Planetarion Forums - The Physicist Steven Hawkins has changed his mind about Black Holes...

pyirt · 21 Jul 2004, 15:16

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3913145.stm

IncubusGod · 21 Jul 2004, 15:22

"I call it a Hawkings Turn"

sayonara · 21 Jul 2004, 15:25

The name is Hawking.

IncubusGod · 21 Jul 2004, 15:28

Pedant!

sayonara · 21 Jul 2004, 15:42

That was for the thread starter, not you.

You were just following the leader, but having linked to the article he should have known better.

Bad o/p, naughty o/p.

pyirt · 21 Jul 2004, 16:39

Ok my fault. Slip of the tougue :/

MrL_JaKiri · 21 Jul 2004, 17:13

It's brilliant.

Before, he said that all the other physicists were wrong and he was right, and now he's just going by what everyone else says and gets called a genius by the media.

sayonara · 21 Jul 2004, 17:46

When I said that on SFN it got turned into a "leave the disabled alone" conversation, so this ought to be interesting.

MrL_JaKiri · 21 Jul 2004, 17:48

PM the link. I didn't see that.

MeridianStar · 21 Jul 2004, 18:01

You know something funny? I just read the article on the BBC website. Read the line just about halfway down:

It was said that black holes had no hair, meaning that it did not matter what came together to make them.

That's got to be the typo of the century.

JonnyBGood · 21 Jul 2004, 18:09

The black holes had no hair bit is a reference to a relatively famous metaphor meaning that one black hole with the same spin, mass and charge is the same as another. Clearly the guy who wrote the article didn't get himself across very well.

queball · 21 Jul 2004, 18:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by MeridianStar

You know something funny? I just read the article on the BBC website. Read the line just about halfway down:

It was said that black holes had no hair, meaning that it did not matter what came together to make them.

That's got to be the typo of the century.

Admittedly it sounds like it's talking about black hole genetics but it's right as it is. What do you think it should say instead?

MeridianStar · 21 Jul 2004, 18:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by JonnyBGood

The black holes had no hair bit is a reference to a relatively famous metaphor meaning that one black hole with the same spin, mass and charge is the same as another. Clearly the guy who wrote the article didn't get himself across very well.

Classic! Not all of us are Physicists, queball.

sayonara · 21 Jul 2004, 18:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

PM the link. I didn't see that.

t=4886

I'd hope you have seen it, seeing as you posted in it several times

ps- I may have* exagerrated slightly

* did

Nodrog · 21 Jul 2004, 22:36

This is unpossible because Kuhn said scientists never changed their minds when confronted with new evidence.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 07:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nodrog

This is unpossible because Kuhn said scientists never changed their minds when confronted with new evidence.

Hawking isn't a scientist, he's a media mechine. Or possibly cyborg.

Sunday8pm · 22 Jul 2004, 07:41

Science is all about making a prediction that sounds somewhat correct that couldn't be found out in your lifetime.

Hawkings tried to off himself earlier in the year if you read related articles but it instead got reported as an assault/wife beating.

I bet he taped down the joystick into forward against a very hard wall hoping to kill himself slowly and ran out of batteries.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 08:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunday8pm

Science is all about making a prediction that sounds somewhat correct that couldn't be found out in your lifetime.

No it isn't. Shut up, go away, and get banned again.

Sunday8pm · 22 Jul 2004, 10:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

No it isn't. Shut up, go away, and get banned again.

Yes it is.

Only person who's done it and was actually right so far is fermat.

vampire_lestat · 22 Jul 2004, 10:51

wasn't fermat maths?

Radical Edward · 22 Jul 2004, 11:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by vampire_lestat

wasn't fermat maths?

it's all much of a muchness.

leave the disabled alone I say!

vampire_lestat · 22 Jul 2004, 11:12

to be fair he is a good scientist, but too many people stick up for him on the basis that he's crippled and this is funny (and old) btw..

IncubusGod · 22 Jul 2004, 11:22

People seem to think he's a total genuis when he's not really contributed to many huge breakthroughs. I mean, he's popular, well known and has brought Physics to the masses in alot of cases but he's nothing spectacular (i.e. the Einstien some ppl make him out to be)

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 12:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sunday8pm

Yes it is.

Only person who's done it and was actually right so far is fermat.

That wasn't science, and that wasn't a prediction.

Furthermore, if science is all about making predictions that can't be proved/disproved until after you're dead...

where the **** do all the nobel prize winners come from.

IncubusGod · 22 Jul 2004, 12:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

That wasn't science, and that wasn't a prediction.

Furthermore, if science is all about making predictions that can't be proved/disproved until after you're dead...

where the **** do all the nobel prize winners come from.

They are the ones sleeping with Alfred Nobels corpse.

queball · 22 Jul 2004, 12:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by IncubusGod

People seem to think he's a total genuis when he's not really contributed to many huge breakthroughs. I mean, he's popular, well known and has brought Physics to the masses in alot of cases but he's nothing spectacular (i.e. the Einstien some ppl make him out to be)

Who makes him out to be Einstein? What do you want? He's doing some cool stuff which happens to be interesting to non-physicists. He gave the consequences of his theory, now he seems to have an explanation of why information is preserved.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 12:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by queball

Who makes him out to be Einstein?

He's a vigourous self publicist, lets put it that way. He also has the advantage in this field of being disabled, because then all the arguments against him can be defeated with a YOU PREJUDICED BASTARD kind of line of discussion.

queball · 22 Jul 2004, 13:21

What kind of self-aggrandisement is he guilty of to provoke so much spite from various students and professors?
He wrote a couple of books, some lectures, and articles aimed at the public. This bet (and a previous similar bet) seem like him having fun. It's not like he's seriously making it out as a great scientific drama with him operating far above mere mortals even when "wrong" (like Fermat was "right" about the last theorem?). Some journalists might be guilty of fawning over the disabled physicist image but that's not his problem. Something to laugh at rather than complain about.

Radical Edward · 22 Jul 2004, 13:47

so did hawkins say wot wud happen wen a blak hole opened up?

IncubusGod · 22 Jul 2004, 13:52

I'm not particularly complaining about it. I was just noting that as a vicious self publicist, he inevitably ends up being protrayed as a super genius.
e.g. in the simpsons "Stephen Hawking?! The worlds smartest man!" , Star Trek when data had a card game with the greatest minds in history...Einstein, Newton...and Hawking?!

I mean, they guy has a sence of humour, I liked some of this books. I don't have many gripes about the man but this whole "lifting himself on a pedestal" and declaring him a genius of our time when so many other physicists are on a par with him is wrong.

Plus, as pointed out before, the groups crying "He's in a wheelchair, leave him alone!"...pffh

Radical Edward · 22 Jul 2004, 14:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by IncubusGod

I'm not particularly complaining about it. I was just noting that as a vicious self publicist, he inevitably ends up being protrayed as a super genius.
e.g. in the simpsons "Stephen Hawking?! The worlds smartest man!" , Star Trek when data had a card game with the greatest minds in history...Einstein, Newton...and Hawking?!

I mean, they guy has a sence of humour, I liked some of this books. I don't have many gripes about the man but this whole "lifting himself on a pedestal" and declaring him a genius of our time when so many other physicists are on a par with him is wrong.

He's in a wheelchair, leave him alone!

IncubusGod · 22 Jul 2004, 14:24

lol

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 17:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by queball

What kind of self-aggrandisement is he guilty of to provoke so much spite from various students and professors?
He wrote a couple of books, some lectures, and articles aimed at the public. This bet (and a previous similar bet) seem like him having fun. It's not like he's seriously making it out as a great scientific drama with him operating far above mere mortals even when "wrong" (like Fermat was "right" about the last theorem?). Some journalists might be guilty of fawning over the disabled physicist image but that's not his problem. Something to laugh at rather than complain about.

Partially it's because the physics in ABHOT is so dumbed down it actually is incorrect.

Furthermore, he's not a very nice person.

queball · 22 Jul 2004, 17:50

Well, he is in a wheelchair.

JonnyBGood · 22 Jul 2004, 17:51

Maybe he's faking it for sympathy.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 17:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by queball

Well, he is in a wheelchair.

Wheelchairs make people bad scientists.

Marilyn Manson · 22 Jul 2004, 18:24

Disabled people are evil.

Boogster · 22 Jul 2004, 18:29

Stone them, etc...

Nodrog · 22 Jul 2004, 18:55

Obviously anyone who dares to write anything outside of academic journals is self-publicizing and deserves to be castrated. Especially anyone actively involved in producing popularizations of a subject - how dare the layman think that he should be able to read about something that interests him without spending 6 years being initiated into the inner circle.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 18:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nodrog

Obviously anyone who dares to write anything outside of academic journals is self-publicizing and deserves to be castrated. Especially anyone actively involved in producing popularizations of a subject - how dare the public think that they should be able to read about something that interests them without spending 10 years being initiated into the inner circle.

Obviously that must be the reason, as we hate Brian Greene and Roger Penrose too.

Nodrog · 22 Jul 2004, 19:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

Obviously that must be the reason, as we hate Brian Greene and Roger Penrose too.

They haven't been as succesful however, and are nowhere near as widely known as Hawking. Plenty of people have written popularisations of science (some good, some bad), but Hawking receives the most criticism mainly because his have picked up the most sales. It's a classic case of scapegoating.

queball · 22 Jul 2004, 19:21

Is that sarcasm and you do 'hate' those two, or sarcasm and you don't hate those two, or not sarcasm at all, and who is this mysterious conspiracy you refer to as we?

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 20:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nodrog

They haven't been as succesful however, and are nowhere near as widely known as Hawking. Plenty of people have written popularisations of science (some good, some bad), but Hawking receives the most criticism mainly because his have picked up the most sales. It's a classic case of scapegoating.

Hawking has received the most criticism for two reasons:

1. his is the most popular, largely because he tries so much to be a media figure.

2. (and this is the main one, 1 is just an emphasis to this one): He gets the physics really really wrong.

It's fine writing a popscience book, but actively misinforming people is BAD.

Flayer · 22 Jul 2004, 20:44

how do you know he is wrong?
you don't look like a rocket scientist who would know everything about it

Boogster · 22 Jul 2004, 20:44

Well, much as I would love to criticize Hawking, I understand he might know a weeny bit more about physics than me. I'll leave it to you gentlemen, instead.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 20:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Flayer

how do you know he is wrong?

Whilst it is impossible to empirically verify things as fact, it is entirely possible to be factually accurate when talking about a scientific theory; for instance, it is factual to state that, at the centre of black holes, General Relativity predicts infinite space-time curvature.

Furthermore, as a physics student, it would be distressing for my college if you were correct, and I didn't know enough about physics to discuss the content of a popscience book.

queball · 22 Jul 2004, 20:51

Would you enjoy giving an example? (from ABHOT although I haven't read it (no-one has))

Boogster · 22 Jul 2004, 20:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by MrL_JaKiri

Whilst it is impossible to empirically verify things as fact, it is entirely possible to be factually accurate when talking about a scientific theory; for instance, it is factual to state that, at the centre of black holes, General Relativity predicts infinite space-time curvature.

Furthermore, as a physics student, it would be distressing for my college if you were correct, and I didn't know enough about physics to discuss the content of a popscience book.

It may be 'popscience', but the mind behind it isn't too shabby, let's be honest.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 21:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by queball

Would you enjoy giving an example? (from ABHOT although I haven't read it (no-one has))

I have, although it was so long ago that I've forgotten what was wrong with it.

I'm going to continue making this assertion, without any backing, and everyone agrees with me, ok?

ps.

Bonus post from radicaledward!

Quote:

Originally Posted by RadicalEdward

steven hawking is full of crap.

personally I prefer penrose.

MrL_JaKiri · 22 Jul 2004, 21:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boogster

It may be 'popscience', but the mind behind it isn't too shabby, let's be honest.

He's ok, I'd hardly put him in the supermega genius category, as... he hasn't actually DONE very much.