Magical Realist takes offense at what he thinks he reads

Discussion in 'Alternative Theories' started by Magical Realist, Nov 23, 2016.

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  1. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    Welcome back MR.
    Alex
     
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  3. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks Alex! It was a nice peaceful vacation. lol!
     
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  5. Bells Staff Member

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    Mod Note

    He has answered you multiple times. And provided you with the actual answer multiple times.

    By the standards of the early 1900's and in particular, 1905's standards in Germany, yes it was. When he first published his Annus mirabilis papers in Annalen der Physik in 1905, he was "peer reviewed" by the editors at the time. The editors were Max Planck and Wilhelm Wien. I don't need to explain how and why Planck and Wien were his peers, do I?

    Back then and in particular Germany, "peer review", or more specifically, what we now term as "peer review" were seen more as endorsements from one's peers or betters.

    Einstein was particularly critical of the whole process of "peer review". But he was "peer reviewed" by the standards of the day and even more so when he migrated to the US and published in the US.

    Albert Einstein's four revolutionary Annus Mirabilis papers in the 1905 issue of Annalen der Physik were peer-reviewed by the journal's editor-in-chief, Max Planck, and its co-editor, Wilhelm Wien, both future Nobel prize winners and together experts on the topics of these papers. On another occasion, Einstein was severely critical of the external review process, saying that he had not authorized the editor in chief to show his manuscript "to specialists before it is printed", and informing him that he would "publish the paper elsewhere".

    So, when you said this:

    You were incorrect.
     
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  7. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    It is really mind boggling how some people that inhabit the fringes of society in general, will always try and justify their stances by any means possible: Particularly in this case, dragging the great man down to their level/s.
     
  8. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    "As a first example, we’ll start with the career of Albert Einstein, who wasn’t just an outstanding scientist, but was also a prolific scientist, publishing more than 300 journal articles between 1901 and 1955. Many of Einstein’s most ground-breaking papers appeared in his “miracle year” of 1905, when he introduced new ways of understanding space, time, energy, momentum, light, and the structure of matter. Not bad for someone unable to secure an academic position, and working as a patent clerk in the Swiss patent office.

    How many of Einstein’s 300 plus papers were peer reviewed? According to the physicist and historian of science Daniel Kennefick, it may well be that only a single paper of Einstein’s was ever subject to peer review. That was a paper about gravitational waves, jointly authored with Nathan Rosen, and submitted to the journal Physical Review in 1936. The Physical Review had at that time recently introduced a peer review system. It wasn’t always used, but when the editor wanted a second opinion on a submission, he would send it out for review. The Einstein-Rosen paper was sent out for review, and came back with a (correct, as it turned out) negative report. Einstein’s indignant reply to the editor is amusing to modern scientific sensibilities, and suggests someone quite unfamiliar with peer review:

    Dear Sir,


    We (Mr. Rosen and I) had sent you our manuscript for publication and had not authorized you to show it to specialists before it is printed. I see no reason to address the in any case erroneous comments of your anonymous expert. On the basis of this incident I prefer to publish the paper elsewhere.

    Respectfully,

    P.S. Mr. Rosen, who has left for the Soviet Union, has authorized me to represent him in this matter."
    ----http://michaelnielsen.org/blog/three-myths-about-scientific-peer-review/
    ===============================================================
    "Most academic papers today are published only after some academic peers have had a chance to review the merits and limitations of the work. This seems like a good idea, but there is a growing movement that wants to retort as Albert Einstein did to such a review process.

    Academic review process was different in Einstein’s time. In his brilliant career, the only time his work was subjected to blind peer review – the authors don’t know the reviewers and vice versa – he showed contempt for what is now the gold standard of science. Was Einstein right to be so suspicious of the peer-review process? Should we learn from him and begin to question the widespread use of peer review in academic science?

    The first part of Einstein’s career was in the German-speaking world. The German physics journals, in which Einstein published his breakthrough work, didn’t have the same peer-review system we use today.

    For instance, the Annalen der Physik, in which Einstein published his four famous papers in 1905, did not subject those papers to the same review process. The journal had a remarkably high acceptance rate (of about 90-95%). The identifiable editors were making the final decisions about what to publish. It is the storied editor Max Planck who described his editorial philosophy as:

    To shun much more the reproach of having suppressed strange opinions than that of having been too gentle in evaluating them.

    Many of the core scientific discoveries were not peer reviewed to modern standards. For example, the publication of the foundational paper describing the double helical structure of DNA by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953 would have been jeopardised in the context of the classic review system as we know it, because of its speculative nature.

    At the prestigious journal Nature, the peer-review system was only formally introduced in 1967. More recently, the discovery of distortion in gravitational waves by a telescope at Harvard – which has crucial consequences for our understanding of the formation of the universe – was presented as preliminary and treated with extreme caution and even sometimes with denigration, because it had not been peer-reviewed.

    American adventure
    It was only after Einstein came to the US in 1935 that he came face to facewith the peer review process. He and his younger colleague, Nathan Rosen, sent a paper on gravitational waves to Physical Review, a journal which had established its reputation as the premier physics journal in the US. The paper had the potential to be highly controversial as it challenged the idea that gravitation was a wave."===http://theconversation.com/hate-the-peer-review-process-einstein-did-too-27405
     
    Last edited: Dec 9, 2016
  9. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    Some notable parts I have highlighted MR: It really appears that all you are trying to do is again denigrate science by comparing a process that was occurring 100 years ago, to what we have today.
    You also seem to have overlooked what Bells said.......
    Perhaps Bells does need to explain who Max Planck and Wien were?
    The present peer review process is not perfect, as neither is the scientific method, but guess what? They are most certainly 100% superior to anything else that we can imagine.
    Overall and in general, the process has served us well. Just look at where we are scientifically, and look at the wholesale nonsense, that we can safely dismiss as totally unscientific and crank nonsense, and so save us all from ever considering such crap. No I won't go into that at this time, but it is evident in this forum in the fringes.
     
  10. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    Magical Realist:

    After your two-week break from the forums, perhaps now would be a good time to make a fresh start, rather than continuing to fight over petty matters than led to your most recent ban.

    Just a suggestion.
     
  11. Xelasnave.1947 Valued Senior Member

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    Hi MR
    May I also encourage you to relax.
    It would be a pity to have you absent from the forum again.
    I for one will miss your videos.
    I think my style is milder than your style, but I do find one can make ones point without getting overly excited.
    I would like to see you start some new threads where we can tell you that you are wrong... I am joking but I am trying to say that discussions with you can be stimulating and I think many do enjoy the little arguements, I do think the key is to realise there is a line and in an effort to keep the peace we must al try not to overstep that line.
    Alex
     
  12. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    If I don't defend myself from false accusations and made up infractions, who will? Certainly not you as you made clear. What's to keep this from happening again with any moderator who suddenly gets a bug up their ass about me? Happens all the time here, as Yazata can bear witness to.
     
  13. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    MR:

    If you set out angrily to provoke one or other of the moderators, then you'll most likely succeed, one way or another.
     
  14. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    I'm really not much inclined to post in this forum anymore. Getting banned for nothing over and over again and an administrator who does nothing about it tends to do that to you after awhile. The whole forum is pretty dead as it is. It doesn't really deserve my efforts to pump life into it. Best to just let it languish like a rotting fish.
     
  15. Magical Realist Valued Senior Member

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    I did absolutely nothing to provoke Penner, who out of the blue gives me 10 infraction points for a discussion I had weeks ago with Paddoboy, and who then creates a new thread of my posts with my name in the title, which is a violation of the rules. Obviously pissing off moderators isn't the problem here and you know it.
     
  16. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    Don't let the door hit you on your way out.
     
  17. Bells Staff Member

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    Mod Note

    Magical Realist, your response to me - post#65 - firstly, you should try and put your own words instead of having a post that consists entirely of the words of others.

    Secondly, as I pointed out, Einstein was peer reviewed, or more to the point, his work was reviewed by his peers before being published in the manner in which "peer review" took place in that time. The editors who approved of his work for publishing were his peers (if not his betters). As noted, in 1905, peer review that we enjoy today was not the same. The Nature magazine peer review format came in in the 1960's. Prior to that, what we refer to as peer review, did take place but differently and Einstein objected to editors reviewing his work and sometimes passing his work onto others to review and assess before publishing them. The more formal format that we have today is different in a way, but your declaration that he was not peer reviewed is erroneous. He was, just not as peer review takes place today.

    RPenner had provided you with these answers and you keep trying to argue the point, despite the fact that what you are quoting in post#65 merely reiterating what he and I have already told you.

    RPenner explained the reason for your infraction in quite a bit of detail. I would suggest you read his notes that he attached with your last infraction (which led to the ban), read the many links he provided of the problematic behaviour that resulted in your infraction and see where you went wrong and attempt to adjust how you post here in the future. As James suggested, start afresh.

    This thread is now closed.
     
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