What are the effects of crackpot addiction on scientific discourse?

In summary, crackpot addiction is the obsession and belief in unfounded theories, which can negatively affect scientific discourse by promoting misinformation and hindering progress. While its prevalence in the scientific community is difficult to determine, it is a known issue that can be harmful to individuals by leading to the rejection of evidence-based information. Scientists can address crackpot addiction by promoting critical thinking, respectful discussions, and actively debunking pseudoscientific claims with evidence-based information. Improving science communication is also important in combating the spread of misinformation.
  • #1
Bandersnatch
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I need help. I don't know what to do.

Every time I see a crackpot posting on PF I'm going into an ecstatic state of utmost glee. I gobble up the convoluted effusions as if they were celestial ambrosia. I wallow in the pungent fragrance of confused and misapplied terminology. I feel my soul raising to heights rarely seen otherwise, and tell myself that I simply find amusement in undoing the conceptual knots that people can tie themselves into. As if it was a good-hearted, bening thing.

But I know, oh I know. I enjoy it so because it makes me feel superior to my fellow man. I am vain, and I don't want to be! But those crackpots keep coming back, and I can't deny myself another fix. I am addicted.

Just now I saw another one, a magnificent specimen scoring in the hundreds on the crackpot index. I couldn't help but enjoy ticking off the boxes as I kept reading(and watching his videos). I even stooped as low as to sneer at his horrible, horrible English.

Help! I need a support group of like-minded, I mean, similarly-afflicted individuals. Perhaps even, oh I can't say that... I will say that - perhaps even a thread where all the fabulous crackpot posts could be reposted(and not deleted by our gracious mods) for the sole purpose of providing aesthetic pleasure. As a medicinal dose, of course. A legalised, regulated medicinal dose. One cannot simply go cold turkey on crackpots after all. It might result in some analogue of delirium tremens, or worse!
 
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  • #2
I am a reformed crackpot, now i just get things wrong, but i am dealing with that :]
 
  • #3
Try a web search for skycentrism.
 
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  • #4
Are there still crackpots posting on PF? I haven't seen one in a long time. Would like some links.
 
  • #6
DataGG said:
Are there still crackpots posting on PF? I haven't seen one in a long time. Would like some links.
We delete most of them.

The internet is full of them, so if you want to see crackpot theories, google will help.
 
  • #7
DataGG said:
Are there still crackpots posting on PF? I haven't seen one in a long time.

Thank you. You just confirmed we are effective.
 
  • #8
Borek said:
Thank you. You just confirmed we are effective.
Yes you are, and (most of, OP excluded) the PF community is very thankful for that.
 
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  • #9
montadhar said:
Yes you are, and (most of, OP excluded) the PF community is very thankful for that.
I am too.

I enjoy the occasional crackpot paper but we don't want them piling up in the forums. That'll just attract other crackpots.
 
  • #10
DataGG said:
Are there still crackpots posting on PF? I haven't seen one in a long time. Would like some links.

Well, there's usually people throwing around the same weird uninformed ideas like consciousness in quantum mechanics.
 
  • #11
Jimmy said:
I remember this recent one:
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/theory-for-gravity.770841/

Oh, yeah. I remember that one for sure, it was quite a treat. Must have sent Bandersmatch into paroxysms of joy since he insisted on it not being deleted, but preserved (presumably to feed his guilty habit on nights when he couldn't sleep. :p )
 
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  • #12
phinds said:
Oh, yeah. I remember that one for sure, it was quite a treat. Must have sent Bandersmatch into paroxysms of joy since he insisted on it not being deleted, but preserved (presumably to feed his guilty habit on nights when he couldn't sleep. :p )

Ha! I was a little surprised Dale went along with it.

I think we have a UFO enthusiast in our midst as well. He's being careful with his posts though...
 
  • #13
It's slightly amusing when someone follows up their ludicrous, disputed by evidence, assertions with a cry of outrage at how Physicists are somehow out of tune with the facts.
 
  • #14
jz92wjaz said:
...follows up their ludicrous, disputed by evidence, assertions with a cry of outrage at how Physicists are somehow out of tune with the facts.
That's random mutation that'll lead to something unknown in advance.
 
  • #15
Bandersnatch said:
I even stooped as low as to sneer at his horrible, horrible English.

Hey, don't be such a grammar nazi. He was a Pole. When English is your second language you have to make a choice, you can either polish your English, or your crackpot theories. There is simply no time in life for both.
 
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  • #16
I enjoy crackpots which are just over-the-top insane. Have you seen this?: http://www.templeos.org/

It's beautiful.
 
  • #17
DataGG said:
Are there still crackpots posting on PF? I haven't seen one in a long time. Would like some links.

How you doing?
=)
 
  • #18
Borek said:
He was a Pole...you can either polish your English
Did you intend that as a 'double-entendre'...? :D
 
  • #19
dipole said:
I enjoy crackpots which are just over-the-top insane. Have you seen this?: http://www.templeos.org/

It's beautiful.

ohhh wow ... the mind boggles ;)
 
  • #20
It's always fun to use a mix of existing terminology that's not related to confuse a crackpot.
Especially when they immediately use the proposed nonsense to 'prove' their claim...

Do not use this before determining he or she isn't going to accept serious answers disproving their claims.
 
  • #22
JorisL said:
Do not use this before determining he or she isn't going to accept serious answers disproving their claims.

You miss the point. Part of the DEFINTION of crackpot is that they are not going to accept serious answers disproving their claims. They are not going to accept frivolous answers disproving their claims. They are not going to accept ANY answers disproving their claims.
 
  • #23
phinds said:
You miss the point. Part of the DEFINTION of crackpot is that they are not going to accept serious answers disproving their claims. They are not going to accept frivolous answers disproving their claims. They are not going to accept ANY answers disproving their claims.

Sometimes they are genuinely confused and think they are right because they are uninformed. Some of those do accept sound advise and reasoning. (although they are rare)

edit: it's easy to mix these persons. I tend to use 't Hoofts list which has yielded results e.g. make them understand they aren't well-versed yet to posit a new theory
 
  • #24
JorisL said:
Sometimes they are genuinely confused and think they are right because they are uninformed. Some of those do accept sound advise and reasoning. (although they are rare)
Really rare, yes. And those usually do not present their ideas as "new theory".
 
  • #25
mfb said:
Really rare, yes. And those usually do not present their ideas as "new theory".

They do have the same belief in their ideas and are often equally hard to convince. To the point threads being closed because they do not accept valid explanations.

At least this is how I'm inclined to 'see the good' in amateurs. (to avoid having a very similar discussion in this thread ~_~')
 
  • #26
As the proud owner of the pf user name bluntwcrackrap, I find this very offensive to crackpots everywhere. You won't suck my soul and steal my ideas! Deathray activate! :p
 
  • #27
You people crack me up. What is so wrong with the crackpots out there? After all shouldn't they be entitled to their own folly too? I think (which is where I usually get into trouble) that this is just a fun loving group that actually lives in a slightly altered reality. On their planet, or whatever they call it, all is well and only looking better. So please let them believe what they will and take what they offer as more fiction than fact. Besides making them look at a different view only frightens them and they do frighten easily. That would chase them away and ruin the fun that all can enjoy. Go ahead be unhappy with me but I for one find the ideas presented entertaining. Besides that, the only way you can be an addict is if there is something to feed off of.
 
  • #28
jmeps said:
After all shouldn't they be entitled to their own folly too?

They are.

Just not here.
 
  • #29
jmeps said:
Besides making them look at a different view only frightens them and they do frighten easily.
This one bit, good sir, shows that you haven't actually met a crackpot in your life. They are indomitable like the Black Knight from Monty Python's Holy Grail.
 
  • #30
And if you scare them off where is the fun?
 
  • #31
Borek said:
They are.

Just not here.

Okay point taken. Let them go play elsewhere.
 
  • #32
jmeps said:
And if you scare them off where is the fun?
No need to scare them. I would rather create new subforum with name "Crackpot corner". All crackpots' posts would be sent there, not deleted :)
 
  • #33
zoki85 said:
I would rather create new subforum with name "Crackpot corner".

Feel free to do so, http://crackpot-corner.com/ seems to be available.
 
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  • #34
zoki85 said:
No need to scare them. I would rather create new subforum with name "Crackpot corner". All crackpots' posts would be sent there, not deleted :)
Yeah, the sentiment is nice, but the sad reality is that they would come there and either complain or peddle their wares, thus compromising the integrity and good standing of PF.

In my personal opinion, it's better to use their ephemeric presence on PF to fuel one's creative side. Maybe distill what you saw into an epitaph(and post it in this thread!), or write a solemn ode to the crackpots(in iambic pentameter) covering all the main points of their post without being explicit enough to attract the attention of them or their kin.
 
  • #35
Bandersnatch said:
without being explicit enough to attract the attention

of Mentors.
 

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