[HN Gopher] Publicity Stunt Fallout ___________________________________________________________________ Publicity Stunt Fallout Author : jjgreen Score : 108 points Date : 2022-12-07 19:13 UTC (3 hours ago) (HTM) web link (scottaaronson.blog) (TXT) w3m dump (scottaaronson.blog) | pmayrgundter wrote: | Uhh, this is cool: | | "If you had two entangled quantum computers, one on Earth and the | other in the Andromeda galaxy, and if they were both simulating | [the wormhole], and if Alice on Earth and Bob in Andromeda both | uploaded their own brains into their respective quantum | simulations, then it seems possible that the simulated Alice and | Bob could have the experience of jumping into a wormhole and | meeting each other in the middle. ... if true, I suppose some | would treat it as grounds for regarding a quantum simulation of | SYK as "more real" or "more wormholey" than a classical | simulation." | dang wrote: | The submitted URL was | https://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=13229, but it's | mostly quoting from Aaronson's post, so I've changed the URL to | the latter. Interesting readers might want to read both, though | (including the comemnts). | UniverseHacker wrote: | It seems unfair to dismiss this as a publicity stunt or fraud, or | to say this is no closer to a real wormhole than a drawing. It's | fundamentally impossible to really describe what is happening | here to the general public without tons of quantum mechanics | background. Any summary of research like this is inherently a | subjective description of why scientists feel it's important, | rather than a coherent description of what actually occurred. | | However, the quantum process they are describing really did | physically occur on the quantum processor, which I feel is really | different than a simulated quantum experiment on a regular cpu. | It is truly a real observation of a real quantum experiment, | which demonstrates that the system they setup really exhibits | properties of wormhole physics that had previously only been | predicted theoretically. | | Is it possible that experimental physicists are just insulted by | the way this is presented, because it's presented as an | experimental milestone, but, because of the use of a quantum | processor, they didn't really have to build anything... it's just | math and code? | pdonis wrote: | _> the quantum process they are describing really did | physically occur on the quantum processor_ | | Yes. But... | | _> It is truly a real observation of a real quantum | experiment, which demonstrates that the system they setup | really exhibits properties of wormhole physics that had | previously only been predicted theoretically._ | | No, it demonstrates that the system they set up has properties | that _some people have hypothesized_ are related to wormhole | physics. Those hypotheses are still pure speculation. This | experiment does not provide any evidence for them. | dang wrote: | Recent and related: | | _The Wormhole Publicity Stunt_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33851295 - Dec 2022 (2 | comments) | | _Physicists Simulate a Simplified Wormhole on Google's Quantum | Computer_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33841537 - Dec | 2022 (1 comment) | | _Physicists Create 'The Smallest, Crummiest Wormhole You Can | Imagine'_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33809648 - Nov | 2022 (2 comments) | | _Physicists Create 'The Smallest, Crummiest Wormhole You Can | Imagine'_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33809498 - Nov | 2022 (1 comment) | | _Scientists build 'baby' wormhole as sci-fi moves closer to | fact_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33809268 - Nov 2022 | (4 comments) | | _Making a Traversable Wormhole with a Quantum Computer_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33807764 - Nov 2022 (20 | comments) | | _This Week 's Hype_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33807169 - Nov 2022 (24 | comments) | | _Making a Traversable Wormhole with a Quantum Computer_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33803257 - Nov 2022 (1 | comment) | | _Physicists Create a Wormhole Using a Quantum Computer_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33802711 - Nov 2022 (1 | comment) | | _Physicists have purportedly created a wormhole using a quantum | computer_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33802613 - Nov | 2022 (29 comments) | | Note that word purportedly - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33809173. | snowwrestler wrote: | We deal with similar fallout here every time climate change comes | up for discussion and someone trots out the claim that scientists | in the 70s were worried about global cooling. A few interesting | papers got wildly over-covered and, well, here we are 50 years | later. | | Ultimately I think this is not a solvable problem because people | want to believe. If a story seems to confirm or support a belief | that is exciting or emotionally charged, it can stick in the | heads of some people and really affect them. | | Information we take in is not just stored for later retrieval, it | is interlinked with what we already think. If you have lots of | other physics in your head, a weird physics story has a chance to | get linked with that and kept in its proper context. | | If you don't have much physics, a weird physics story might get | linked elsewhere: to religious views, political ideology, science | fiction stories, etc. | dkural wrote: | String Theory, "It from (Qu)bit", etc. have been putting out a | large amount of B.S. for many years now, and the hype itself | became so common that, to compete with other B.S. the hype has | now become over-the-top blatant nonsense. | | Many fields of science these days suffer from dishonest and | attention seeking researchers and professors, overhyping their | results on media, fudging experiments etc. | | We need to make science actively painful (cut all funding, | regularly jail them, condemn them to obscurity, make sure no one | wants to date them etc.) so it only attracts people in it for the | right reasons :) | karencarits wrote: | > Many fields of science these days suffer from dishonest and | attention seeking researchers and professors, overhyping their | results on media, fudging experiments etc. | | And the administration loves them for it! And they will happily | book expensive influencers and self-made media personalities to | arrange workshops and courses in how to present your research | in the simplest and most emotional ways - to maximize | engagement and outreach. It's almost funny to see the disbelief | in researchers' eyes when the extroverted influencer brings | them the microphone and asks: ignore for a moment the specifics | of your research, what are the three qualities that makes YOU | unique and special? | constantcrying wrote: | One commenter on that article points out that there is a | symbiotic relation between scientists, the press and the | public. All of them desire spectacular results and there is | little incentive to ever play down a paper. | | The result is that scientists "polish" their results when | communicating to the press, who again make sure that it "sounds | good". In the end the public usually gets the truth only in so | far as "could" means "there is a low but nonzero chance of this | ever working, but only if there are massive engineering efforts | and many more breakthroughs and economic and resource | incentives line up right". | | Putting scientists into the media game, instead of isolating | them was a grave mistake. It even creates competition for | gtants, based on how "flashy" the results are. | tppiotrowski wrote: | Long gone is the age of self-funded aristocrat scientists who | experimented to satisfy their curiosity. | | Curious if there's any renowned independent scientists | producing research at home and sharing directly online | (bypassing universities and journals) | biggoodwolf wrote: | Whoa, but then how would governments shape research? | birdman3131 wrote: | We have those. We tend to ignore them or call them kooks. | | For good reason in (Large percentage) of cases. But I do feel | that there are a few that are getting marginalized. Often | because they are semi related to stuff that is politically | unpopular. | pclmulqdq wrote: | Several of them are absolutely marginalized and not kooks | at all. The reputation, unfortunately, sticks with them. | | David Shaw is the poster child of rich people who succeeded | at breaking through the elitism into the scientific | establishment, but he went through the whole PhD process | before "settling" for becoming a finance billionaire. | zmachinaz wrote: | Might go back to this model over time. Guess it is no secret | that academia is in strong decline. Lot of excellent people | just don't bother anymore to enter that circus. They might do | their own independent research after they succeeded | financially. | boringg wrote: | Too expensive to get access to what is needed for | independent research. | zmachinaz wrote: | Do you think research equipment was cheap during the time | of "aristocrat scientists" ? The point being here "after | they succeeded financially". | birdman3131 wrote: | It is possible to do surprising amounts on a shoestring | budget. Ive seen cheap (Sub $1k) electron microscopes go | up for sale. As well as a ton of other lab equipment. | SoftTalker wrote: | Isn't all the science that is possible to do "at home" | already done? | gus_massa wrote: | Most of it, but there are some corners. For example, high | temperature superconductivity was discovered in 1986 [1]. | The process is not so complicated, and can be done at home. | Well, at least in a very good personal lab, for example see | this video by Applied Science. | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLFaa6RPJIU | | I think the original team made like 100 samples using | different metals and different oxygen proportion. | Discovering the first one requires some brute force that | needs a small team, and is too much for a single person. | Anyway, it doesn't look too far away from something a | single person can discover. | | [1] That's 36 year ago. I'm feeling old... | Brian_K_White wrote: | I don't think so, for at least 3 reasons. | | 1) The tools available to an individual are always | progressing. | | By "tools" I mean all of direct physical tools and | materials, computational, theories and understandings, | services, etc. | | 2) Big funded labs have business owners, stockholders, | academic department heads, and grant comittees that have | specific goals and ideas and topics they are willing to pay | for. | | Many of the most important discoveries were never on | anyone's list of things they will pay for (until after it | happened some other way first). | | They only happened either by accident in real labs despite | all conscious intention to be working on something else, or | by people who didn't need anyone's permission and were just | satisfying their own curiosity, and couldn't be told to | work on something more sensible by any boss or other | funding source. | | 3) It is true that some large scale things _probably_ won | 't be advanced in a garage. | | Then again, a lot of times large scale things are up-ended | specifically from a garage exactly because the garage | researcher does not have the option to address problems | with (expensive/large/dangerous) brute force. | | They need to somehow make pressure of a zillion psi, but | they can't build a zillion psi machine, so instead they | figure out how to align sound waves to create a zillion psi | just where the waves meet or something, and that goes on to | obsolete a huge industry and now everyone's making | MrFusion's in their spare bedrooms and selling them on | Etsy. | | The smallness of the operation is the very cause of the | discovery and would not have happened in a normal funded | lab. | disentanglement wrote: | > cut all funding, regularly jail them, condemn them to | obscurity | | I can't even begin to describe how overjoyed I am to finally | have found a fellow campaigner for implementing the glorious | techniques of Maoist China in dealing with free thought. | mistermann wrote: | There is a big difference between free thought and making | false claims, scientific or otherwise. | PaulHoule wrote: | It's got about as much scientific validity as | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGFp09nS5sM | carabiner wrote: | Paul. | peteradio wrote: | Yea leave Sliders out of this Paul. | [deleted] | zmachinaz wrote: | At its start, the quanta magazine was a good read. But, it | degraded very quickly after they started to use it mainly to put | scientists from under-represented groups into the spot light. | Nowadays not worth any attention. | paganel wrote: | This bit form Sabine Hossenfelder's comment is something that | I've personally also started to think about lately: | | > It's easy enough to address the problem: Give every scientist a | basic education on the sociology and philosophy of science, and | social and cognitive biases. | | Granted, I'm not a scientist, but even from the very far outside | (i.e. the position from where I'm writing this comment) one can | see that that knowledge about the "sociology and philosophy of | science" seems to be lacking in today's scientific community. | danbmil99 wrote: | So sad -- this mindset seems to me like "Q-Anon for smart | people". As if Q was a meme (mind virus) that originally only | infected people with a low IQ, but then mutated to become a high- | IQ variant... | tom-thistime wrote: | We sure missed the point here on HN: | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33828602 | clnq wrote: | I'd be joyed if there was any meaningful fallout. Magical | thinking in science only benefits click-deprived blogs (which | some people call mainstream news outlets, despite "news" implying | journalistic integrity). But where is this fallout? All I see is | tempered pushback from the scientific community. It seems to me | like the publicity stunt worked for the most part. | NelsonMinar wrote: | Discussion here about the claim of the wormhole | | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33802613 | | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33807764 | trynewideas wrote: | If you lack context, see Peter Woit's previous blog post: | https://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=13209 | | And Ars: https://arstechnica.com/science/2022/12/no-physicists- | didnt-... | echelon wrote: | These researchers are trying _really hard_ to start a Quantum | Winter. | | It's already looking pretty grim, but lying about results is a | sure way to accelerate the decrease in funding for their | departments and bring about professional repercussions. | pclmulqdq wrote: | "Quantum" is losing its magic. The researchers in the field | really over-promised, and so far they have delivered almost | nothing to show for it on general-purpose computing problems. | 15 was factored some time ago, and the record number that has | been factored with Shor's algorithm as of 2022 is 21. | | Personally, I think D-wave and the other attempted Ising | machines took the right approach: use quantum computing to | solve problems that are essentially reducing to energy | minimization of a system. | adamsmith143 wrote: | Exponential curves look really boring, until they aren't. | mdorazio wrote: | Can you show us this exponential curve? | pclmulqdq wrote: | Every growth function looks exponential until it's not. | Most things in science and technology aren't exponential, | though. Computers have been, and if we think they are the | model for everything, I give you the airplane and the car | as counterexamples. | | As far as quantum computing goes, IBM and Google were | promising us exponential growth in quantum chip size, but | what we have actually seen so far is exponentially faster | decoherence that comes with size. | anigbrowl wrote: | This is what happens when calling bullshit is shushed as | incivility. It's not a new problem by any means, but just as a | diet of fast food is correlated with diabetes and dementia, a | culture of hype correlates with mediocrity and mendacity. | debacle wrote: | Calling bullshit on HN is almost always met with a deading. | bawolff wrote: | I don't think that's true. | | Just yelling "bullshit" certainly is, and hn has a bit of a | positivity bias, nonetheless, comments that say something is | BS and explain why are usually reasonably well recieved. | kergonath wrote: | > hn has a bit of a positivity bias | | Interestingly, it also has a bit of negativity bias. This | means that any story, however anodine or ground-breaking, | will have: | | - a group of people doing some motivated reasoning showing | how obviously terrible the thing is and how clever they | are; | | - a group of people arguing that the thing is the best | since warm water and is going to solve everything (if only | reality would behave). | | This makes a lot of discussions simultaneously very | interesting and utterly depressing. | mistermann wrote: | In my experience "are usually reasonably well received" is | heavily influenced by the topic of discussion. | ineedasername wrote: | I call bullshit on this comment. Lots of times when a study | of some sort is posted the comments are filled with people | calling bullshit on the study either due to sampling bias or | too small of a sample or flawed experimental protocols. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-12-07 23:00 UTC)