@Amit podcasts can still be on a spectrum ranging from lay-talk to precise-talk. it's just that i find semi technical talk to be more valuable because I've some knowledge of technical stuff

it depends on the audience

@qwerty That's correct, but I think that goes more to say that some do pop-sci worse than others. I mean it's not really fair to expect the pop-sci guys to constantly preface every sentence with words like "Well that's not really accurate but...", that would just shut everyone off from listening to them, wouldn't it? :)

I refuse to engage with pop science at all because I don't think my brain is robust enough to withstand picking up imprecision and handwaving. AND I can't stand the similarly emotive titles. I took pop sci seriously as a teen because that was mostly what was available. when I learnt physics at uni I felt betrayed by its portrayal

usually with podcasts, i don't feel that i learned much because they don't make their ideas precise

@Amit yeah quanta mag is tolerable for me. but it's unusual

though I feel the quality of its journalism might decline as it gets more popular. I haven't been following closely for a year years now

*a few years

@bolbteppa by absolute bs, did u just mean LQG???

it is wrong to say people are talking bs just because they r not inclined toward string theory

@qwerty your point about offering a shortcut is really the catch here: a good pop-sci makes you want to deepen your knowledge in a sincere way, rather than give you a false sense of understanding something you really don't

@RyderRude The host is clearly ready to embrace all forms of nonsense, these mediums are simply rigged towards misinformation and amplifying nonsense

@qwerty Yes, I felt exactly the same, especially when I started learning quantum mechanics and quantum field theory and it was nothing at all like the "understanding" I thought I had gained from popular media

If I go on there saying I have a quaternion theory of everything and that the media are suppressing me and the establishment are hiding my ideas, how is anyone going to be able to figure any of it out

@bolbteppa i will have to watch more of it to be able to judge. i agree that he does have crackpots on the podcast

I think it's great someone is open minded enough to bring Lisi on, however once you bring him on you're supposed to endlessly embarrass him or else you are spreading misinformation, it's that simple

but every podcast has crackpots anyway. the host should simply listen to the crackpot, instead of promoting

Equality of opportunity =/= equality of outcome

This guy was ignoring textbook level stuff known for decades

@RyderRude this is probably the worst take you've had so far, which is saying something

I'm just saying that this channel is not unique in hosting Lisi or Wesintein. They're everywhere

no, it is not inevitable that every show will have on crackpots, the showrunners could simply grow a spine and show some intellectual integrity by not platforming nonsense

@RyderRude yes, and all of those channels are intellectually bankrupt and deserve to be scorned

I agree, to some extent....

Hey that's a pitch to SE, a podcast for every site, starting with the main ones... :D

Appeasement is the wrong strategy towards people who display complete absence of scientific integrity; don't defend them, don't watch them, don't invite them, don't recommend them

you'll do it the right way

@RyderRude That is nuts

but this is a sensitive topic, because who gets to decide what's complete misinformation and what's not. shouldnt we give some breathing room to podcasters for bringing people over who we strongly disagree with

that's an easy no from me, dawg

i happen to agree that many of these guests are spreading misinformation

lol

but that opinion can be subjective with many guests

I think the point is that if you bring a controversial figure, at least put someone on the other side that can intelligently deal with his arguments, rather than let him have his monologue

@ACuriousMind hah I was about the ask you the other day if you knew if any low-level, possibly even children's level books on QM/QFT that focussed on concepts in an intellectually honest way. I suspect the answer is no, but I did get introduced to SR/GR by a very good children's book that focussed on the main concepts in a very intellectually honest way.

@RyderRude Who decides whether touching a hot stove is bad, just because big pharma says don't touch a hot stove, who said they were correct

@bolbteppa I'm just saying that it's not black and white with every guest. Someone might say that LQG is non sense because string theory is obviously right. but that doesn't mean someone wouldn't be justified in hosting LQG

this was the book goodreads.com/book/show/…

@qwerty I've heard good things about Q is for Quantum

@RyderRude LQG is different to Lisi's nonsense, anybody who spends 5 minutes looking into this can determine that

@Amit yes. This would be a good approach

@bolbteppa i understand. some opinions are more objective than others

The average undergraduate can determine most of these things, anybody trying to be remotely objective can decide these things, LQG is obviously an honest/serious attempt vs Lisi's checkerboard/ignoring-textbook-info/wild-claims approach

@ACuriousMind thank you!

@bolbteppa i agree... but the problem is where exactly do u draw the line between LQG (completely objective) to Lisi's theory (complete misinformation). There r a whole range of theories

this is y free speech simply allows everyone to have a voice, even at the cost of misinformation

cuz u can't objective draw a line

No, your conception of free speech is to give flat earthers all the time in the world to mislead people without any pushback by the host, you just said this above, this is simply lunacy

oh no, the world is complex without clear lines, so I guess we're not allowed to criticize people for spreading nonsense :(

To be clear, u might objectively say that some people r talking non sense, but some other people are more in the grey @bolbteppa

@RyderRude no one is demanding that these people be thrown in jail, this is not a free speech issue

@bolbteppa i agree that the host should push back, yes

A minute ago you said the complete opposite

No one said podcasters like that should be sent to Guantánamo... though now that you mention it... lol

@bolbteppa i agreed with @Amit a minute ago, who suggested the same thing

ooh i get it now

u mean the comment where i say the host should simply listen instead of promoting

Everybody knows in medicine that these kinds of podcasts quickly devolve into vaccine denial and other lunacy (pushing horse paste etc), in physics one has a similar tendency but there is very little pushback. Unfortunately people like Motl were some of the biggest pushback against that stuff because everyone else just lets it go, the price you pay is you get subjected to Motl's own crazy personal beliefs and the lunatics get to write it all off

but WHY give them time RR? there are conventional routes for your ideas to become accepted

podcast on YT will not interest anyone serious

@qwerty should we draw the line at "people who have tried conventional routes like academia for their ideas". This would filter out Lisi but not filter out LQG

so this seems like a good line

but again, nothing is that black and white. Non academia doesn't mean that the person doesn't deserve a platform

I think Rogan was one of the big catalysts of this echo chamber effect, he was one of the first to popularize the combination of "long form podcast" + "no pushback because there's no ability/knowledge to push back with", lol

he's mostly just really good in giving another pull on his joint and go "WOW that's crazy"

dammit, now Youtube thinks I want to see more of this stuff because I clicked on it

lol

I have multiple Eric Weinstein conspiracy videos on the sidebar of one of these :\

@RyderRude yes but other people are allowed to walk away, not listen and call it nonsense. the only problematic thing is the algo will feed it to people who have no background and ability to discern and it'll loop

and the more you input low quality stuff into your brain the more acceptable it will become. it's the exposure effect

@ACuriousMind hah called it.

@qwerty misinformation is a problem. this is why the host should push back agains the guest

@qwerty yes. it's completely fine for someone to call it non sense

just as much as everyone should have the voice to propose ideas, everyone should have the voice to reject ideas

@RyderRude no, it's why he shouldn't invite them; let them film their own terribly shot youtube video on their own small channel

there is no obligation to platform people who are just wrong, just don't invite them; if you think they need to be debunked, make a video debunking them, there's no need to invite them to your podcast and let them talk to your audience

If the host is really interested in mainly talking to the guest and not in the clicks and likes, he'll engage with the guest... that about sums it. In this case as I mentioned, the title gave away immediately which of them was the case

@ACuriousMind u must have people u strongly think are wrong and people u strongly disagree with. u might want the podcaster to not invite the former kind while u may tolerate the latter kind as long as there's push back

in this channel, i agree there's promotion of misinformation, especially the titles

@RyderRude I have no idea what point you are trying to make.

This little quarrel we're having right here about the subject, if you allow to call it that, is better than anything that's going on in such podcasts. If you get why, you got it all :P

why don't we all just stay off YouTube science instead? filtering out the good from the bad is too much hard work and it's clear podcasters etc are not going to filter

it's their podcast so it's their prerogative - I'm just not going to go near those channels

@qwerty I honestly think very few people who are active Phys.SE users rely on podcasts for their physics knowledge... some YouTube lectures are useful, that's something totally different

as I mentioned the signal to noise ratio with pop science is very very bad

to be clear, i think there's misinformation on this podcast. i said in the beginning that the titles were horrible. but i just like the fact that they discussed math which no other podcast does

so i like it for the latter reason but hate it for the former reason

@RyderRude remember this:

interesting how "not bad at all" now turned into a nonsensical mixture of hate and like

@Amit yes it was directed at RR who watches it and ACM who suggests everyone is capable of high standards of integrity or discernment

If you want that kind of podcast, there is this

that initial comment is wrong @ACuriousMind

@qwerty to be fair I think that the "everyone" ACM is able to reach by writing in h Bar is rather limited :P

@bolbteppa thanks!!

One can see from the audience views whether bs (previous podcast host) or technical discussions are more sought after

@Amit what I meant by that is that ACM is idealistic that podcasters (and publicists and publishers) all should have discernment... I think it's a hard ask and better to not engage

@bolbteppa i am also looking for a semi technical podcast for philosophy. Do u know any

i want to see some real debates

@qwerty He'll say he has ideals but he is not idealistic if I have to guess... but ask him! He's right there! :D

the debates on youtube are too layman

@qwerty If I was an idealist then I would be continuously suprised that the world is full of grifters; I'm not. That doesn't mean I can't demand that it shouldn't be. The practically impossibility of an ideal does not mean that ideal is not worth pushing and pursuing.

@RyderRude I don't know, but that channel can act as the channel you should listen to to get a serious string theory perspective instead of this Weinstein Keating style nonsense

@bolbteppa hmmm.. i thought Brain Keating was pro string theory?

@bolbteppa but thanks for the channel

Yes, humans are bad at being ideal in all sorts of ways; that doesn't mean we should stop having ideals, they're aspirational - how can you become better if you don't believe in an ideal of what actually would be better?

He is too busy crying about not being handed a nobel prize

I had also tried listening to string theorist get-togethers, but even there they only discussed layman stuff

@bolbteppa lol

@ACuriousMind ok - but the majority of people putting this stuff out there ARE grifters. I don't know how we can solve that besides walking away?

@qwerty I mean - that's what I do, and what I continually recommended here: Don't platform nonsense, don't watch grifters, etc.

The real problem is these crank discussions offer an easy way to pretend you're studying the highest level physics without doing any work and letting you spout off opinions based off your sense of what group you belong to