC could remain on Earth. However, there are much larger and denser astronomical bodies than the Earth in the Universe. Black holes produced in cosmic-ray collisions with bodies such as neutron stars and white dwarf stars would be brought to rest. The continued existence of such dense bodies, as well as the Earth, rules out the possibility of the LHC producing any dangerous black holes.

Originally Posted by xman

Very close to the truth. First let's remember that scientific theories are not the same as colloquial theories. They are based on the physical laws of the universe, so it's a little dishonest to say they 'only' exist in theory. It is truer to say they haven't been detected ... yet. Just like quarks were solidly theorised for many years before we were able to detect them.

Personally, I suspect that quantum singularities will be created before dark matter is directly observed.

Gravitational lensing has actually allowed cosmologists to make maps of dark matter in the universe!

So, basically, microscopic black holes are on the same scientifically provable level as Russell's teapot.

It, and they, simply haven't been detected yet.

EDIT:

Forgot the Youtube link for the sake of veracity of truth:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IlHgbOWj4o