When good scientists go bad?

[Tessa K]

Some of you probably already know about Prof Brian Josephson but I only just found out about him via a friend who did a PhD with him many years ago. He does seem to have gone down the Linus Pauling road. Why do scientists do that, do you think?

https://physicsworld.com/a/life-beyond- ... YS85Jr1oXE

One Nobel-prize-winning physicist who has perhaps veered off the conventional path more than any other is Brian Josephson, who leads the self-styled Mind-Matter Unification Project at the University of Cambridge in the UK ... Most controversially, as far as physicists are concerned, he also carries out speculative research on paranormal phenomena, a field known as parapsychology. Josephson’s interests even touch on homeopathy and cold fusion – two areas in which few physicists would dare to dabble.

He has also faced criticism from the likes of geneticist David Winter, who have accused him of suffering from “Nobel disease” – the notion that a Nobel prize gives a scientist who is an expert in one area an “unfounded confidence” to speak on subjects they know nothing about. Winter believes the affliction encourages sufferers to “spout anti-scientific rubbish”, citing the Nobel-prize-winning chemist Linus Pauling who thought that high doses of vitamin C are medicinally useful.

Such comments do not seem to deter Josephson, who believes that, on the contrary, it’s his critics who are in the dark. “It is people such as Winter who speak with unfounded confidence, on subjects they know essentially nothing about such as telepathy, or memory of water,” he insists. “In the latter case, fallacious arguments are frequently used to dismiss the possibility.”

[sTeamTraen]

I suspect a lot of Nobel Prize winners are somewhere on the autistic spectrum, with all the traits that can sometimes imply, including a tendency towards obsessional/cranky beliefs.

[dyqik]

I suspect a lot of Nobel Prize winners are somewhere on the autistic spectrum, with all the traits that can sometimes imply, including a tendency towards obsessional/cranky beliefs.

This isn't generally true in my experience (I've worked directly with three Nobel laureates, and one almost).

Brian Josephson is an odd case, because he got his prize for a two page paper he wrote before starting graduate studies. He basically never got any real scientific research training.

[monkey]

There seem to be quite a few people with "proper" doctorates that end up doing bad science. Should it be surprising that an occasional Nobel winner does the same?

[Tessa K]

There seem to be quite a few people with "proper" doctorates that end up doing bad science. Should it be surprising that an occasional Nobel winner does the same?

My doctorate is in French (specifically a Belgian writer) so I'm not sure how I could go bad. Might be fun to try though.

[monkey]

There seem to be quite a few people with "proper" doctorates that end up doing bad science. Should it be surprising that an occasional Nobel winner does the same?

My doctorate is in French (specifically a Belgian writer) so I'm not sure how I could go bad. Might be fun to try though.

Humanities was why I put the quote marks on proper Didn't think it was the best way of shortening "a STEM PhD that wasn't bought on the internet" but I went for it anyway. Hope you knew what I meant!

I think the only Belgian writer I know is Hergé.

[Tessa K]

There seem to be quite a few people with "proper" doctorates that end up doing bad science. Should it be surprising that an occasional Nobel winner does the same?

My doctorate is in French (specifically a Belgian writer) so I'm not sure how I could go bad. Might be fun to try though.

Humanities was why I put the quote marks on proper Didn't think it was the best way of shortening "a STEM PhD that wasn't bought on the internet" but I went for it anyway. Hope you knew what I meant!

I think the only Belgian writer I know is Hergé.

I did understand.

You've probably heard of Georges Simenon who wrote the Detective Maigret books.

On topic, my guy (Maeterlinck), was a Nobel Prize winner and his work definitely got a bit crap when he got into mystical bollocks later in his career.

[dyqik]

What's Bob Dylan done that's any good recently, anyway?

Then there's what Obama did after getting the peace prize.



"Past performance is not indicative of future results" should be etched onto the Nobel Memorial Economics medals.

[Tessa K]

What's Bob Dylan done that's any good recently, anyway?

Then there's what Obama did after getting the peace prize.



"Past performance is not indicative of future results" should be etched onto the Nobel Memorial Economics medals.

Or as Oprah Winfrey said: 'Every day, you're only as good as your last show.'

[shpalman]

What did Einstein contribute to physics after 1921 anyway?

[Tessa K]

What did Einstein contribute to physics after 1921 anyway?

And he did marry a woman who was both his first and second cousin, which is not the smartest thing to do.

(their mothers were sisters and their fathers were cousins)

[Woodchopper]

Luc Montagnier is another Nobel recipient we've discussed a few times. He's now into anti-vaccinationism and homeopathy.

IMHO getting a Nobel may well mean that the winner has embraced ideas which were far ahead of the rest of their colleagues. That's a good thing but someone like Montagnier may also be be attracted to other ideas that are rightly not accepted by their peers (but be unable to tell the difference).

[Bird on a Fire]

IMHO getting a Nobel may well mean that the winner has embraced ideas which were far ahead of the rest of their colleagues. That's a good thing but someone like Montagnier may also be be attracted to other ideas that are rightly not accepted by their peers (but be unable to tell the difference).

I noticed this a bit with Lynn Margulis. Early on in her career she came up with the idea of endosymbiosis - that mitochondria and chloroplasts originated as symbiotic bacteria before being 'absorbed' as organelles in eukaryotic cells. The idea was ridiculed for ages by mainstream folks like Dawkins, but ultimately she was right about pretty much everything.

Sadly, later in her career she also got into weird ideas like HIV denialism. I do wonder if being the target of strong controversy leads to a kind of f.ck-you feeling towards the rest of your colleagues and community as well.

[shpalman]

John Nash was asked something like “How could you…believe that extraterrestrials are sending you messages? How could you believe that you are being recruited by aliens from outer space to save the world?” and he replied “Because the ideas about supernatural beings came to me the same way that my mathematical ideas did. And so I had to take them seriously”.

To some extent good science relies on having an inspirational hypothesis and then finding ways to test them. These can involve theoretical and experimental struggles for which a certain resilience is required. They can also involve struggles against other scientists with differing hypotheses. Bad science is not knowing when to let go because you're wrong, it doesn't work, they're right.

[Allo V Psycho]

I did a quick count of Nobels in my former field in recent years, that I knew of (as in, went to their seminars, asked questions at least) but as a very junior PhD student or post doc. I was very lucky that my PhD supervisor was of that ilk. I very evidently wasn't.
John Gurdon
Bob Edwards
Martin Evans
Sydney Brenner
John Sulston
Christianne Nusslein-Vollhard
I did have a fun couple of days with John Sulston, shooting nematode cells with a laser. Met Janni Nusslein-Vollhard as she was starting her PhD, and we all agreed it was a right bugger of a project! I was so glad that wasn't my project....and it turned out to be a big part of the Nobel prize.

I think they all remained reasonably sensible, as far as I know.
I wouldn't have chosen Bob Edwards. Would have given that one to a lovely man and brilliant scientist, a Polish scientist called Andrzej Tarkowski, who I felt had done the hard groundwork. They didn't actually ask my opinion, however.

[basementer]

What did Einstein contribute to physics after 1921 anyway?

And he did marry a woman who was both his first and second cousin, which is not the smartest thing to do.

(their mothers were sisters and their fathers were cousins)

It's OK if, like them, one doesn't generate children. But we digress.

[snoozeofreason]

A friend of mine had his undergraduate project supervised by Josephson, and he was apparently a good supervisor. I've always been inclined to cut him a bit of slack since then because I imagine that, if you have won the Nobel Prize (and he had by that stage), you aren't obliged to supervise undergraduate projects.

[Tessa K]

What did Einstein contribute to physics after 1921 anyway?

And he did marry a woman who was both his first and second cousin, which is not the smartest thing to do.

(their mothers were sisters and their fathers were cousins)

It's OK if, like them, one doesn't generate children. But we digress.

Unlike the Royal family...

[Lariliss]

Hello, I would like to share the following thoughts/opinion.

Behind a great man, a scientist is always a person and personal experience.
And the path is different, regarding education, opportunities, and so forth.
Maybe someone’s target is only a Nobel prize (any acknowledgement). And then - ugh! I will do what I’ve always wanted to do.
I like the Oprah quote mentioned @Tessa K

Michio Kaku - why is he not so popular or often in videos? Though he gives consultancy and answers questions in popular TV programs sometimes, sharing his expertise.

Very few are on the top of the wave, on the top of the notion, on the top of behavior? It might be a coincidence, if one believes so.

Science has got popularized to a great level, which is a great achievement. Still we cannot say the same about the education level.
Pop-culture is sometimes about science in a very clear way.

For scientists ‘good’ and ‘bad’ have very vague borders. They support some ideas or not, sharp in disputes or not, sometimes noble or not.

[JackWhite1]

Scientists are like other people have their pros and cons. Everyone has their own "sins" which they hide or do not want to talk about much. These people are under a pressure of this world as we are so that's no surprise we can hear such things about scientists. We have to understand each other and be empathetic!

[nezumi]

I love Michio Kaku for his entertainment value (he's certainly a better presenter than De Grasse Tyson (fight me! ) but his ideas are often so far out there as to be based in a distant galaxy. Entertaining definitely, scientific? Not in my opinion.

I share the opinion that achieving great things in one area can make one think one is an expert in many, many other areas, even when one is absolutely unqualified to comment.

[Al Capone Junior]

IMHO michio and Neil are both good presenters of scientific ideas, but differ in how much grandstanding (best choice of word?) they do. Michio seems to allow footage of himself into much sketchier programming than niel. Also, Niel seems to do far less speculation on things like the multiverse.

I could be wrong, but since I'm human, if you try to tell me I'm wrong, I'll get real offended, dig in my heels, double down, resort to ad-hominems and other logical fallacies, and then quickly use the confirmation bias machine (i.e. google) to reinforce my beliefs, thus keeping my self image intact and the cognitive dissonance to a bearable level.

[noggins]

Nobel prize winners are lucky. They had a hunch and it turned out to be true.

[Tessa K]

Nobel prize winners are lucky. They had a hunch and it turned out to be true.

Good scientists aren't lucky. There's no such thing as a hunch. It's a combination of experience and talent that lets them identify potentially fruitful lines of research and then put in many many hours of work. There's a certain amount of confirmation bias in calling them 'lucky'; there will be many ideas/theories etc that turned out to be fruitless in their careers.

It also helps to be a white male in a well-funded lab. Which isn't luck either.

[Bird on a Fire]

Nobel prize winners are lucky. They had a hunch and it turned out to be true.

Good scientists aren't lucky. There's no such thing as a hunch. It's a combination of experience and talent that lets them identify potentially fruitful lines of research and then put in many many hours of work. There's a certain amount of confirmation bias in calling them 'lucky'; there will be many ideas/theories etc that turned out to be fruitless in their careers.

It also helps to be a white male in a well-funded lab. Which isn't luck either.

I'm a bit confused by this.

Call it a "hunch" or a "potentially fruitful line of research", science can nevertheless only be judged after you've put in the many many hours of work. Maybe "luck" isn't quite the right word, but I don't think it's the case that the Nobel Prizes simply go to the "best" or "most hard-working" scientists - what label would you give to the remaining variation?