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<p>A mathematician I once knew repeated a second hand quote from a
well-known mathematician: "In mathematics, even to be second rate
you have to be pretty smart." <br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 7/7/20 2:20 PM, Gary Schiltz wrote:<br>
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<div dir="ltr">I think there is envy within and among most
professions. When I was at Bios Group, I felt there was, if not
envy, then competition for recognition, between the scientists
and software engineers. Being a software guy myself, I can only
see it from that side of the fence; I can't speak to how the
scientists saw things. I always felt a bit of an inferiority
complex, as well as some hero worship toward the scientists.
Part of this probably has to do with the supply and demand
ratios for complexity scientists and software engineers. Geeks
have always been in demand, and so it is easier to be somewhat
mediocre and still be gainfully employed and well compensated. I
suspect that scientists, particular theoretical physicists and
mathematicians, have to really stand out in their field to be in
demand. </div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Tue, Jul 7, 2020 at 2:41 PM
∄ uǝlƃ <<a href="mailto:gepropella@gmail.com"
moz-do-not-send="true">gepropella@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
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<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">Hm.
In these cases, where Firestein talks about quantum mechanics
as an exemplar of how we navigate ignorance and my cancer
survivor friend as a defense mechanism for avoiding nihilism
or depression or whatnot, there is no "I wish I were a
physicist". Firestein is a credentialed neuroscientist and my
friend is a graphic artist. Neither seem to feel inadequate in
their disciplines or wish their disciplines were more like
physics. So, I really doubt it's envy. What it sounds more
like is captured well by "There are more things in heaven and
earth ...". Both Firestein and my friend are using physics to
lend some credibility by proxy to their rhetoric. I just can't
warp my way to thinking it's physics envy.<br>
<br>
Even in this tangent, the clinicians I've worked with don't
disregard experimentalists or vice versa. It's simply a
practical acceptance. Where large N experiments can be run,
GREAT! Where they can't, we use expert experience and
heuristics. [†] In fact, gathering "raw", private, data from
patients is a common practice and the toolkits used to
translate between contexts is diverse. (We had a meeting about
just such a thing yesterday.)<br>
<br>
So, I remain unconvinced. It's not physics envy. It's appeal
to authority.<br>
<br>
<br>
[†] Now, if you instead argued that by "physics envy", you
simply mean "we'd like to have more data, but we don't YET",
then *maybe*. But why call that "physics envy"? That would be
a misleading moniker for having to work with less data than
you'd otherwise prefer.<br>
<br>
On 7/7/20 11:53 AM, Frank Wimberly wrote:<br>
> Clinicians (therapists, counselors, psychiatrists, etc)
use data that is based on private, highly sensitive personal
information, it's very difficult and often impossible to apply
the methods of experimental psychologists to that data. The
clinicians do write papers but by the experimenters standards
the sample sizes are so tiny as to merit dismissal of the
results. <br>
> <br>
> So, imagine you are a clinician. Every case you have
ever seen of a person with paranoid delusions involves
significant grandiosity. (Why would the CIA be focusing on
you, Marvin) Your colleagues have observed the same with few
exceptions. Some clinician writes an article which mentions
this. Experimental psychologists read it and say you need to
do a double blind study to assert that. You realize that's
impossible so you learn to disregard experimentalists just as
they disregard you. You both think, "I wish I were a
physicist but I hated math".<br>
<br>
<br>
-- <br>
☣ uǝlƃ<br>
<br>
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<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Joe
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