From: pepke@scri.fsu.edu (Eric Pepke)
Subject: Re: Characterization of quack theories
Organization: Florida State University, but I don't speak for them
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 93 22:30:06 GMT

That's an excellent summary!  Here are a few thoughts I had while reading 
it.  Some of them overlap with things you have said, especially the first 
one, which overlaps several of your categories, and the second, which 
overlaps REVOLUTION WITHOUT SUPPORT.

MARGINAL RESULTS.  When faced with marginal results, scientists will 
attempt to refine or replicate the experiments until stronger and more 
consistent results are found.  When a researcher spends an inordinately 
large amount of time interpreting and reinterpreting old data, or new data 
from the same experimental setup, and relatively little time attempting to 
get better data, the results are suspect.

MISESTIMATION OF EFFECTS.  Quack researchers frequently misestimate the 
effects their discoveries will have.  While they may speak about grandiose 
social effects, they frequently underestimate the scientific effects.  One 
example is homeopathy, which would cause a revolution in chemistry if 
true.  Yet the supporters seldom grapple with the idea of these effects.  
Another example is the frequent claims for a carburetor or other gizmo 
which will make an automobile get an incredible number of miles per 
gallon.  Simple calculations reveal that the engine needs to operate at 
higher than Carnot efficiency.  Personally, if I knew a way to run a heat 
engine at higher than Carnot efficiency and thus ignore the 2nd law of 
thermodynamics, I would have better things to do than waste my time 
building a carburetor factory.

SCIENCE AS INSTITUTION.  Philosophers, psychologists, and anthropologists, 
when they deal with science, currently view it as "that which scientists 
do."  Although this definition is possibly useful for what they are trying 
to study, when it is used as the meaning of "scientific" in "scientific 
evidence," trouble starts.  The conflation of meanings leads to the notion 
that all those things which any scientist does are valid science.  This 
results into a combination of appeals to authority and ad hominem attacks 
which are wrongly presented as scientific inquiry. 

ANALOGOUS THEORIES.  Many scientific theories begin as analogies to 
existing well established theories or as attempts to apply the results of 
a field of study laterally to something new.  Although this sometimes 
produces theories which hold up well on their own, it frequently gives 
undeserved credence to the new theories.  Well established theories 
generally apply to a specific well-defined set of phenomena, and the 
support for the theory exists within that context.  The analogy or lateral 
application discards the context entirely.  The result is a sort of 
informal belief that the new theory is well supported, when there may be 
no reason to believe that the two situations have anything to do with each 
other.  An example of this is Social Darwinism, whereby evolution by 
natural selection of organisms is assumed to work as well to social 
institutions.

DEFENSIVENESS.  It is a common human tendency to take criticism of one's 
work personally and respond devensively.  Scientists must constantly be 
aware of this tendency and suppress it, because unchecked defensiveness is 
the death of scientific inquiry.  When a researcher consistently 
interprets criticism of his or her theories, hypotheses, or data as 
personal insults, they become suspect.  The researcher falls into the trap 
of considering it a personal conflict and naturally resists the kind of 
criticism that is absolutely neccessary to test hypotheses.  The first 
strong indication that I had of the problems with cold fusion, back when 
it still seemed plausible and exciting and everyone was trading 
speculations about mechanisms, was a letter by one of F&P accusing all of 
their critics as attacking them personally.

Eric Pepke                                    INTERNET: pepke@scri.fsu.edu
Supercomputer Computations Research Institute MFENET:   pepke@fsu
Florida State University                      SPAN:     scri::pepke
Tallahassee, FL 32306-4052                    BITNET:   pepke@fsu

Disclaimer: My employers seldom even LISTEN to my opinions.
Meta-disclaimer: Any society that needs disclaimers has too many lawyers.
From: jean@hpfcso.FC.HP.COM (Jean Jasinski)
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 17:24:40 GMT
Subject: Asperger's Syndrome
Organization: Hewlett-Packard, Fort Collins, CO, USA