| 1. First Edition | 24 September 2008 |
| Categories | Blog, Science Communication |
This is a blog article, which expresses informal views.
This article is based on a letter I wrote, following a 2008 conference, about the current state of research in physics foundations.
What I'll say below is a challenge to societies and institutions, to adopt an inclusive and non-prejudicial policy that is likely to result in the greatest long-term returns on investment, through the use of people external to their institutions and immediate interests.
To be clear, I'm not saying that pseudo-science be given centre stage. Rather I'm proposing that it is difficult for the mainstream to discover and adopt sound ideas that have potential to be developed, so there needs to be a better way of lifting the best ideas out of the noise.
Lee Smolin, in his recent book The Trouble with Physics, confirmed many of my half-developed thoughts, and pointed out that academic physics is generally interested in predictable returns on their investment. The disciplined institutions want new research to be conducted within strict parameters, and with predictable outcomes. This is especially so when they need to find funding by inventing and selling technologies, and the department's cash flow needs to be positive; it seems that knowledge, or the prospect of future knowledge, has no value at year-end!
Those starting their careers are forced to be interested in a small specialisation, otherwise they are isolated or excluded from the professional careers that they seek to develop. Innovation is sterilized, and the current model eliminates the possibility of truly creative thinking, open agendas, and 'blue sky research'. We are doomed never to nurture another Einstein or Newton from our universities.
This is not necessarily a conspiracy; it's more likely to be an effect of 'group think', where small behaviours among many have the effect of closing ranks or building walls, even when no intent to exclude was intended. The situation is that professionals are not looking outside the walls, because it's too unregulated out there, and time is precious, especially if someone wants to know how you're spending it.
This need to remain 'on message' with the institutional research syllabus prevents all but the most respected physicists from using their full potential and produce genuine innovative ideas; by adopting and continuing this policy, we stifle the class of ideas that history sees as important to the advancement of the subject, and the ideas that prove to be revolutionary. Our creative thinkers are aborted before they develop.
I propose that we can encourage those creative thinkers to air their ideas and be listened-to. I realise that this is a risky proposition, and that a balance must be struck between control and freedom. We currently have a highly controlled mainstream: a gifted person must gain their education and learn the craft before they are allowed to have the ears of those who might understand their ideas. This makes the whole system of science easier to run and reference; it is generally pure, the work is of a generally high technical standard, and authors and readers will be using the same language, so that their ideas can be readily understood. At the other extreme, complete freedom will result in an impenetrable chaos. Uneducated and uninformed 'wannabes' will pollute the body of research with works that show little care to be true, verifiable or technically competent. The scientific method would be dead.
There needs to be a balance, whereby the unqualified geniuses can be heard when they have a good idea. Chances are that these people would benefit from the knowledge and experience of those who are professionally involved in the subject. Already, this looks to be doomed to failure: who will pay for the time that professionals would spend trawling the murky waters of amateur works?
Look closer, and this does not seem so ridiculous. Through history, some of the best revolutionary ideas have come from the minds of gifted amateurs. They love their work, and will dedicate unpaid time to their subject, just because the puzzle interests them. Without the institutional pressure of predictable outcomes, the amateur is free to explore their subject of interest at will, to dedicate small or large amounts of spare time, to think creatively and deeply about the assumptions that their professional counterparts have made, and to challenge established ideas without fearing for their careers or throwing away their education. I think there is only a small price to pay for professionals to keep a net in the murky waters, even if 95% of the time they hauled up trash... 5% of the time they might find something useful!
The argument is slightly modified for 'minority academics' who pitch their ideas in a hostile landscape dominated by a self-interested majority. I have no direct experience of this, but have seen reports of hostility because of the 'off message' inconvenience of ideas, or impatience when reading text that seems to be outside their comfort zone.
I believe that this deep trawling should be encouraged in one special research area: foundational physics. In the structure of human knowledge, we have foundational ideas, which are then used to build notions of how the universe works in specialised situations. We can think of the foundational principles as being 'core', and specialisms as the fringe or boundary. Current institutional research is highly specialised, and very much at the outer boundary; it is distanced from the core, and has a very narrow remit. The risk of boundary work is low, and the returns are likely to be very small. By calling for more work at the foundational level, I believe that if we work on getting the core right (it is currently flawed), then we may build a better body of human knowledge upon it. This is a high risk strategy, but where there is refusal to speculatively fund open thinking, there is the alternative of instead spending the time on trawling the murky waters and offload some of this risk to the gifted amateurs. There is also the combination of these approaches, which allows the amateurs to have their ideas tested, and for mentoring to be concentrated on those who seem to have ideas that might later develop into a useful theory.
What's in it for universities, societies and institutions? While it might lack a predictable return on investment, there will be a sweet spot for a probable return on investment, and schools of thought will flourish when this balance has been found. However, we should be careful to avoid the narrow remit of any group, so that negative aspects of 'group think' are avoided.
The information age seems to be our opportunity to find new and interesting ways of publishing innovative ideas, but there is a danger that the whole spectrum of society will generate content that they are traditionally not authorised to publish. As guardians of human knowledge, we should develop the means to pick out the important and revolutionary ideas, and take advantage of the vast numbers of people who now have access to material that inspires them to be creative. We must not stifle this creativity; we must instead encourage it and be able to recognise a good idea within the mass of general output, without imposing any structure, morals, or dogma that would stifle ideas that should bubble to the attention of those best positioned to make the most of them.
Controversially, this might even challenge notion that good science must be technically perfect and philosophically truthful, which leads to one of my main points: ideas do not need to be complete; they just need to be communicable and it should be easy for anyone to evaluate the merit and usefulness of an idea to their own studies.
At the time of writing this article, I do not know the ideal format or forum for the free exchange of informed ideas, nor whether this forum needs to be a modified version of the existing mainstream, or new a new method of organisation. It would be insulting to invite a wider group of contributors, only to have them tiered into a class ranking system that makes their contributions inaccessible to those most able to make use of them.
Echoing the ideas of above, I leave this mostly-baked idea as an exercise for a deep-trawling expert to catch and develop.
– John Valentine, 31 August 2009