I like this. Most of the time the reporters overstate the research, the scientists keep the data secret, and the general public is left scratching their heads.
http://arxiv.org/abs/1106.2822 http://iopscience.iop.org/1367-2630/13/5/053051
Second, they compared the neutrino results with light results. Third, they ask to replicate the results in some other environment. This is a normal scientific procedure.
Please also note the number and variety of authors on this work. They will make sure that there is no overstate, understate, secrets, or head scratching.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/22/fa...
I am expecting one of two things to happen:
a. A systemic error in the measurements, which is most likely IMO. b. a modification of physics similar to how relativity was a modification of Newtonian physics.
Most of the time reporters misunderstand the research and then oversell it in order to get their story read. The general public is usually left scratching their heads because of this bizarre layer of clueless journalists between them and the scientists. Yes, some scientists are hard to understand, but there's no hope in trying to understand particle physics filtered through the soft spongy grey matter of a liberal arts major! Scientists are quite often educators who are used to speaking to a wide range of audiences. Journalists would do far far better to introduce the subject and then let the scientist explain it in their own words. I have no idea why this is not done more.
As for the FTL neutrinos at CERN... I'd hold on to skepticism for now. The reason they're asking for help finding the glitch instead of proudly proclaiming that they've found tachyons (FTL particles) is because this would be a truly bizarre result that would upend a century of physics that has, to date, proved remarkably accurate in its predictions. If this discovery proved true it would literally force us to rewrite physics from ~1900 onwards. Physicists are not afraid of this. Quite the contrary! It would touch off a bonanza of research! There would be so much work to do that the field would literally explode. It's just a lot more probable that there really is a glitch somewhere and we simply haven't found it yet.
This actually would not be the first time that tachyons were "found". A group in the 70's found statistically significant evidence for them preceding cosmic showers. They were so sure of their results that they published. Then, a year or two later, they discovered that it was just a glitch in their electronics! These guys were small fry compared to CERN, but CERN's accelerator is so complex that glitches could be very hard to find. The scientists at CERN are clearly out of ideas and mean just what they say: They don't believe their results and they want help finding the glitch that's probably causing them. It's extremely irresponsible to report this story as if FTL particles have really been found before CERN has had a chance to consult with outside scientists and other facilities have had a chance to try reproducing their results.
Publish != tell the media. Publish != share raw data.
I have yet to find encounter a group in my field that refused to share raw data when asked for it. They're usually happy to have another set of eyes look for a meaning they didn't publish (This could lead to another paper they might not have to work very hard for!). Again, is it really secret if all you have to do is ask for it? Corresponding author email addresses are on papers for a reason!
I will say that it is unusual for a group of scientists as prominent as the ones at CERN are to go to the media before publishing, but they are clearly very unsure of their results and would rather have a lot of eyes looking for bugs before they commit to publishing their results. This, of course, won't accomplish much if they try to keep secrets, as you are suggesting.
In fact, here's a challenge for you. Go ask CERN for their FTL neutrino data. I bet they'll be happy to give you a copy. They'll probably even have a grad-student to spare to explain some of it to you, although his or her time will probably be at a premium for the next few weeks!
About the 70's group, can you share the link to the article?
on the flipside, i would be certain that certainty is a particular kind of hell, if having such knowledge didn't condemn me to it. excuse me while i proceed to consume my tail http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros
I so so digg your 'the more we learn, the less we know' dialogue.
10: Question Reality
20: Verify Results
30: GOTO 10
while anyone_cares:
improve_model()
if theory_of_everything_appears or strong_ai_appears:
raise Exception("rethink loop")20: Verify Results
30: GOTO 10
In scientific studies, a question is made and an answer is given. That answer then leads to newer questions further probing the ultimate. One can approach, but never completely know.
In the Occult, one accepts a maxim or answer as an answer. Questioning hinders or derails to what is desired. I am speaking of the ultimate goal of the study of the esoteric: understanding of self.
(You mentioned an occult icon, thereby opening this line of commentary)
I forget the source, but they later tested their setup with random input and found it predicted tachyons from that as well.
Um, no. There are plenty of data being released, and in even more cases the scientists are happy to give you the data if you ask. It's very dependent on discipline, though. In astronomy, pretty much all data obtained with publicly funded facilities (e.g. including all large space instruments) are accessible by anyone after a proprietary period of 1 year.
About the later date: I think it's reasonable that those that put together the proposal and thought up the project have a chance at getting their results out first. Otherwise, why would you go through the effort of planning and executing observations if you could just poach someone else's data as it comes down the pipe? Think of it as a 1-year patent on the research project.
Some argue this isn't good enough (and I have some sympathy for those arguments). But it's very different to a deliberate action to hide or obscure information.
That said, it's very true that this is worlds different from maliciously withholding data.
Go down to your local university library. Go over to one of the computers (or hop on the wifi). Read the article. Email it to yourself. Not that hard now was it?
This is not ideal, but it's not that you _cannot_ access it, it's just not convenient.
Which is less cautious and more of the standard fare of not-very-well-reported science.
sigh
http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/ko638/if_the_par...
In a better world, that would be true.
In this world, it's not.
Most of the climate science data that Phil Jones and others have worked with, and most of their models are secret.
It is THIS that makes me keep at least one ear open for the "anti-" side in the climate debate. Real science SHOULD be conducted out in the open.
For example, the three models developed by NASA: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelE/ar4/
Direct links to each model + code + datasets:
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/tools/modelE/ - with nightly code snapshots here: http://simplex.giss.nasa.gov/snapshots/
http://aom.giss.nasa.gov/ - with direct access to code here: http://aom.giss.nasa.gov/code.html and here: http://aom.giss.nasa.gov/code4x3.html
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/tools/modelii/ - seemingly work on this has now been merged with the ModelE simulation.
Lots of other code and data is available if you take the time to find it ... and then considerably more time to understand it.
Still, in the larger context validating someone's data is basically worthless activity. It's far more important to go out and collect new data, build a new model, run a new simulation, and report those results than it is to try and shortcut the process. The data deluge is making it way to easy for people to validate bad science using the same bad data / model as someone else. Fundamental assumptions in statistics break down when you use the same 10 coin flips to substitute for the 10 million coin flips that cost more than your willing to pay for.
PS: The failure to collect significant quantity's of new data is a hallmark of fringe / bad science. If you really think global warming is a joke or you can be more healthy by eating coco puffs then go collect that data and do your analysis and see if someone can poke holes in your process.
The larger model is based around how that the extra heat maintained gets distributed around the world and everyone knows this is far less accurate. The people building this are well aware it's highly limited but by trying to balance the errors in both direction they hope to create a good estimate. The problem is when you start tweaking the heat distribution equations it's easy to find errors in every direction because they are greatly simplified so it's easy for someone to introduce systematic errors by only correcting issues in one direction.
Which is why you provide a high level description but when you release your source code you open yourself up to a lot of fruitless debate. Sort of like someone saying based on your methodology the rocks are really 1/1,000,000th a year older which means your science is a joke and less valid than my consistent theory that god created the world 8 weeks ago. But, if you actually build a model from scratch under similar assumptions it's going to have similar outputs and error bars or look really biased.
I don't think they're "secret" i think they assume anyone they haven't heard of who is asking for the info is a troll.
Business-sponsored science is very often secret, but please don't attempt to paint, as the parent commenter disingenuously attempts to do, that scientists are the root of data secrecy.
There have been now six separate inquiries into the misguided, corporation driven, politically-motivated and frankly dumb charges that climate science data is faulty or is associated with some kind of scientific misconduct. All six separate inquiries indicated it was not:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climatic_Research_Unit_email_co...
Moreover, scientific organizations are overwhelmingly making changes that makes their data even more accessible:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Data+without+the+doubts%3A+the...
First of all, "climate science" != "science as a whole".
Second, if any scientific field ends up in the crosshairs of a well-funded politically motivated movement working against it at any cost, then it will become hostile towards skeptics and eventually start stonewalling them. This happened in biology re: critics of evolution (in the anti-evolution camps there are tons of complaints about censorship, refusal to address criticisms, provide data, share models and code, etc.), and whereas it's always possible to address criticisms, the other side is always willing to spend more money to poke new "holes" in the theory, and you'll just never win.
"Skeptics" like to portray the ultimate goal of science as if it's to continually try to poke holes in existing theories, because progress is made when theories are disproven. But that's not science. Science is when you mix a desire to poke holes in theories with a reasonable threshold of acceptance, a willingness to step back and say "Okay, we've spent a lot of energy coming up with arguments as to why this is wrong, and they've been addressed satisfactorily, so this is probably right, let's see if this takes us anywhere new rather than getting stuck arguing the point".
Climate skeptics lack the willingness, even in theory, to accept that enough is enough - I don't believe for one moment that there is, even in principle, any piece of evidence that would lessen the amount of criticism against AGW. I don't believe they would give in because we've already seen that no amount of evidence reduced the amount of anti-evolution noise, and it's by and large the same sources of funding and political motivation that's behind both movements.
Now, it very well may be the case that climate scientists also lack the willingness to admit that they're wrong (actually, I think this is pretty likely), in which case they're not doing science, either, and that's bad. I'm totally in agreement there.
But they're taking exactly the approach to the skeptics that they would (and arguably, should) be taking if they were doing proper science. So the way they deal with skeptics is not a point of evidence either for or against the honesty of their scientific investigations, it's merely an inevitable result of the politicization of their field.
If you can't make an argument without resorting to name calling in the first line, please excuse me while I disregard anything at all you have to say. kthxbye.
This has happened in other fields.
In this case, it's "this fact that we've believed to be completely fundamental to physics for the past century appears to be wrong," and if you stated that without asking for people to check your work carefully because you are puzzled too, people are going to laugh at you if it turns out that you were wrong somehow. I'm not sure how you really could report this without downplaying it; it's just too incredible a claim for people to believe if you did anything close to overstating it.
Inherently impossible, a troubling myth that is made all the more troubling by the fact people believe it.
Impartiality is gone the moment the camera is aimed over here as opposed to over there.
Until it steps on the state's toes.
I doubt funding can ever be divorced from control, even if it is indirect. The BBC knows where its next meal comes from.
That said, the GP does have a point. The only thing preventing the possibility of closed-door deals going on between the BBC and political parties is good faith. Ergo, if it's not already happening or hasn't already happened, which is unlikely, there's no reason it can't happen in future.
Note: despite Australia's high exposure to UK content, I don't know much about the British media landscape. I haven't read the BBC's charter (nor the ABC's, for that matter).
Edit:
It's a tradeoff of different goals. On one hand, you get a news agency which can focus on news - not entertainment as would be dictated by a comittment to profit. On the other hand, that news agency is more susceptible to decisions by government. Consider: what determined the BBC's spending cuts?
I think publicly-owned news organisations are a great idea. The ABC, BBC, and NPR usually provide great news coverage. They have no need to sensationalize content, and that services the public to no end.
Political parties could equally make backroom deals with private media companies as well. It would also be considerably less risky, because they wouldn't have to violate the Royal Charter.
The problem with backroom deals concerning the license fee is that they have to be remain secret, yet affect how the news is reported without drawing suspicion. Any control would have to be very subtle.
An government inquiry into the BBC's reporting would be even worse, as it would be a clear violation of the BBC's independence.
That's why you don't reduce it right away. You threaten to reduce it if they're impolitic enough to pursue certain courses. You make this fairly clear to them. The actual decisions come from the BBC's own leadership, acting on such knowledge.
> An government inquiry into the BBC's reporting would be even worse, as it would be a clear violation of the BBC's independence.
Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. The only independence the BBC can have under its funding model is if it decided to risk going downhill and no longer being able to do the good things it's doing now. A reduction in license fees would accomplish that, meaning if you can wave that stick around the BBC will waive its independence and allow investigations.
And the next day there's a headlining report on government corruption.
I'm not quite seeing how the government can threaten the BBC, when they have so much to lose if those threats become public.