Webb Telescope Image Sharpness Check(esa.int)
esa.int
Webb Telescope Image Sharpness Check
https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2022/04/Webb_in_full_focus
141 comments
It's beautiful. I can't wait until someone gets time on it to point it at some of the known exoplanets to study them at a higher resolution than was possible so far.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_directly_imaged_exopla...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_directly_imaged_exopla...
Those will still be optical points, sadly. There's no (spatial) resolution possible for things smaller than the diffraction limit.
edit: But it can still provide 1-D light curves, for planets rotating at the right speeds. Combined with spectroscopy, it's plausible it could show a planet where one can say, e.g. "this side is ocean; this side has a continent".
edit: But it can still provide 1-D light curves, for planets rotating at the right speeds. Combined with spectroscopy, it's plausible it could show a planet where one can say, e.g. "this side is ocean; this side has a continent".
Yes, that's what I'm hoping for, differentiation in the IR signature based on the rotation, essentially a one bit scanner with very high sensitivity. Depending on how frequently it can take images you could get a pretty neat one-dimensional image of a planet across the axis of rotation, assuming a planet isn't tidally locked to the star.
Favoring the James webb over the terrestrial planet finder is the biggest funding mistake NASA ever made
Maybe. I am curious what Webb will do for science, it's going to be around for a lot longer than originally planned so maybe we'll get lucky and something very interesting will turn up. For sure the instruments are in a class of their own.
And who knows, maybe at some point we'll see a revival of the project.
Funding wise I think it was mostly Hubble missions that ate up a sizeable chunk of TPF's budget, not so much the JWT, is there something I can read that documents that this was a binary choice?
Personally I think that we can't spend enough on projects such as this, the knowledge gained will serve us for as long as mankind manages not to blow itself up.
And who knows, maybe at some point we'll see a revival of the project.
Funding wise I think it was mostly Hubble missions that ate up a sizeable chunk of TPF's budget, not so much the JWT, is there something I can read that documents that this was a binary choice?
Personally I think that we can't spend enough on projects such as this, the knowledge gained will serve us for as long as mankind manages not to blow itself up.
For scale:
Building hubble costed 1.5 billion. Yes the most revolutionar telescope in the world was very cheap and with 20 years of scientific and process progress one would expect that cost to goe down or the overall abilities to improve.
James webb costed 10 billion so ~7 distinct hubbles.
You don't need to read further, 20 years of progress and a 7 time higher budget would enable to make a hubble killer (although maybe a downscaled version of the terrestrial planet finder)
The hubble total mission cost was 16 billion (without shuttle).
Compare this https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490345#/media/File:N891s.jpg To this https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260366957_A_resolve... In my opinion, infrared is pathetic because it reduce the picture colorimetric information to a single float.. A dumb continuum of redshift intensity. I'm not saying it doesn't has its uses, it sure sounds great for capturing small rocks... But come on.. Why do I have to be the only one furious at the optics stagnation since the 90s and to realize the facts that optics are extremely superior both for Art and for scientific discovery, including but not only exoplanets.
Of course i agree a world with funding for both would be great vs e.g buying twitter but when we have to choose because of artificial democratically voted scarcity, the hubble 2.0 is the painfully obvious rational choice. The empty promises of better capturing the cosmic background in infrared will quickly fade.. Infrared is noisy, monodimensional, and James webb doesn't cover the relevant spectrum (wtf) unlike herschel. And while herschel was the at the peak, we didn't get any breakthrough art or science discovery out of it. As one should painfully guess, the cosmic background is mostly noise and there's not much to extract from it. The herschel resolution increase didn't reveal any reason to believe a larger scale would make discoveries actionable. If it did, then those should be publicized because I'm not seeing any.
The hubble total mission cost was 16 billion (without shuttle).
Compare this https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490345#/media/File:N891s.jpg To this https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260366957_A_resolve... In my opinion, infrared is pathetic because it reduce the picture colorimetric information to a single float.. A dumb continuum of redshift intensity. I'm not saying it doesn't has its uses, it sure sounds great for capturing small rocks... But come on.. Why do I have to be the only one furious at the optics stagnation since the 90s and to realize the facts that optics are extremely superior both for Art and for scientific discovery, including but not only exoplanets.
Of course i agree a world with funding for both would be great vs e.g buying twitter but when we have to choose because of artificial democratically voted scarcity, the hubble 2.0 is the painfully obvious rational choice. The empty promises of better capturing the cosmic background in infrared will quickly fade.. Infrared is noisy, monodimensional, and James webb doesn't cover the relevant spectrum (wtf) unlike herschel. And while herschel was the at the peak, we didn't get any breakthrough art or science discovery out of it. As one should painfully guess, the cosmic background is mostly noise and there's not much to extract from it. The herschel resolution increase didn't reveal any reason to believe a larger scale would make discoveries actionable. If it did, then those should be publicized because I'm not seeing any.
Important to correct that for when the money was spent though, that makes quite a big difference. Hubble dollars weren't the same dollars as the ones that funded Webb and a good chunk of the Webb cost were born by other countries than the US I believe.
And even Hubble had its teething problems, and those ate up quite a bit of money. I'm going to be patient what the JWST turns up, I agree that it may end up being a bit boring but science doesn't necessarily generate just pretty pictures the important details are sometimes just numbers or confirmation of theories. Of course we all want the pretty pictures (see my comment above).
A moon based observatory would be a fantastic reason to establish a permanent presence on the moon. That's one that I would love to see in my lifetime.
And even Hubble had its teething problems, and those ate up quite a bit of money. I'm going to be patient what the JWST turns up, I agree that it may end up being a bit boring but science doesn't necessarily generate just pretty pictures the important details are sometimes just numbers or confirmation of theories. Of course we all want the pretty pictures (see my comment above).
A moon based observatory would be a fantastic reason to establish a permanent presence on the moon. That's one that I would love to see in my lifetime.
on an optimist note, the ELT is set to be ready for 2027 and capture 250 times more light than Hubble and for a claimed final sharpness increase of X16!
It is a ground based next gen segmented telescope and has a very low cost (1.5 billion).
Also the tragically overlooked solution is airborne/dirigeable optical astronomy. It already exist for infrared and capture 85% of light (where space is 100%) unfortunately it has been underfunded and the mirror aboard the airplane is only 2 meter. With the Antonov, one could easily and cheaply bring a regular 8.4 meter mirror near space and capture the world for the first time, with a disruptive, god-like accuracy, and indeed being on the ballpark of a ground based 100 meter telescope, according to transposable claims, it would allow for the first time to optically discriminate the chemical compositions of the atmosphere of exoplanets and therefore trivially prove or disprove the presence of extraterrestrial life in an industrial scale manner, by the mere detection of biosignatures, such as e.g. oxygem,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-225_Mriya#/media/Fi... (space was much cooler before) It's a shame the antonov got destroyed during the ukrainian war. although there are probably other transport solution. The real shame is that no one in command has realized this was the solution the world needs.
Also the tragically overlooked solution is airborne/dirigeable optical astronomy. It already exist for infrared and capture 85% of light (where space is 100%) unfortunately it has been underfunded and the mirror aboard the airplane is only 2 meter. With the Antonov, one could easily and cheaply bring a regular 8.4 meter mirror near space and capture the world for the first time, with a disruptive, god-like accuracy, and indeed being on the ballpark of a ground based 100 meter telescope, according to transposable claims, it would allow for the first time to optically discriminate the chemical compositions of the atmosphere of exoplanets and therefore trivially prove or disprove the presence of extraterrestrial life in an industrial scale manner, by the mere detection of biosignatures, such as e.g. oxygem,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonov_An-225_Mriya#/media/Fi... (space was much cooler before) It's a shame the antonov got destroyed during the ukrainian war. although there are probably other transport solution. The real shame is that no one in command has realized this was the solution the world needs.
Why do stars appear spike-y in the new images?
Diffraction spikes from occluding support poles:
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/james-webb-spikes/
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/james-webb-spikes/
That's a great explanation, thanks!
I wonder why they don't seem to attempt to deconvolve the image.
These are calibration test images. It wouldn't make sense to use software to improve the image before the hardware is well calibrated.
I don't think that's possible, to recover the true image from the light that's been through the diffraction pattern. It would be like if you were able to resharpen an image that had been passed through a blur filter. You would be reconstructing / creating information that had been lost.
It's absolutely possible, and it may surprise you to learn that blurring is not (by itself) a lossy operation and you can, in theory, unblur an image if you know the blurring function. The practical difficulty in doing so is that the blurred image has a lot of information in the low bits, which tend to get distorted through other processes (quantization, sensor noise, lossy compression).
I too am surprised that no attempt appears to be made to remove the diffraction spikes from JWST's images, since the function should be known with great precision.
I too am surprised that no attempt appears to be made to remove the diffraction spikes from JWST's images, since the function should be known with great precision.
There wouldn't be any more information, but it'd look nicer and might perhaps be easier to process / interpret without the spikes.
> resharpen an image that had been passed through a blur filter
This is trivial if you know what filter was used and it’s possible even if you don’t know the filter: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_deconvolution
Note that when you blur an image in software, information is only lost when you round each channel to the nearest u8. Each of the NxN output pixels is a linear combination of the NxN input pixels. There are only N^2 equations with N^2 unknown variables.
This is trivial if you know what filter was used and it’s possible even if you don’t know the filter: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_deconvolution
Note that when you blur an image in software, information is only lost when you round each channel to the nearest u8. Each of the NxN output pixels is a linear combination of the NxN input pixels. There are only N^2 equations with N^2 unknown variables.
How about MIRI vs herschel. I don't think the perceived difference would be high for this picture.
"My God, it's full of stars!"
Wow.
Looking at that image I feel a weird superposition of awe and anger. Awe at the incredible work that it took to get that image and the fact that I'm around to see it, and anger at the rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance. Acquiring scientific knowledge is incredibly hard work, and we as a society denigrate it at our peril. The extent to which science denial is in fashion nowadays really steams my clams.
Looking at that image I feel a weird superposition of awe and anger. Awe at the incredible work that it took to get that image and the fact that I'm around to see it, and anger at the rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance. Acquiring scientific knowledge is incredibly hard work, and we as a society denigrate it at our peril. The extent to which science denial is in fashion nowadays really steams my clams.
We're being conned. Yes, Webb telescope is Science, and it's great, and it's lovely, and there should be more of it and it should get more respect and resources.
But.
Other people take the same word "Science" and use it for.... less clear-cut stuff. With less clear-cut benefits. And they use the same word because they want to get more respect and more resources and want to confuse you.
This works because it's hard to know what's "Science". Most people use heuristics like "My side's Authority says so" or "It happens in a University" or "It uses Times News Roman".
Unfortunately there is no easy solution. You'll have to think for yourself. If only there was some kind of method to tell the bullshit apart from the facts!
But.
Other people take the same word "Science" and use it for.... less clear-cut stuff. With less clear-cut benefits. And they use the same word because they want to get more respect and more resources and want to confuse you.
This works because it's hard to know what's "Science". Most people use heuristics like "My side's Authority says so" or "It happens in a University" or "It uses Times News Roman".
Unfortunately there is no easy solution. You'll have to think for yourself. If only there was some kind of method to tell the bullshit apart from the facts!
I dunno.
Webb seems to me to be data gathering. Really good data gathering.
Science is building hypothesis that predict the data, and confirming or falsifying them (I know that Popper was clear that it's the latter). The point is that Science is made of contingent knowledge. I believe these hypothesis, but if you show me evidence that supports better hypothesis or that contradicts my previous hypothesis then I'll change my mind - possibly (depends on the evidence).
Anyway, science isn't I think about clear cut things - it's about developing and weighing a body of evidence.
Webb seems to me to be data gathering. Really good data gathering.
Science is building hypothesis that predict the data, and confirming or falsifying them (I know that Popper was clear that it's the latter). The point is that Science is made of contingent knowledge. I believe these hypothesis, but if you show me evidence that supports better hypothesis or that contradicts my previous hypothesis then I'll change my mind - possibly (depends on the evidence).
Anyway, science isn't I think about clear cut things - it's about developing and weighing a body of evidence.
good science is good data. there's no way around it. it's the same thing. sure we devise clever (and expensive) experiments to falsify bad models, but that's because we don't have enough high quality data that you can look at and immediately tell which model is good and which is bad.
but nowadays everything in science is even more data driven. (mostly because we have the infrastructure/technology to process all that data.) initially it was mostly high energy physics (run the big machine for a few years, gather data, check for 5 sigma) but when it comes to things like LIGO and the EHT (event horizon telescope) to even get the signal out of the noise they need to use a model, that of course builds on data (and its interpretation) from previous observations.
many advances in the medical field are due to better microscopes, better techniques to gather data.
sure, without interpretation it's just pretty images or just big "science machines" (in case of colliders and other data gathering experiments)
but nowadays everything in science is even more data driven. (mostly because we have the infrastructure/technology to process all that data.) initially it was mostly high energy physics (run the big machine for a few years, gather data, check for 5 sigma) but when it comes to things like LIGO and the EHT (event horizon telescope) to even get the signal out of the noise they need to use a model, that of course builds on data (and its interpretation) from previous observations.
many advances in the medical field are due to better microscopes, better techniques to gather data.
sure, without interpretation it's just pretty images or just big "science machines" (in case of colliders and other data gathering experiments)
These are all hypotheticals, but if you can trace articles back to their source, and you have a Web of trust, then things like Wikipedia can carry more authority/trust. So too can random Facebook articles, war reporting, tutorials, science with data to match, escrow etc
You'd likely get a split-brain scenario in society, but we seem to already have a partisan narrative for most things, and this at least makes for a solid foundation.
You'd likely get a split-brain scenario in society, but we seem to already have a partisan narrative for most things, and this at least makes for a solid foundation.
It’s all too easy to confuse skepticism with science denialism. It’s important to be skeptical of scientific claims. This is essentially the core engine of scientific progress.
> It’s important to be skeptical of scientific claims. This is essentially the core engine of scientific progress.
This often gets abused. Laymen frequently will doubt scientific results and then make exactly this argument. That's a totally different breast than someone dedicating years of studies to understand the state of the art in a scientific field and THEN doubting results. Otherwise we can never move past agreeing even on fundamentals
Edit: to add an example, in college I had a friend who didn't believe black holes were really a singularity and that something else might be going on. He wasn't able to explain beyond "feels wrong". When I called out that if he doesn't even have a coherent explanation why he maybe should shut up and trust experts everyone got angry because "scepticism is fundamental to scientific process". Sure, you doubt it. Fine! Hey a PhD in physics and proof your point!
This often gets abused. Laymen frequently will doubt scientific results and then make exactly this argument. That's a totally different breast than someone dedicating years of studies to understand the state of the art in a scientific field and THEN doubting results. Otherwise we can never move past agreeing even on fundamentals
Edit: to add an example, in college I had a friend who didn't believe black holes were really a singularity and that something else might be going on. He wasn't able to explain beyond "feels wrong". When I called out that if he doesn't even have a coherent explanation why he maybe should shut up and trust experts everyone got angry because "scepticism is fundamental to scientific process". Sure, you doubt it. Fine! Hey a PhD in physics and proof your point!
It does get abused, but IMO the abuse of perceived scientific authority is far more important. At the end of the day, who really cares if some random college friend doesn't believe in the scientific consensus on black holes? His opinion has zero impact on anything at all. On the other hand, when bad science gets elevated to near-religious status, we get horrific outcomes.
I'm 1000x more afraid of the regime that can persuade some random college friend to mouth the mainstream opinion on black hole structure than I am that this guy wants to believe something that might not be true, especially in a field that will never have any impact on any of our daily lives.
I'm 1000x more afraid of the regime that can persuade some random college friend to mouth the mainstream opinion on black hole structure than I am that this guy wants to believe something that might not be true, especially in a field that will never have any impact on any of our daily lives.
The point is that critical thinking doesn't mean "question everything and assume everybody except yourself is incompetent or evil".
It means that you understand you can replicate someone's results if you doubt them. You can look at the methods they used and find why they were adequate or inadequate. You can reason if the conclusions they drew from their findings are accurate.
But all of this will not come out of "I have a strange feeling on that topic". Unless you are really an expert on the matter, many topics will produce strange feelings in people, because chances are they lack some fundamental understanding that would be needed to even understand the findings.
I am not saying you need to either do all the work and check yourself OR blindly trust science and awallow everything that looks "sciency". What we need to do is to educate people on how to check studies and papers for themselves all while admiting which parts they don't know.
It means that you understand you can replicate someone's results if you doubt them. You can look at the methods they used and find why they were adequate or inadequate. You can reason if the conclusions they drew from their findings are accurate.
But all of this will not come out of "I have a strange feeling on that topic". Unless you are really an expert on the matter, many topics will produce strange feelings in people, because chances are they lack some fundamental understanding that would be needed to even understand the findings.
I am not saying you need to either do all the work and check yourself OR blindly trust science and awallow everything that looks "sciency". What we need to do is to educate people on how to check studies and papers for themselves all while admiting which parts they don't know.
I don't think we should.
The problem isn't science, the problem is that fake "sciencey" presentations of opinions that are known to be wrong have been used to devalue real science.
Climate change is the perfect example. The fossil barons knew that a move to renewables would destroy their political influence and financial power, so they literally ran a decades-long campaign to discredit the established science and individual scientists.
There is far more need to educate the public about toxic PR technologies, media manipulations, FUD, cut-out think tanks all funded by the same sources and pushing the same disinformation, social media bot farms, and all the other industrial fake news techniques than there is about basic science.
It doesn't matter if individuals don't understand what a mass spectrometer does. But it's hugely damaging to democracy if individuals believe they have an informed personal opinion when in fact they've been manipulated into a distorted and provably unrealistic world view without even being aware of it.
The problem isn't science, the problem is that fake "sciencey" presentations of opinions that are known to be wrong have been used to devalue real science.
Climate change is the perfect example. The fossil barons knew that a move to renewables would destroy their political influence and financial power, so they literally ran a decades-long campaign to discredit the established science and individual scientists.
There is far more need to educate the public about toxic PR technologies, media manipulations, FUD, cut-out think tanks all funded by the same sources and pushing the same disinformation, social media bot farms, and all the other industrial fake news techniques than there is about basic science.
It doesn't matter if individuals don't understand what a mass spectrometer does. But it's hugely damaging to democracy if individuals believe they have an informed personal opinion when in fact they've been manipulated into a distorted and provably unrealistic world view without even being aware of it.
I think your assertion is spot on: One of the biggest issues of today is that people think they know everything. And they want to know everything because they learned not having an answer is bad in school.
At the same time they have an ever-present answer machine in their pockets. Just type a question and you will find the answer. That the question might already imply a certain answer is either ignored or willfully accepted.
I am not sure how we come (back?) to a culture where people who don't know anything about an issue stop pretending they do, but I think this is not unimportant these days.
At the same time they have an ever-present answer machine in their pockets. Just type a question and you will find the answer. That the question might already imply a certain answer is either ignored or willfully accepted.
I am not sure how we come (back?) to a culture where people who don't know anything about an issue stop pretending they do, but I think this is not unimportant these days.
"someone dedicating years of studies to understand the state of the art in a scientific field and THEN doubting results."
That very same argument was and is done on the theological level, too. You doubt god? You just haven't read the bible enough. How dare you criticize someone who spend 40 years studying it? Do the same and then you understand and maybe can start criticizing. (I was told this many times in various forms.)
So critical questions are the core of science. Even if they are ignorant ones, then you can point them to the subject they are missing.
And sure, not every ignorant answer deserves to be answered. Time and energy are limited. But appeal to authority is never a good scientific argument. I rather believe they erode the fundaments of it. There likely are many wrong models around and usually wrong models don't get challenged by the established institutions.
(Max Planck: science progresses one funeral at a time)
But of course, in your example, there was no critical question. So no science. Those people I tell to create a structured argument first, if they want to have a scientific debate.
That very same argument was and is done on the theological level, too. You doubt god? You just haven't read the bible enough. How dare you criticize someone who spend 40 years studying it? Do the same and then you understand and maybe can start criticizing. (I was told this many times in various forms.)
So critical questions are the core of science. Even if they are ignorant ones, then you can point them to the subject they are missing.
And sure, not every ignorant answer deserves to be answered. Time and energy are limited. But appeal to authority is never a good scientific argument. I rather believe they erode the fundaments of it. There likely are many wrong models around and usually wrong models don't get challenged by the established institutions.
(Max Planck: science progresses one funeral at a time)
But of course, in your example, there was no critical question. So no science. Those people I tell to create a structured argument first, if they want to have a scientific debate.
Science is not a perfect, pure, infallible process. It's messy, political, and often wrong. In our modern world where science impacts every aspect of our lives and informs policy, laymen are the ones who need to be concerned with science and its results. A PhD cannot be a prerequisite to discuss these issues in a democracy, by definition.
> Science is not a perfect, pure, infallible process.
But every single day, studies are reported as infallible, final words on whatever subject is at hand. Then, a few years later, more "science" happens, and that study gets modified heavily, and the NEW results are ALSO reported as the last word on the subject. Hence, a big part of the overarching confusion and befuddlement being discussed up and down this thread. A lot of people say "good 'science'" is a continual process, and that's certainly true, but the layman's view of the situation is presented as discrete, objective, unchangeable and unchallengeable fact.
But every single day, studies are reported as infallible, final words on whatever subject is at hand. Then, a few years later, more "science" happens, and that study gets modified heavily, and the NEW results are ALSO reported as the last word on the subject. Hence, a big part of the overarching confusion and befuddlement being discussed up and down this thread. A lot of people say "good 'science'" is a continual process, and that's certainly true, but the layman's view of the situation is presented as discrete, objective, unchangeable and unchallengeable fact.
It seems unfair to blame science and scientists for how their work is reported. Scientists are skeptics, and are fully aware that the latest press release is not the “last” word. Reporters are not teachers - their job is to tell stories that sell ads, not wallow in subtlety. If you want to learn about new science, stay away from the popular press.
Organised attacks on science are also not a pure, infallible process.
They're messy, political, corrupt, and even more likely to be wrong.
They're messy, political, corrupt, and even more likely to be wrong.
A PhD isn't a prerequisite to legitimately weighing in on things. Working knowledge is. A PhD in a given field is a good predictor of working knowledge. There is a pandemic of people thinking they should talk about shit they know nothing about.
I wish people like that would write science fiction instead. We need more kooky sci-fi writers and fewer armchair skeptics.
The first subject of skepticism must always be yourself. Science is the enterprise to stop fooling ourselves. Scepticism without it is meaningless.
Those who refuse to look through telescopes (because the evidence might upset their treasured notions of reality) have always been around. I wondered whether that particular story about Galileo's contemporaries was apocryphal, but it appears to have some fairly solid evidence:
https://www.libraryofsocialscience.com/newsletter/posts/2016...
However, note that 'science denial' has been an attack used by all manner of charlatans and fraudsters - as well as by people who are simply ignorant of facts - to defend their positions throughout our so-called 'age of reason'. This has often led to the spectacle of two different groups of perhaps well-intentioned (or not) people hurling the insult of 'science denialist' at each other while refusing to engage in actual science, i.e. examining observational data, conducting experiments, developing theories, rinse and repeat.
Part of the problem is that science often reveals facts that powerful interests don't want to accept, for example, that smoking cigarettes greatly increases the risk of lung cancer, or that burning fossil fuels leads to warming of the planet and climatic destabilization, or that using antibiotics on factory farms increases the rate at which antibiotic resistance arises (due to the pressure of natural selection as per evolutionary theory). These outfits have made a practice of hiring deceptive and dishonest 'scientists' for PR purposes, because simply accepting the science would be expensive and/or embarrassing, and they're the ones who tend to scream 'science denialism!' the loudest.
Hence it is not a very useful phrase, and it's always better to be explicit about what particular scientific concept you view as being subjected to attack on dubious grounds.
https://www.libraryofsocialscience.com/newsletter/posts/2016...
However, note that 'science denial' has been an attack used by all manner of charlatans and fraudsters - as well as by people who are simply ignorant of facts - to defend their positions throughout our so-called 'age of reason'. This has often led to the spectacle of two different groups of perhaps well-intentioned (or not) people hurling the insult of 'science denialist' at each other while refusing to engage in actual science, i.e. examining observational data, conducting experiments, developing theories, rinse and repeat.
Part of the problem is that science often reveals facts that powerful interests don't want to accept, for example, that smoking cigarettes greatly increases the risk of lung cancer, or that burning fossil fuels leads to warming of the planet and climatic destabilization, or that using antibiotics on factory farms increases the rate at which antibiotic resistance arises (due to the pressure of natural selection as per evolutionary theory). These outfits have made a practice of hiring deceptive and dishonest 'scientists' for PR purposes, because simply accepting the science would be expensive and/or embarrassing, and they're the ones who tend to scream 'science denialism!' the loudest.
Hence it is not a very useful phrase, and it's always better to be explicit about what particular scientific concept you view as being subjected to attack on dubious grounds.
The emotions you’re expressing — awe and anger at disbelievers — are rooted more in religious sciencism than actual science.
Science is critical and robust under criticism. Sciencism is not.
Science is critical and robust under criticism. Sciencism is not.
> The emotions you’re expressing — awe and anger at disbelievers — are rooted more in religious sciencism than actual science.
They didn't say a word about "disbelievers" (which implies faith). They spoke of the "rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance", which are two things very much separate from belief/faith.
They didn't say a word about "disbelievers" (which implies faith). They spoke of the "rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance", which are two things very much separate from belief/faith.
> They didn't say a word about "disbelievers" (which implies faith).
Sciencism is rooted in faith — faith in institutions and authority.
Science is dispassionate and rooted in empiricism and logical reasoning. Enforced truth isn’t required — any claims can be tested and refuted.
> They spoke of the "rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance", which are two things very much separate from belief/faith.
Could have been written “the rise of heresy and the glorification of idolatry”.
There’s no rise of pseudo-science; that’s been with us all along, and generally far more prevalent than it is today.
The science continues to win regardless, because it can be proven without appeal to emotion or authority.
Sciencism is rooted in faith — faith in institutions and authority.
Science is dispassionate and rooted in empiricism and logical reasoning. Enforced truth isn’t required — any claims can be tested and refuted.
> They spoke of the "rise of pseudo-science and the glorification of ignorance", which are two things very much separate from belief/faith.
Could have been written “the rise of heresy and the glorification of idolatry”.
There’s no rise of pseudo-science; that’s been with us all along, and generally far more prevalent than it is today.
The science continues to win regardless, because it can be proven without appeal to emotion or authority.
> Could have been written “the rise of heresy and the glorification of idolatry”.
"Heresy" and "pseudo-science" are not synonyms. "Ignorance" and "idolatry" definitely aren't even similar. This point is poorly argued
> There’s no rise of pseudo-science; that’s been with us all along, and generally far more prevalent than it is today.
Certainly there's always been pseudo-science. Far more prevalent, perhaps. But never has it been more harmful.
> The science continues to win regardless, because it can be proven without appeal to emotion or authority.
This I disagree with. Any time politics enters into the equation, an appeal to emotion or an appeal to authority become benefits. For example, Nuclear power is statistically safer than any other form of electricity generation, yet politicians worldwide can win on anti-nuclear platforms. Choose any intersection of science and politics, and there is no obvious pattern of science winning.
"Heresy" and "pseudo-science" are not synonyms. "Ignorance" and "idolatry" definitely aren't even similar. This point is poorly argued
> There’s no rise of pseudo-science; that’s been with us all along, and generally far more prevalent than it is today.
Certainly there's always been pseudo-science. Far more prevalent, perhaps. But never has it been more harmful.
> The science continues to win regardless, because it can be proven without appeal to emotion or authority.
This I disagree with. Any time politics enters into the equation, an appeal to emotion or an appeal to authority become benefits. For example, Nuclear power is statistically safer than any other form of electricity generation, yet politicians worldwide can win on anti-nuclear platforms. Choose any intersection of science and politics, and there is no obvious pattern of science winning.
> "Heresy" and "pseudo-science" are not synonyms.
They are when your definition of “science” is an argument from authority.
> "Ignorance" and "idolatry" definitely aren't even similar. This point is poorly argued
Idolatry is the worship of false idols — worshipping something other than the one true god.
The parallel with “glorification of ignorance” should be obvious enough.
> Certainly there's always been pseudo-science. Far more prevalent, perhaps. But never has it been more harmful.
Pseudo-science has never been more harmful? Really?
How about the use of pseudo-scientific eugenics to label and justify sterilization — and often, murder - of undesirables?
That’s just recent history.
We’ve done worse in a myriad of small ways, for longer, from positions of much greater ignorance.
> Choose any intersection of science and politics, and there is no obvious pattern of science winning.
You don’t believe there’s a clear pattern of science winning over the course of recent human history?
They are when your definition of “science” is an argument from authority.
> "Ignorance" and "idolatry" definitely aren't even similar. This point is poorly argued
Idolatry is the worship of false idols — worshipping something other than the one true god.
The parallel with “glorification of ignorance” should be obvious enough.
> Certainly there's always been pseudo-science. Far more prevalent, perhaps. But never has it been more harmful.
Pseudo-science has never been more harmful? Really?
How about the use of pseudo-scientific eugenics to label and justify sterilization — and often, murder - of undesirables?
That’s just recent history.
We’ve done worse in a myriad of small ways, for longer, from positions of much greater ignorance.
> Choose any intersection of science and politics, and there is no obvious pattern of science winning.
You don’t believe there’s a clear pattern of science winning over the course of recent human history?
I'm sorry, but it's like you're describing how awesome navigation has gotten, but ignoring the fact that ship's captains don't trust sextants and watches.
The march of scientific progress is awesome, but unless it can be applied, it's kind of useless.
What I'm lamenting, and I think others are too, is that we don't have a society that says, "Well, science provides the best tools we have to understand the universe, and so, we will trust scientists to guide our decisions."
Picture if we learned about vaccinating against HPV, but no one agreed to do it. What good would it do us to know the virus causes cancer, and to have developed a vaccine, if almost no one trusted the safety and efficacy of the vaccine?
And frankly, no one has the expertise to be properly skeptical of the science that affects our daily lives. We all have to trust in authorities, like peer review. Don't believe me? How do you know lead is harmful? No, really, walk me through it. Are you properly skeptical of that claim? How have you proven it to your own satisfaction? Lead may be beneficial to developing brains, for all you know. Maybe even especially beneficial in high concentrations. Maybe you should start giving lead to every child you encounter.
Or just admit that you take it on faith that the conclusions you've heard repeated are coming from scientific institutions that you hope will get it right, eventually.
If you're lost at sea, trust the navigator to tell you which way to row the lifeboat. Call it "Sciencism" if you want to. All else being equal, trust the experts to guide you. Run experiments if you can. Verify if you have the time and resources. But really, we all have to trust the institutions and authority. If you want to invest some more, put money towards duplicating important findings, or auditing the math and methodology of foundational research.
The march of scientific progress is awesome, but unless it can be applied, it's kind of useless.
What I'm lamenting, and I think others are too, is that we don't have a society that says, "Well, science provides the best tools we have to understand the universe, and so, we will trust scientists to guide our decisions."
Picture if we learned about vaccinating against HPV, but no one agreed to do it. What good would it do us to know the virus causes cancer, and to have developed a vaccine, if almost no one trusted the safety and efficacy of the vaccine?
And frankly, no one has the expertise to be properly skeptical of the science that affects our daily lives. We all have to trust in authorities, like peer review. Don't believe me? How do you know lead is harmful? No, really, walk me through it. Are you properly skeptical of that claim? How have you proven it to your own satisfaction? Lead may be beneficial to developing brains, for all you know. Maybe even especially beneficial in high concentrations. Maybe you should start giving lead to every child you encounter.
Or just admit that you take it on faith that the conclusions you've heard repeated are coming from scientific institutions that you hope will get it right, eventually.
If you're lost at sea, trust the navigator to tell you which way to row the lifeboat. Call it "Sciencism" if you want to. All else being equal, trust the experts to guide you. Run experiments if you can. Verify if you have the time and resources. But really, we all have to trust the institutions and authority. If you want to invest some more, put money towards duplicating important findings, or auditing the math and methodology of foundational research.
Honestly, arguing against religious ideology is an exhausting exercise and I’m happy to let someone else do it from here on out.
I’ll just note that you should trust the science, not the scientists. Blind trust in institutions and authority is just religious thinking, with all the pitfalls inherent therein.
I’ll just note that you should trust the science, not the scientists. Blind trust in institutions and authority is just religious thinking, with all the pitfalls inherent therein.
Why are you insisting that my trust is "blind"?
I'm looking at predictive power and track records.
Yes, it's entirely possible that an institution has played the long con, revealing one verifiable truth after another, only to tell me a giant lie.
Or that an institution can be suborned and corrupted.
If there's some cutting edge field, with an urgent and important finding, I have to trust the scientists. You and I do not have the expertise to verify their findings. We can try. But it takes a deep understanding to make valid and constructive criticisms.
I mean, let me walk you through this - your doctor says you have condition X, and need treatment Y. Being a skeptic, you get a second opinion, but it concurs. Tell me how you are not merely trusting the scientists? Feel free to explain like I'm five, I won't be offended.
I'm looking at predictive power and track records.
Yes, it's entirely possible that an institution has played the long con, revealing one verifiable truth after another, only to tell me a giant lie.
Or that an institution can be suborned and corrupted.
If there's some cutting edge field, with an urgent and important finding, I have to trust the scientists. You and I do not have the expertise to verify their findings. We can try. But it takes a deep understanding to make valid and constructive criticisms.
I mean, let me walk you through this - your doctor says you have condition X, and need treatment Y. Being a skeptic, you get a second opinion, but it concurs. Tell me how you are not merely trusting the scientists? Feel free to explain like I'm five, I won't be offended.
> I mean, let me walk you through this - your doctor says you have condition X, and need treatment Y. Being a skeptic, you get a second opinion, but it concurs. Tell me how you are not merely trusting the scientists? Feel free to explain like I'm five, I won't be offended.
So, you repeat the experiment and get the same results? The second doctor presumably re-ran tests, gave you his independent interpretation, etc?
If he came to the same conclusion, you’ve replicated the original findings. You used the scientific method!
This should have occurred at every step of the process, and you can (and should!) review the literature to the best of your ability and get it explained to you as throughly as possible.
You’re not trusting the scientists, you’re trusting the science.
(If you want to deploy sophistic epistemological arguments to claim you’re really just trusting the doctors, fine. I’ll bow out of the conversation, because arguing epistemology is an exhausting waste of everyone’s time).
Now imagine that instead, you’re not allowed to ask another doctor. Trust the science. No second opinions, the institution has already spoken.
Or the institution’s spokespeople, as is the case with (invariably poor) science reporting and politically-driven science bodies.
So, you repeat the experiment and get the same results? The second doctor presumably re-ran tests, gave you his independent interpretation, etc?
If he came to the same conclusion, you’ve replicated the original findings. You used the scientific method!
This should have occurred at every step of the process, and you can (and should!) review the literature to the best of your ability and get it explained to you as throughly as possible.
You’re not trusting the scientists, you’re trusting the science.
(If you want to deploy sophistic epistemological arguments to claim you’re really just trusting the doctors, fine. I’ll bow out of the conversation, because arguing epistemology is an exhausting waste of everyone’s time).
Now imagine that instead, you’re not allowed to ask another doctor. Trust the science. No second opinions, the institution has already spoken.
Or the institution’s spokespeople, as is the case with (invariably poor) science reporting and politically-driven science bodies.
> If he came to the same conclusion, you’ve replicated the original findings. You used the scientific method!
You most certainly have not. You have decided to trust two experts instead of one.
> This should have occurred at every step of the process, and you can (and should!) review the literature to the best of your ability and get it explained to you as throughly as possible.
What if you don't have the ability or expertise to understand the literature? If you're asking for a simplified version then you're just trusting the expert's understanding. (This is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, but still involves a level of trust in the authority of the expert).
Out of interest, do you make sure you understand the science behind bridge technology and the engineering of every single bridge you cross, or do you trust in the expertise of certified bridge engineers?
You most certainly have not. You have decided to trust two experts instead of one.
> This should have occurred at every step of the process, and you can (and should!) review the literature to the best of your ability and get it explained to you as throughly as possible.
What if you don't have the ability or expertise to understand the literature? If you're asking for a simplified version then you're just trusting the expert's understanding. (This is a perfectly reasonable thing to do, but still involves a level of trust in the authority of the expert).
Out of interest, do you make sure you understand the science behind bridge technology and the engineering of every single bridge you cross, or do you trust in the expertise of certified bridge engineers?
[deleted]
> I’ll bow out of the conversation, because arguing epistemology is an exhausting waste of everyone’s time
I'm sorry, but I have to laugh at you.
"Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion."
You yourself started this epistemological debate by arguing that belief in scientific institutions and authority was not justified.
I'm sorry, but I have to laugh at you.
"Epistemology is the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion."
You yourself started this epistemological debate by arguing that belief in scientific institutions and authority was not justified.
You disingenuously left out the first half of the definition:
“the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope.”
An epistemological debate would be over whether empiricism and the scientific method are even valid “ways of knowing”, whether “religious ideology” and “faith” were themselves valid forms of knowledge, et al.
I addressed your question about the application of the scientific method to trust the science, not the scientists.
We were not engaged in a discussion of epistemological theory, and your response is exactly the kind of two-bit sophistry I was referring to.
“the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope.”
An epistemological debate would be over whether empiricism and the scientific method are even valid “ways of knowing”, whether “religious ideology” and “faith” were themselves valid forms of knowledge, et al.
I addressed your question about the application of the scientific method to trust the science, not the scientists.
We were not engaged in a discussion of epistemological theory, and your response is exactly the kind of two-bit sophistry I was referring to.
So my belief that you are engaged in an epistemological debate is not justified?
Got it.
We absolutely 100% were engaged in a discussion of epistemology, whether you realize it or not.
You are a single human, and we have to question your methods and scope of the analysis you claim is required, to "do better than the scientists." And I'm telling you, the world is far too complex for you to put up any kind of real front, on any but the most absolutely critical decisions of your life, and even on those, I assert your best bet is to have faith in the experts.
How do you know lead is dangerous?
You and I have a justified belief that it is, even though you and I are merely trusting scientists who have told us that.
Got it.
We absolutely 100% were engaged in a discussion of epistemology, whether you realize it or not.
You are a single human, and we have to question your methods and scope of the analysis you claim is required, to "do better than the scientists." And I'm telling you, the world is far too complex for you to put up any kind of real front, on any but the most absolutely critical decisions of your life, and even on those, I assert your best bet is to have faith in the experts.
How do you know lead is dangerous?
You and I have a justified belief that it is, even though you and I are merely trusting scientists who have told us that.
>Honestly, arguing against religious ideology is an exhausting exercise and I’m happy to let someone else do it from here on out.
Good. The term "religious ideology" here is so loaded that it doesn't deserve serious consideration.
Good. The term "religious ideology" here is so loaded that it doesn't deserve serious consideration.
It’s accurate. If you have a better description for the observed phenomena, I’m all ears.
>If you have a better description for the observed phenomena, I’m all ears.
I actually don't believe you are. Using the term "religious ideology" is laughably dishonest.
I actually don't believe you are. Using the term "religious ideology" is laughably dishonest.
[deleted]
I presented graphs to a friend, and he asserted the data had been faked.
His belief that the process is corrupted supersedes any other evidence I could give him.
His description of the observed phenomena is a perfect trap, preventing any revisions.
He's not the only one I've had this discussion with.
One person questioned my ability to understand science, asserting, "Yes, smallpox disappeared about the same time as the smallpox vaccine, but correlation doesn't equal causation." She is convinced that smallpox was faked, and that the vaccine was one of many devices meant to teach us to obey governmental authoritarianism. You tell me, how could I possibly break through to her?
She is 100% convinced she has the best description for the observed phenomena.
And you know what? That's fine. It's fine that you're also a skeptic. I don't need everyone to adhere to the church of scientific instutitions.
But as a society, I think our representatives would be fools to think they have a better instrument to observe the world, than through the lenses of the scientific institutions. Use their own brains to interpret the data, and to decide how to behave, of course. But to provide them with the best theory that fits the observed data.
Watching someone in Congress assert that oceans are rising because soil is eroding into the oceans... I mean... It's heartbreaking. [1]
[1] : https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/20/opinions/erosion-sea-level-ri...
His belief that the process is corrupted supersedes any other evidence I could give him.
His description of the observed phenomena is a perfect trap, preventing any revisions.
He's not the only one I've had this discussion with.
One person questioned my ability to understand science, asserting, "Yes, smallpox disappeared about the same time as the smallpox vaccine, but correlation doesn't equal causation." She is convinced that smallpox was faked, and that the vaccine was one of many devices meant to teach us to obey governmental authoritarianism. You tell me, how could I possibly break through to her?
She is 100% convinced she has the best description for the observed phenomena.
And you know what? That's fine. It's fine that you're also a skeptic. I don't need everyone to adhere to the church of scientific instutitions.
But as a society, I think our representatives would be fools to think they have a better instrument to observe the world, than through the lenses of the scientific institutions. Use their own brains to interpret the data, and to decide how to behave, of course. But to provide them with the best theory that fits the observed data.
Watching someone in Congress assert that oceans are rising because soil is eroding into the oceans... I mean... It's heartbreaking. [1]
[1] : https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/20/opinions/erosion-sea-level-ri...
> What I'm lamenting, and I think others are too, is that we don't have a society that says, "Well, science provides the best tools we have to understand the universe, and so, we will trust scientists to guide our decisions."
That would be a horrible idea. It's trying to package the whole edifice up in a nice "just tell me who I can unequivocally trust" bow.
No-one! Nullius in verba! You can trust no-one!
There is no faith, only degrees of confidence.
That would be a horrible idea. It's trying to package the whole edifice up in a nice "just tell me who I can unequivocally trust" bow.
No-one! Nullius in verba! You can trust no-one!
There is no faith, only degrees of confidence.
What is your degree of confidence in an alert coming out of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that warns of a Category 5 Hurricane making landfall in the next 6 hours, with accompanying dangerously high winds and a record-setting storm surge?
Is that enough to warrant forced evacuations from homes?
This isn't a hypothetical.
Do you, or do you not, think that we as a society should immediately act upon information from the NOAA about hurricanes?
Is that enough to warrant forced evacuations from homes?
This isn't a hypothetical.
Do you, or do you not, think that we as a society should immediately act upon information from the NOAA about hurricanes?
I’m sure I’ll regret wading into the epistemological debate over your faith-based belief system, but here we are.
Over the past few months, I have received two completely incorrect fire evacuation notices from our local emergency services.
This occurred as a result of complaints after our last major fire; people complained that the alerts were insufficiently broad.
In response, our emergency operations center sent out over-broad alerts that inaccurately geo-targeted recipients.
Should I have immediately acted on those alerts, loading my possessions and pets into the car and hightailing it out of the area?
Should we be forced to evacuate based on the invalid geotargeting? Should communication providers and social networks censor contrary information?
I’m just trying to gauge what degree of uncritical trust and faith you think we should place in fallible authorities and institutions, and how strictly we should enforce your orthodoxy, rather than requiring presentation of evidence and leaving open the door for critical scientific examination.
To be very clear, I’m on the local fire department and the invalidity of the evacuation notices is beyond question. They were incorrect and counterproductive.
Over the past few months, I have received two completely incorrect fire evacuation notices from our local emergency services.
This occurred as a result of complaints after our last major fire; people complained that the alerts were insufficiently broad.
In response, our emergency operations center sent out over-broad alerts that inaccurately geo-targeted recipients.
Should I have immediately acted on those alerts, loading my possessions and pets into the car and hightailing it out of the area?
Should we be forced to evacuate based on the invalid geotargeting? Should communication providers and social networks censor contrary information?
I’m just trying to gauge what degree of uncritical trust and faith you think we should place in fallible authorities and institutions, and how strictly we should enforce your orthodoxy, rather than requiring presentation of evidence and leaving open the door for critical scientific examination.
To be very clear, I’m on the local fire department and the invalidity of the evacuation notices is beyond question. They were incorrect and counterproductive.
I'm honestly sick of you calling my beliefs "uncritical."
Of course I'm critical.
Of course authorities and institutions are fallible.
Of course authorities and institutions should present their evidence.
Of course there should be peer review and examination of their methods and claims.
But are you also aware that "anecdote" is not the plural of data?
I'm sorry you were incorrectly geo-targeted.
That's very different from the question I asked, where the NOAA clearly indicates the areas under threat.
But all else being equal, when government needs to decide how to act, it should look first to the scientific authorities and institutions to gather and assess the data.
You're not going to launch your own weather satellites, and you are not equipped to evaluate the raw data, or to evaluate the comments of the peer reviewers.
People should trust in the alerts from the NOAA. And they should want the review processes inside the NOAA to be as strong as they can. And they should want government oversight of the NOAA, and they should want a free press to report about negligence, incompetence, corruption inside the NOAA.
But the government should rely on the NOAA to determine when to issue an evacuation order, and citizens should follow those orders. Among other things, it endangers rescue crews if they don't.
Of course I'm critical.
Of course authorities and institutions are fallible.
Of course authorities and institutions should present their evidence.
Of course there should be peer review and examination of their methods and claims.
But are you also aware that "anecdote" is not the plural of data?
I'm sorry you were incorrectly geo-targeted.
That's very different from the question I asked, where the NOAA clearly indicates the areas under threat.
But all else being equal, when government needs to decide how to act, it should look first to the scientific authorities and institutions to gather and assess the data.
You're not going to launch your own weather satellites, and you are not equipped to evaluate the raw data, or to evaluate the comments of the peer reviewers.
People should trust in the alerts from the NOAA. And they should want the review processes inside the NOAA to be as strong as they can. And they should want government oversight of the NOAA, and they should want a free press to report about negligence, incompetence, corruption inside the NOAA.
But the government should rely on the NOAA to determine when to issue an evacuation order, and citizens should follow those orders. Among other things, it endangers rescue crews if they don't.
Nothing the NOAA presents is without evidence and it is not taken on trust and faith.
Their models, data, and analysis are available for evaluation, e.g. https://mag.ncep.noaa.gov/
External meteorologists perform their own analysis (locally, and globally). Local analysis can and does supersede previous reports out of the NOAA.
Nothing of what they do requires a faith-based enforced orthodoxy. We trust in the science, not the scientists — up until you try to enforce orthodoxy.
Their models, data, and analysis are available for evaluation, e.g. https://mag.ncep.noaa.gov/
External meteorologists perform their own analysis (locally, and globally). Local analysis can and does supersede previous reports out of the NOAA.
Nothing of what they do requires a faith-based enforced orthodoxy. We trust in the science, not the scientists — up until you try to enforce orthodoxy.
We trust in the humans to implement the science. Because the science itself is often wrong in ways that we trust humans to correct.
You also do not have a nozzle labeled "scientific results" which come out whole formed from an abstract machine.
It's a messy, human process. Variously helped and hindered by awful human politics. You trust humans to get the truth out, as close as they can, as quickly as they can.
You have this romanticized version of "science" which is just not the real world at all.
Do you have any idea how many times scientific reports were censored? How often scientists had to risk their livelihood to publish results?
So you paint trusting scientists as a straw-man orthodoxy. You treat it as though it's uncritical, when nothing could be further from the truth. It's because we recognize that we're forced to rely on scientists, that we are especially critical of them. That we worry so much about how they are funded and influenced. That we watch out for their results being censored.
Science itself doesn't provide legal protections for whistle-blowers. But those legal protections are critical to protect scientists. Because science is messy. And you honestly seem to not get that.
I don't trust government. I trust my representatives. Because I can hold them accountable. In the abstract, sure, you can trust the Constitution. But you're forced, by reality, to trust human agents to uphold the Constitution.
You also do not have a nozzle labeled "scientific results" which come out whole formed from an abstract machine.
It's a messy, human process. Variously helped and hindered by awful human politics. You trust humans to get the truth out, as close as they can, as quickly as they can.
You have this romanticized version of "science" which is just not the real world at all.
Do you have any idea how many times scientific reports were censored? How often scientists had to risk their livelihood to publish results?
So you paint trusting scientists as a straw-man orthodoxy. You treat it as though it's uncritical, when nothing could be further from the truth. It's because we recognize that we're forced to rely on scientists, that we are especially critical of them. That we worry so much about how they are funded and influenced. That we watch out for their results being censored.
Science itself doesn't provide legal protections for whistle-blowers. But those legal protections are critical to protect scientists. Because science is messy. And you honestly seem to not get that.
I don't trust government. I trust my representatives. Because I can hold them accountable. In the abstract, sure, you can trust the Constitution. But you're forced, by reality, to trust human agents to uphold the Constitution.
As I see it if you cannot reproduce or understand science all you got left is to either believe it or don't believe it.
Better would be if people could judge methods etc for themselves, because if you just believe, how are you going to tell actual science apart from hogwash that presents itself in a sciency fashion?
This is what pseudo-science is: utter invention that tries to borrow some credibility from science by mimicking the way science looks. This is btw. why actual science cannot say it doesn't care. Because if we want to live in a world where rational facts form the basis of the decisions we as societies take, then pairing a faux-science that is more exiting than the real thing with an lack of education is an recipe for disaster.
Better would be if people could judge methods etc for themselves, because if you just believe, how are you going to tell actual science apart from hogwash that presents itself in a sciency fashion?
This is what pseudo-science is: utter invention that tries to borrow some credibility from science by mimicking the way science looks. This is btw. why actual science cannot say it doesn't care. Because if we want to live in a world where rational facts form the basis of the decisions we as societies take, then pairing a faux-science that is more exiting than the real thing with an lack of education is an recipe for disaster.
Are you by any chance a young-earth creationist?
No, I’m an agnostic software engineer in formal verification.
Why?
Why?
Because you are employing the same rhetoric that YECs often do.
Young earth creationists argue against religious thinking?
That seems unlikely to me, but I’m totally unfamiliar with their rhetoric and will have to take your word for it.
That seems unlikely to me, but I’m totally unfamiliar with their rhetoric and will have to take your word for it.
> Young earth creationists argue against religious thinking?
Yes. And the irony is lost on them.
Yes. And the irony is lost on them.
[deleted]
Which Gods are you agnostic about?
agnostic, n. a person who believes that nothing is known or can be known of the existence or nature of God or of anything beyond material phenomena
All of them. None of them.
What answer were you hoping for?
All of them. None of them.
What answer were you hoping for?
No I'm belittling the entire concept of agnosticism as though it's meaningfully distinct from atheism.
Either you dilute the definition of God so much as to be meaningless (and thus you are an atheist who "well actually's" every conversation since you clearly make a number of claims about what God isn't) or you implicitly are being quite religious about which God you believe is the only option (in which case Pascal's wager does in fact apply very strongly to you).
Which is to say your ongoing position in this thread that "sciencism" is a real belief structure speaks to the fact that what you claim to believe is completely inconsistent to start with: you've just hunted around for a middle ground which you felt existed for the company you keep.
Either you dilute the definition of God so much as to be meaningless (and thus you are an atheist who "well actually's" every conversation since you clearly make a number of claims about what God isn't) or you implicitly are being quite religious about which God you believe is the only option (in which case Pascal's wager does in fact apply very strongly to you).
Which is to say your ongoing position in this thread that "sciencism" is a real belief structure speaks to the fact that what you claim to believe is completely inconsistent to start with: you've just hunted around for a middle ground which you felt existed for the company you keep.
Agnosticism means I get to say “I literally don’t care” to your entire argument, and that’s why it’s superior to your brand of atheism.
I have zero interest in arguing about or considering god, or gods, and the existence or non-existence thereof, until such time as you can propose and carry out a repeatable experiment that demonstrates some observable fact within this realm of inquiry.
That’s all “agnostic” means to me: leave me out of your pointless arguments; they’re not science.
I have zero interest in arguing about or considering god, or gods, and the existence or non-existence thereof, until such time as you can propose and carry out a repeatable experiment that demonstrates some observable fact within this realm of inquiry.
That’s all “agnostic” means to me: leave me out of your pointless arguments; they’re not science.
I wish I had enough karma to downvote you. We're watching modern disinformation tear society apart at the seams, this person is lamenting that somehow the "information age" has been entirely corrupted, holding up a great piece of progress as a foil to the latest news and its motivations... and you have to go make some absurd argument that "science will always win" even though we're definitively seeing that to be false. Misplaced faux-philosophy and a condescending tone to boot.
> We're watching modern disinformation tear society apart at the seams
If this is what you call being torn apart at the seams, I can’t imagine what you’d make of most of the past few centuries of human history.
> somehow the "information age" has been entirely corrupted
You legitimately believe the “Information Age” has been entirely corrupted?
If anything, your rant convinces me that you’re the victim of a great deal of targeted disinformation.
> you have to go make some absurd argument that "science will always win"
No, I made the argument that science is dispassionate and stands on its own.
It does not require censorship or appeals to authority to “win”.
Its conclusions can be tested using empiricism and logical reasoning. If they cannot, or if subjecting results to review is not permitted, it’s not science.
If this is what you call being torn apart at the seams, I can’t imagine what you’d make of most of the past few centuries of human history.
> somehow the "information age" has been entirely corrupted
You legitimately believe the “Information Age” has been entirely corrupted?
If anything, your rant convinces me that you’re the victim of a great deal of targeted disinformation.
> you have to go make some absurd argument that "science will always win"
No, I made the argument that science is dispassionate and stands on its own.
It does not require censorship or appeals to authority to “win”.
Its conclusions can be tested using empiricism and logical reasoning. If they cannot, or if subjecting results to review is not permitted, it’s not science.
> > We're watching modern disinformation tear society apart at the seams
> If this is what you call being torn apart at the seams, I can’t imagine what you’d make of most of the past few centuries of human history.
Your counterargument to my point is just as stupid as your last one. "Oh, you think society is going backwards? Imagine if you lived even further in the past, it would be even worse!!"
Have you watched the news recently? Seen what is happening in the USA and across the world with right-wing extremism and authoritarianism uprisings? Elites have coopted connectivity in order to control massive amounts of the populace through extensive propaganda networks. The world was on a genuine upswing for a long time, and now religious fanaticism is tearing down those pillars of progress. That's pretty thoroughly corrupted
> If anything, your rant convinces me that you’re the victim of a great deal of targeted disinformation.
This doesn't even mean anything, if you had a point for every trite aphorism you spew you might be interesting to talk to
> I made the argument that science is dispassionate
Which has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the human populace is largely forgoing the construct in favor of propagandized pop culture. Which is why I said you are out here flapping your fingers in an entirely pointless, dissatisfying fashion, designed only to make yourself smile at how pretty a picture your words paint, conversation be damned
> If this is what you call being torn apart at the seams, I can’t imagine what you’d make of most of the past few centuries of human history.
Your counterargument to my point is just as stupid as your last one. "Oh, you think society is going backwards? Imagine if you lived even further in the past, it would be even worse!!"
Have you watched the news recently? Seen what is happening in the USA and across the world with right-wing extremism and authoritarianism uprisings? Elites have coopted connectivity in order to control massive amounts of the populace through extensive propaganda networks. The world was on a genuine upswing for a long time, and now religious fanaticism is tearing down those pillars of progress. That's pretty thoroughly corrupted
> If anything, your rant convinces me that you’re the victim of a great deal of targeted disinformation.
This doesn't even mean anything, if you had a point for every trite aphorism you spew you might be interesting to talk to
> I made the argument that science is dispassionate
Which has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the human populace is largely forgoing the construct in favor of propagandized pop culture. Which is why I said you are out here flapping your fingers in an entirely pointless, dissatisfying fashion, designed only to make yourself smile at how pretty a picture your words paint, conversation be damned
Frankly, I think your rants prove my point about the religious nature of “sciencism” better than anything else I could possibly say in reply, and so I’ll take my leave here.
nawgz(1)
What you call “argument from authority” other people call “spending significant effort examining research or summaries of research, and using past experience to gauge its credibility.”
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Pseudo science will be here forever because it is much easier to get into than actual science and people will always look for explanations where science says 'we don't know'.
> anger at the rise of pseudo-science
As a consolation, it will not spread beyond this minuscule speck in the cosmos.
As a consolation, it will not spread beyond this minuscule speck in the cosmos.
I always disliked the "pale blue dot" narrative. We might be an atom in the universe, but we are also a universe of atoms.
If mainstream scientists were all denying that space exists despite these images, would it not surprise you that there would arise an anti-science movement? Because that’s basically how the current one came into existence.
Huh??? Mainstream scientists are "all denying that space exists"? That's news to me.
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The optical performance of the telescope continues to be better than the engineering team’s most optimistic predictions. ... The image quality delivered to all instruments is “diffraction-limited,” meaning that the fineness of detail that can be seen is as good as physically possible given the size of the telescope.
Congratulations, Webb team!
Congratulations, Webb team!
i.e. the aberrations and detector aren't limiting the resolution of the image?
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Fun fact the Hubble space telescope and now the James Webb uses NeXT computers to calibrate some of the instruments on the ground. Possibly even to test out configuration changes.
In particular they’re used for the Aberrated Beam Analyser. The ABA has been used to verify the optical performance of many different science instruments.
In particular they’re used for the Aberrated Beam Analyser. The ABA has been used to verify the optical performance of many different science instruments.
I believe the scheduling planner is written in Common Lisp also.
edit: It's derived from the one written for Hubble,
https://franz.com/success/customer_apps/scheduling/sti.lhtml ("Spike: Hubble Telescope Scheduling System")
edit: It's derived from the one written for Hubble,
https://franz.com/success/customer_apps/scheduling/sti.lhtml ("Spike: Hubble Telescope Scheduling System")
This reminds me of this article: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01431-y
Some informative background about this release here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-pNS5mDExQ. I found it really interesting; it includes comparisons against past telescopes, insight into what physical limits come into play causing image artifacts, known engineering issues etc.
All these images are red-ish in colour. I guess that's just an aesthetic decision here - presumably the instruments themselves are "monochromatic", plus filters are available?
I'm guessing these pictures taken are single exposures, as opposed to composed with multiple filters, but since Webb works "in infrared", pictures should be "reddish". It's not even like, "infrared is red". It would be some other colour if we could see it.
Or are these pictures genuinely stacked and some kind of false colour palette mapped onto them?
I'm guessing these pictures taken are single exposures, as opposed to composed with multiple filters, but since Webb works "in infrared", pictures should be "reddish". It's not even like, "infrared is red". It would be some other colour if we could see it.
Or are these pictures genuinely stacked and some kind of false colour palette mapped onto them?
James Webb works mostly in IR range or close to it. Near-infrared, mid-infrared.
ps. Hubble was not the largest optical space telescope before Webb. It was Herschel that operated in Lagrange point (L2) 29 April 2013 - shut off on 17 June 2013. https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Missions/Herschel/(class)...
What you can expect is sharper Herschel.
ps. Hubble was not the largest optical space telescope before Webb. It was Herschel that operated in Lagrange point (L2) 29 April 2013 - shut off on 17 June 2013. https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Missions/Herschel/(class)...
What you can expect is sharper Herschel.
Right, but here, in these specific JPEG images, the "red tint" is a, hmm, red herring, right? Presumably these images are monochromatic in some IR band, and red tint added for PR reasons? The color does not convey information, I'm guessing?
Or are these images genuinely stacked from a few sub-spectrum images? If so, what exactly is the hue of the colour?
If it's the former, I'm always amazed how much effort goes into making space exploration eye-popping. Artists' renders of spaceships and exploding supernovae, tarted up space telescope pictures and so on.
Or are these images genuinely stacked from a few sub-spectrum images? If so, what exactly is the hue of the colour?
If it's the former, I'm always amazed how much effort goes into making space exploration eye-popping. Artists' renders of spaceships and exploding supernovae, tarted up space telescope pictures and so on.
The NIRCAM image was at 2um, totally invisible to the human eye. Some NIRCAM filters overlap the lower end of human vision: https://jwst-docs.stsci.edu/jwst-near-infrared-camera#JWSTNe...
Ok great, but is there any way to click to see a high resolution image? The website design seems to prevent this.
Interesting - when I zoom in (to the 'detail' box) it looks very striated : i'm seeing what appears to be some sort of 45 degree diagnoal scanning procedure. Is this from the source or some sort of artifact of PNG? (zoom into the top left box which says 'detail')
The text caption explains that; C-f for "microshutter array". The one you zoomed in on is a spectrograph that's not meant to take photos.
OK, but I think if you announce "super good quality" or similar, people are going to zoom in and look at your pictures. Artifacts should be explained to head off confusion?
As @perihelions just noted, the explanation for the stripes you can see is provided in the article, just as you seem to be hoping for?
as always, context is key. "super good quality" refers to the comparison of the Spitzer and Webb images. it's clear that whever the alignment process is currently (as in, not finished yet), it is far far better resolution and results than the Spitzer was ever able to achieve. this is what has everyone excited. not that there's some artifacts in the image, but that even at this stage of the game it is already much much better and there's still room for improving during further alignment and other software tweaking.
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Wow, this is almost overwhelming and literally breathtaking.
The quote "My god, it's full of stars" is all that springs to mind.
The quote "My god, it's full of stars" is all that springs to mind.
Yeah seems broken. New tab. Though I expected better than a 5meg png
Right-click, Open Image in New Tab
I'm so looking forward to proper first light. Waited half my life for it!
I wish they would share many more photos, and also document what's happening on the engineers' screens
The idea of 'exclusive use' rubs me the wrong way
The idea of 'exclusive use' rubs me the wrong way
True, knowledge of the universe, our planet etc. being exclusive is indeed very irksome/painful :(
Are the photons that land in between the instruments just lost? Why not make them cover more of the space?
Why does MIRI looks so much better?
MIRI is the only instrument that works in mid-infrared, the other three work in near-infrared. It simply isn't seeing the same things.
"Better looking" is subjective, we are literally talking about your favorite color. I personally prefer the other ones, MIRI looks blurry, but really, they all have their use and they all have great scientific potential.
"Better looking" is subjective, we are literally talking about your favorite color. I personally prefer the other ones, MIRI looks blurry, but really, they all have their use and they all have great scientific potential.
Because Webb is optimized for looking through the dust clouds and nebulosity, whereas we’re all used to looking at sweet nebulas from Hubble with their gorgeous dust clouds instead of just a collection of points of light with diffraction patterns.
Webb really isn’t going to be the crowd pleaser that Hubble is. And that’s okay. But I do kind of wish that was communicated better early on.
Webb really isn’t going to be the crowd pleaser that Hubble is. And that’s okay. But I do kind of wish that was communicated better early on.
I think there will still be some stunning imagery, if a bit more ethereal, even for the lay public. We just haven't seen anything multi-spectral and color-mapped.
Here's the pillars of creation in infrared - https://esahubble.org/images/heic1501b/
Here's the pillars of creation in infrared - https://esahubble.org/images/heic1501b/
My god, it’s full of stars!
Compared to the visible light shot it's easy to see why we're investing in infrared. Looks like an order of magnitude more stars are visible.
https://esahubble.org/images/heic1501a/
I just started astrophotography a few months ago and am starting to get a very vague intuition about the imaging pipelines and what things like h-alpha filters can do to amplify certain features. But (possibly because I'll likely never do it) I had no idea how much occlusion is happening in nebulous regions.
Galaxies in infrared definitely lose a little something for me.
Look at ngc891 in visible light for example: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490345#/media/File:N891s.jpg
Here it is in a bunch of different IR wavelengths: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Images-of-NGC-891-at-var...
Quick note: The field of view of the visual spectrum image i linked above is ~4.5 arcminutes, which at the 7000ly distance to the pillars of creation mean the image spans about 9 light years from the left to the right edge. If you download the fullsize jpeg, each pixel represents about 7 billion miles, approximately the diameter of pluto's orbit. On a 96dpi monitor a star the size of our sun would be approximately 1 millionth of an inch.
https://esahubble.org/images/heic1501a/
I just started astrophotography a few months ago and am starting to get a very vague intuition about the imaging pipelines and what things like h-alpha filters can do to amplify certain features. But (possibly because I'll likely never do it) I had no idea how much occlusion is happening in nebulous regions.
Galaxies in infrared definitely lose a little something for me.
Look at ngc891 in visible light for example: https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q490345#/media/File:N891s.jpg
Here it is in a bunch of different IR wavelengths: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Images-of-NGC-891-at-var...
Quick note: The field of view of the visual spectrum image i linked above is ~4.5 arcminutes, which at the 7000ly distance to the pillars of creation mean the image spans about 9 light years from the left to the right edge. If you download the fullsize jpeg, each pixel represents about 7 billion miles, approximately the diameter of pluto's orbit. On a 96dpi monitor a star the size of our sun would be approximately 1 millionth of an inch.
Space is indeed very full for a thing synonymous with emptyness.
What I really want to see are interactive layerings showing Hubble and Webb data overlayed. Here's the stuff lit up by <clicks layer button> this light source obscured by these <clicks layer button again> dust clouds.
We need this
I've seeen a few examples of this over the years, but it's mainly been rolling over the image reveals something else. There are tons of examples of images that people have created combining data from different platforms. They make for some pretty pictures.
I have a pet project idea that I would love to work on, but I run into the typical problems of not enough time and not enough money to pursue it while chasing other projects too. But this type of interactive viewing of objects so that you can see why they glow and what causes them to be seen is one feature of the project.
I have a pet project idea that I would love to work on, but I run into the typical problems of not enough time and not enough money to pursue it while chasing other projects too. But this type of interactive viewing of objects so that you can see why they glow and what causes them to be seen is one feature of the project.
While maybe not as visually spectacular, visual clarity is appealling to a large audience - just look at the 4K display sector for proof of that.
Can't wait to see a Webb deep field!
What would deep field show that these images doesn’t?
Galaxies, i.e. cool nebulosity.
Also, the deeper you look, the more redshifted it is. So eventually, Webb is capable of seeing full visible color spectrum again, if it looks far enough back in time. :)
(Additionally, for the most deepest-field objects, they're actually significantly larger in terms of angular extent than nearer objects of the same physical size due to the fact that the ancient universe was smaller: https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2019/12/07/ask-...)
Also, the deeper you look, the more redshifted it is. So eventually, Webb is capable of seeing full visible color spectrum again, if it looks far enough back in time. :)
(Additionally, for the most deepest-field objects, they're actually significantly larger in terms of angular extent than nearer objects of the same physical size due to the fact that the ancient universe was smaller: https://www.forbes.com/sites/startswithabang/2019/12/07/ask-...)
The release mentions that MIRI captures on a wavelength which includes both starlight and interstellar clouds, which admittedly looks awesome when put together!
Love it. Seriously can't wait for the first images this summer.
Aren’t these first images too?
these are test prints. they are still tweaking everything about it. you take a picture to see where you are. you analyze it, make adjustments, and take a new picture. lather, rinse, repeat. the fact that these pictures are so much clearer than the best the previous gen platform could do is worth letting everyone know this isn't suffering from the same issues as Hubble. it's working this well without being fully calibrated, so everything is nominal.
If only people saw what the optical terrestrial planet finder would have captured instead of webb..
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https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2022/05/MIRI_and_S... ("MIRI and Spitzer comparison image")