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Re: Ten Learning Principles - Worthwhile or Not?



At 19:42 -0600 2/2/02, Jack Uretsky wrote:

I don't understand Hugh's remark. Demolishing a well-accepted
theory or belief can be worth a Nobel prize. Some examples: Lederman, et
al.'s demonstration of neutrino flavors, Michelson's demolition of "ether
drift", Lee and Yang for proposing the Wu experiment on parity
nonconservation.
What is important is that the experiment showing "bad things"
can be reproduced.
One counter-example is worth 1000 (before inflation) examples.

Merely an urge for maximum possible objectivity in both directions.
If I put forward some revolutionary hypothesis, the people I would
want examining it are those who are willing to set aside all
prejudices, both for and against the idea. Those who may have
something to gain by finding bad things about my proposal are those
who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. I am
reminded of the protagonist in the novel "Night Thoughts of a
Classical Physicist." Although this character evokes much sympathy
among the readers, I rather doubt that Schroedinger would have been
happy having him as referee of his papers on quantum mechanics.

If some would fool themselves by seeing things that aren't there
(N-waves, for instance), there is no reason to expect that others
might fools themselves by not seeing things that are there, or
refusing to believe what they do see, as was the reaction of some to
the wondrous things revealed by Galileo's telescope (I wish I had a
more recent example to offer, but right offhand, I don't).

Hugh
--

Hugh Haskell
<mailto://haskell@ncssm.edu>
<mailto://hhaskell@mindspring.com>

(919) 467-7610

Let's face it. People use a Mac because they want to, Windows because they
have to..
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