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.
  • #141
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/quantum-entanglement-and-ftl.790536/ ... @Bandersnatch!
 
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  • #142
Anyway, can anyone give me some etymological explanations about the word "crackpot"?
 
  • #143
Shyan said:
etymological
"Crack" is obviously fractured/broken/non-functional, and "pot" may be a corruption of "pate" for head (not goose liver).
 
  • #144
Shyan said:
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/quantum-entanglement-and-ftl.790536/ ... @Bandersnatch!
Ohh...they removed it!
Bystander said:
"Crack" is obviously fractured/broken/non-functional, and "pot" may be a corruption of "pate" for head (not goose liver).
Nice, thanks.
 
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  • #145
Shyan said:
Ohh...they removed it!
You will want to be subtle with hints/clues.
 
  • #146
Bystander said:
You will want to be subtle with hints/clues.
Sorry, I sometimes have problem understanding English. Could say what you mean more clearly?
 
  • #147
Don't be too obvious with pointers to a specific thread, or that might point to a specific member of the forum.
 
  • #148
Ohh...yeah,right!
 
  • #151
Shyan said:
Anyway, can anyone give me some etymological explanations about the word "crackpot"?
I seem to remember a discussion about this here at the forum, but "crackpot" and "origin" bring up way too many threads to find it.

This webpage seems to have a plausible history:

Crackpot

In short, they theorize that it was an evolutionary set of multiple abbreviations.

Cracked being shortened to Crack
Cracked being an ellipsis for Brain-Cracked. Cracked, meaning broken.. Hence: A broken brain
They claim that Pot was a word used for Head in the middle ages, citing an English translation of an apparently French document from 1425; "Ye pot of ye heued"
Though, "The pot of the head", sounds more like a hat to me.
hmmm...
Perhaps this is the origin of tin-foil hats, worn by crackpots?

On a related crackpot side-note, I've decided to include these two jewels, from my 10 minutes of research (circa 2006):

Tom Mattson said:
What Zapper was telling you is that PF represents a new type of case that does not fit the molds you know. PF is an example of a science website whose membership and activity actually exploded after we implemented tighter controls on crackpottery. Today we don't allow crackpottery at all on the site, and we are at an all time high. If you do not start to incorporate this data point into your analysis then I'm afraid your arguments are going to fall on deaf ears.

Chroot said:
You're not the first person to tell us that our site will die without crackpots.

The thread is incredibly long, and it brings me both joy and pain, at the same time.

Tom's post reminds me of my first days here, as I was really tired of poorly moderated sites:

Om-might-be-a-troll-Cheeto said:
I did a test post to see how this forum would respond to a kook post my first few days here.
It was locked immediately.
I promptly became a gold member.

IMHO, I would say that they are a bit slow around here about locking/deleting/banning...

But, that's just my humble opinion...

Ivan Seeking said:
Haha, yes, that was the first time that someone sent me a pm to thank me for locking their thread. :)

It was so unusual that I made a post about it in the Mentor's forum. :biggrin:

It was a test, and only a test, of the emergency crackpot system.
 
  • #153
Looks like DaleSpam is on it -- he replied in the thread.
 
  • #154
Bystander said:
S&GR. Quick. @@Bandersnatch @@berkeman @@phinds @@Shyan @@Borg
Thanks.
Bandersnatch has some point in being interested in crackpots. This guy invents his own physics and then asks us to clarify the mess!
 
  • #155
Maybe we should set up a conversation among the connoisseurs.
 
  • #156
You don't know crackpots until you've known John Gabriel.

Think epic NPD and Dunning-Kruger.
Boyer is the only mathematician before me that realized this fact. Cauchy did not understand what is an incommensurable magnitude, just as most ignorant academics of the last 400 years. He inadvertently assumed that such magnitudes are numbers. I often think that the last great French mathematician was Descartes.
Cauchy's ideas were so wrong, that no one before me had sufficient intelligence to realize this fact. Cauchy's derivative definition stated in words:
 
  • #157
I just did a non-crackpottery search of the forum, and ran ran across the following:

gonzo said:
Relativity and free energy
May 2005
[a bunch of jibber jabber]
...
Chronos said:
You are missing the patent on your free energy machine. I am still kicking myself for not getting a patent on the clapper. Have you checked your electric bill lately? You would think they would have been the first to jump at 'free energy'. Not that they would drop the rate, just increase the profit margin.
...

Every time I run across one of these humorous posts, by one of the titans of PF, the scene from Men in Black pops into my head:

MIB said:
Beatrice: You here to make fun of me too?
Kay: No, ma'am. We at the FBI do not have a sense of humor we're aware of. May we come in?
Beatrice: Sure.

:oldlaugh:

------------------------------
Just for the record, I was looking for information on the best way to do a patent search. I'll create a new thread if I don't find what I'm looking for, so no need to respond here.
 
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  • #158
Bandersnatch said:
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!
Bringing this forward because I'm not sure I understand post 152-155 ??:nb):(
 
  • #159
RonL said:
Bringing this forward because I'm not sure I understand post 152-155 ??:nb):(
Are you confused because the left us off the notification list?
If so, perhaps we should start our own thread; "The OmCheeto and RonL Crackpot Hour".

We can discuss how we've managed not to get banned, after all these years.
 
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  • #160
Sorry. It's not clear who all the hard-core addicts are, and I notified everyone I could remember at short notice. "155" was just fishing for whether we set up a conversation titled "Wire Stockholm" or "Penny Nickle Nickle" for quicker, more discrete communications of interesting "events."
 
  • #161
OmCheeto said:
Are you confused because the left us off the notification list?
If so, perhaps we should start our own thread; "The OmCheeto and RonL Crackpot Hour".

We can discuss how we've managed not to get banned, after all these years.
Are you sure you can handle it ? I'm as close to the edge, as that guy swinging Drizzle out over the abyss :oldsurprised: guess what keeps me from being a real crackpot is that I'm willing to accept that I might be wrong:D
 
  • #162
Bystander said:
Sorry. It's not clear who all the hard-core addicts are, and I notified everyone I could remember at short notice. "155" was just fishing for whether we set up a conversation titled "Wire Stockholm" or "Penny Nickle Nickle" for quicker, more discrete communications of interesting "events."
I'm pretty simple about all the user options of a web-site, I had the feeling that "@somename" is code for private conversations, that's OK because that is the reason for PM's :D
My biggest fear is, not being smart enough to be considered a crackpot :eek::D
 
  • #163
RonL said:
I'm pretty simple about all the user options of a web-site, I had the feeling that "@somename" is code for private conversations, that's OK because that is the reason for PM's :D
My biggest fear is, not being smart enough to be considered a crackpot :eek::D

@RonL , The "@someone" just sends you an alert.
It's not really necessary if you are subscribed to a thread.
But it's good if you aren't, such as the days they posted the awards, and award nominations.
No one was subscribed to the threads, so none of us would have known we'd been nominated.

ps. I think you're smart enough to be a crackpot. :D

RonL said:
Are you sure you can handle it ? I'm as close to the edge, as that guy swinging Drizzle out over the abyss :oldsurprised: guess what keeps me from being a real crackpot is that I'm willing to accept that I might be wrong:D

I'll send you an @ when I post it, along with the online mentors. They may have reservations about the idea. But I think I can schmooze it through. I was thinking of something along the lines of micromass's "Funny pictures of politics and World Affairs" thread. I envision it as something like "Car Talk" for cranks like us, who haven't gone over the crackpot waterfall. You'll see. Or, maybe not. Cross your fingers. :angel:
 
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  • #164
OmCheeto said:
@RonL , The "@someone" just sends you an alert.
It's not really necessary if you are subscribed to a thread.
But it's good if you aren't, such as the days they posted the awards, and award nominations.
No one was subscribed to the threads, so none of us would have known we'd been nominated.

ps. I think you're smart enough to be a crackpot. :D
I'll send you an @ when I post it, along with the online mentors. They may have reservations about the idea. But I think I can schmooze it through. I was thinking of something along the lines of micromass's "Funny pictures of politics and World Affairs" thread. I envision it as something like "Car Talk" for cranks like us, who haven't gone over the crackpot waterfall. You'll see. Or, maybe not. Cross your fingers. :angel:
Ah ha!... I can hardly wait :w at this time I feel like a salmon, halfway up the falls, :D hold on, are those big fury dark things on each side of the stream, mentors ? :eek::oldsurprised:
 
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  • #165
RonL said:
Ah ha!... I can hardly wait :w at this time I feel like a salmon, halfway up the falls, :D hold on, are those big fury dark things on each side of the stream, mentors ? :eek::oldsurprised:
And they're holding ban-hammers...

This may take me a bit of time.

OmCheeto; "...But that's not what's worrying me. It's how to do it. These things must be done delicately...or you hurt the spell!"
[Om messes up]
RonL; "Run, Om - run!"

:D

[edit]: I forgot to include my reference.
 
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  • #166
OmCheeto said:
And they're holding ban-hammers...

This may take me a bit of time.

OmCheeto; "...But that's not what's worrying me. It's how to do it. These things must be done delicately...or you hurt the spell!"
[Om messes up]
RonL; "Run, Om - run!"

:D

[edit]: I forgot to include my reference.
I wouldn't want to be banned, but it might go a long way toward solving my time issues for the year 2015:D
 
  • #167
  • #168
Bystander said:
Eng. Sys. & Des.
@Bandersnatch
Hmmm...
Silly? Yes. A crackpot? I think to be bestowed such grandoise title one requires to put in a bit more effort. It doesn't look like there's enough content there to score anything positive on the Index.
 
  • #169
Awaiting developments. Have you any idea what the reference is?
 
  • #170
Well, the famous fictional enterpreneur Tony Stark built the thing from scrap while held captive in a cave. Then he built a suit of armour around it, called himself Iron Man (even though I'm pretty sure he based it all on steel), and proceeded to do battle with evil cartoons for freedom, justice and other requisite American values. They made comic books and films about him, so it's all well documented.
 
  • #171
Here I thought we had something new from Atlantis. "Never mind."
 
  • #172
I'm sorry, but what's going on here? I thought we were talking about crackpots...confused. Though that may be due to the fact that it's 4 in the morning.
 
  • #173
Since there appears to be a bit of a demand, I'm going to start a conversation for crackpot watchers.

It should allow the participants to repost (by quoting), link to and freely mockdiscuss their sightings. This way we'll get to preserve and enjoy the finds, wihtout attracting unwanted attention from the posters themselves and other crackpots at large.

Hopefully that'll be all kosher with the mods.

Post below and I'll add you to the conversation. Or send me a message. Or like this post if you don't care about the continuous devaluation of "likes".

I reserve the right of not adding you, should you bear the likeness of broken pottery.
 
  • #174
Bandersnatch said:
Since there appears to be a bit of a demand, I'm going to start a conversation for crackpot watchers.

It should allow the participants to repost (by quoting), link to and freely mockdiscuss their sightings. This way we'll get to preserve and enjoy the finds, wihtout attracting unwanted attention from the posters themselves and other crackpots at large.

Hopefully that'll be all kosher with the mods.

Post below and I'll add you to the conversation. Or send me a message. Or like this post if you don't care about the continuous devaluation of "likes".

I reserve the right of not adding you, should you bear the likeness of broken pottery.

I'm having all my cracks lead filled and smoothed over, so that I'll look like one of George's finest Kustom jobs :D provided I'm worthy :nb):nb):nb)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George...r)#mediaviewer/File:1960s_Batmobile_(FMC).jpg
 
  • #175
Bandersnatch said:
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.

At least someone likes what I write.
 

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