[FRIAM] All models are wrong - modeling Covid-19

[thompnickson2 at gmail.com]

Glen, 

I think the repetition of the Feynman Quote, which is just misguided, and which I hear all the time, and which I cannot believe Feynman would not have repudiated if he were set down with a good philosopher, is Cultish.  

But it was Cranky Nick who said that.  I disavow him, utterly. 

Nick 

Nicholas Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology
Clark University
ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com
https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
 


-----Original Message-----
From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of u?l? ?
Sent: Thursday, April 16, 2020 12:29 PM
To: FriAM <friam at redfish.com>
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] All models are wrong - modeling Covid-19

It's not a matter of the audience misunderstanding you so much as taking responsibility for our own actions. With the recent discussion with Dave about his assuming nobody would read his words as authoritative (despite their wording not having any "in my opinion" caveats) AND the citing of notorious self-aggrandizing egomaniacs like Wolfram who rarely, if ever, credit others for their works, I think it's important for us to do at least some accounting of where our work starts and others' works end.

FWIW, I can barely bring myself to read Kauffman's works with all the "I invented this" and "I thought that". Wolfram is orders of magnitude worse than Kauffman ... makes me sick to my stomach to read anything Wolfram writes ... but then, I'm an ordinary person so my gustatory reaction to his work is irrelevant.

As for the Feynman cult ... there is no Feynman cult, only well-deserved recognition. You can see that pretty easily from *how* Feynman is cited, as compared to other admitted geniuses like Kauffman or Wolfram.

On 4/16/20 10:57 AM, thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:
> Could anybody have been in any doubt that those weren’t my words?
> 
> (};-)]
> 
> If there is such a person, I am honored by their confusion.
> 
> By the way, what is this “reality” that the author is talking about, speaking of physics’ s need for philosophy.  And while I am in and being grumpy, Steve, speaking as a lifetime bird researcher, I can assure you that birds could make good use of ornithology if it were available to them.  I am truly, TRULY, bothered by the Feynman cult.  That’s a terrible quote.

--
☣ uǝlƃ

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