Quote:
Originally Posted by Nereid
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Why so little success?
There are many reasons, I think, but the main ones can be grouped under two headings: ignorance, or misunderstanding, of the nature of astronomy as a science; and lack of familiarity with current results in astronomy and related fields of science.
The second is relatively straight-forward – many, perhaps most, presentations of ATM ideas were apparently blind to easily accessible material directly pertinent to those ideas; someone just didn’t do their homework first.
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Nereid,
Very interesting observations from you. I would think somewhere in all of this is at least a paper, if not a thesis, in some sort of observational sociology of ATMers.
I don't disagree with anything you said, but I just wanted to add a thought to your comment about ignorance. I believe for some of these people (I am not saying a majority), it is deliberate ignorance. They are not trying to understand the universe; they have an idea and they are doing everything they can to promote THEIR IDEA. It essentially becomes an ego thing, with the possibility of becoming famous because THEY overturned GR or QM. They also tend to assume that the rest of the world in general and science in particular thinks the same way, and it just becomes a turf war. It doesn't matter if your idea best explains the observations, it becomes a popularity vote and if you attract more supporters, you win.
Lastly (and I'm not trying to kiss up to a mod
), I have to applaud the moderators generally and you in particular for your determination and patience in all of this. I don't think I could do it.