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Comment by ab5tract | Hacker News Reader

I think that the scientific community at large is so frightened of the shame of being wrong that they cling to obviously flawed concepts like dark matter (how come I never got to just add in a chunk of invisible theoretical force whenever my equations were unbalanced in school, eh?).

The fear of embarrassment is a large part of the inertia against scientific revolutions. Furthermore, men hold an inordinate amount of their masculine confidence in their correctness, further exacerbating their ability to admit to being wrong.

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If your equations don’t balance because of a lack of a coherent and falsifiable theory for why they don’t, I guess you’ve stumbled across one of the big open questions in science. Which is fine, it just means there’s still white spots on the map. Granted, they’re enormous. Still better than jusf giving up and attributing it to a deity.

Our own optimism drives us to stay evolutionary fit. Which is great for us. I just wish I could see the full picture one day.

It’s mind boggling to think everyone who has lived on this planet died with an incomplete picture and understanding about the true nature of the universe.

Okay now get back to work.

Who said anything about a deity? My only point is that hubris and embarrassment play a huge role in holding back the evolution of human understanding.

Nah I didn't intend to accuse you of that, just that science is the successor model to religion as a way to understanding the world. I guess I don't agree about science 'clinging' to dark energy / dark matter - they're basically placeholders until a more coherent theory comes around, and so far that hasn't happened. I don't think a majority of physicists would bat an eye to wave goodbye to those concepts if it became clear how to do it.

Now, that's not saying there isn't a whole lot of dogma in science that should be gotten rid of, I even think that the Kopenhagen interpretation has gotten to a dogmatic point - I just don't think that it applies to cosmology. Plenty of influencial astrophycists have open discussions on this, see e.g. R. Penrose.

> they're basically placeholders until a more coherent theory comes around

No.

https://medium.com/starts-with-a-bang/theres-a-debate-raging...

This is a fine opinion to hold in general, but if you're going to tie that to the failings of a particular theory (dark matter), you better be able to be specific about what those failings are and how hubris and embarrassment have led to those failings.

Just claiming something is "obviously flawed" does nothing to advance science, hubris or not.

Dark matter is obviously flawed because it is clearly a patch on a broken paradigm. The hubris is related to the inability of scientists to even discuss that maybe, jut maybe, gravity is not the only organizing force in the cosmos (you know, we create plasma in labs with electricity, not gravity right? But let’s just ignore that completely because there can’t be electricity in space because hysterical raisins).

Or how about the discrepancy around quasars and red shift implying that maybe the doepler effect is not 100% transferable to space? Nope, don’t try that if you want a job or credibility.

The book that proves these dynamics historically is called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.

Kuhn is interesting reading, but he does not give any guideline to predict or create the next paradigm. For every paradigm shift there is probably thousands of theories which just turns out to be useless blind alleys.

You allude to some alternative theory, but you are pretty vague about it.

Dark matter is a supersolid that fills 'empty' space, strongly interacts with ordinary matter and is displaced by ordinary matter. What is referred to geometrically as curved spacetime physically exists in nature as the state of displacement of the supersolid dark matter. The state of displacement of the supersolid dark matter is gravity.

The supersolid dark matter displaced by a galaxy pushes back, causing the stars in the outer arms of the galaxy to orbit the galactic center at the rate in which they do.

Displaced supersolid dark matter is curved spacetime.

Nobody seems to have a good idea for what we are dealing with other than we have a mysterious extra "force" show up in our observations, so there's no real "shame" in being wrong here because nobody's gotten it right.

Sorry, but when the fundamental equations of your cosmological worldview require elaborate “empty patches” and tons of “oh inventing this would really balance the equations” but you refuse to question the underlying assumptions (gravity as the only organizing force, despite being the weakest one we know), then you are not conducting honest science. And that dishonesty runs rampant through every scientific revolution.

It’s not a gender thing. Although, it’s a mental issue —> narcissism, pride, ego.

These traits exist in each and everyone to some scale of a degree.

But I agree, as someone who used to be super passionate about research. I would say seeing highly regarded individuals fabricate data and assume wrong assumptions, in order to appear respected and important, did dissuade me and me think of the research industry in a different light, one of a business.

There are many smart scientists, and they are working hard. The ones that have the resources and means to influence academic papers, experiments and grants are able to influence particular theories and experiments over others.

️ that can lead some theories, your example dark matter is a perfect example to be more accepted than questioned.

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