Are the rules at this forum too strict??
Posted Feb6-12 at 11:24 PM by micromass
I have not been a mentor for very long, but I can see pretty clearly that we get quite a lot of complaints of people who think the PF-rules are too strict or that we should be more lax in enforcing the rules. It may not surprise any of you that I disagree with this. But let me try to explain my motives behind my disagreement.
First of all, there is only one person in this entire forum who decides what the rules are. That person is Greg. It is his forum. He is the one who spends a lot of time and money in maintaining this wonderful forum. He does so entirely without profit and as a hobby. He does not owe us anything. We choose to come on this forum and we know that it is Greg who ultimately decides everything. If we disagree with him, then we can argue with Greg, we can explain our position. But he has the final call. And if we don't like his decision, then we're also free not to come on this forum. It's as simple as that: it's Greg's forum and he gets to do whatever he likes. The only thing we can do is choose to participate or not to participate on his forum.
I choose to participate on this forum, because I think the rules are good and fair. Let me take an example of rules that some newbies don't like. First of all, it's a rule that people should always make some kind of effort on a homework problem. I like this rule: it forces students to think instead of being spoonfed. Students don't benefit from getting the answer from somebody else, students benefit from finding the answer for themselves. This is my opinion, but (I guess) it is also the opinion of the established members, the homework helpers and the science advisors. I think that those people would not stay here much longer if it were allowed that we just give the answer to students. Nobody of them wants to see PF being degenerated into yahoo answers. Make no mistake: it are the established members who make PF what it is today. Without them, PF would be worth nothing. So it is in everybody's interest to keep the established members happy. And that means: no spoonfeeding and no crackpottery.
This is a science forum. And people signing up for it should note that a scientific mentality is one of the most important things on this forum. If you do not respect science or the scientific method, then please do not come here. There are many other forums where you can express your opinion.
Furthermore, we only talk about mainstream science here. No speculative ideas allowed. The purpose of this forum is to help current science students understand the science of today. The purpose of this forum is NOT to try and formulate an innovative new theory. Even if Einstein were to use this forum to formulate his new relativity theory, he would still get his post deleted. We know that it will never happen that a groundbreaking theory appears and says: "This was first published on PF." This will not happen and we're ok with it. We're ok with it because it is simply not the purpose of this forum.
And finally. Are our rules so strict?? Really? I think we allow a lot here. A lot depends on the very attitude of the poster. Take for example the simple misconception: "If a spaceship flies at 0.9c and I fly inside the spaceship with 0.2c, then in total I will fly with 1.1c. So I go faster than the speed of light." If somebody comes here and says: "Look at this. This shows that Einstein was wrong. You are all arrogant physicists" then this is not allowed. If somebody comes here and says "Look at this. It seems to violate physics, but I know that physicists consider it to be ok. Where did I go wrong?" then this is perfectly allowed.
Do not come here and assume you are the smartest person who ever lived. We have PhD's and grad students here (and other smart members): it can be expected that most of them understand the science quite well. So it would be advisable to listen to these people with an open mind.
Thank you everybody for letting me rant!!
First of all, there is only one person in this entire forum who decides what the rules are. That person is Greg. It is his forum. He is the one who spends a lot of time and money in maintaining this wonderful forum. He does so entirely without profit and as a hobby. He does not owe us anything. We choose to come on this forum and we know that it is Greg who ultimately decides everything. If we disagree with him, then we can argue with Greg, we can explain our position. But he has the final call. And if we don't like his decision, then we're also free not to come on this forum. It's as simple as that: it's Greg's forum and he gets to do whatever he likes. The only thing we can do is choose to participate or not to participate on his forum.
I choose to participate on this forum, because I think the rules are good and fair. Let me take an example of rules that some newbies don't like. First of all, it's a rule that people should always make some kind of effort on a homework problem. I like this rule: it forces students to think instead of being spoonfed. Students don't benefit from getting the answer from somebody else, students benefit from finding the answer for themselves. This is my opinion, but (I guess) it is also the opinion of the established members, the homework helpers and the science advisors. I think that those people would not stay here much longer if it were allowed that we just give the answer to students. Nobody of them wants to see PF being degenerated into yahoo answers. Make no mistake: it are the established members who make PF what it is today. Without them, PF would be worth nothing. So it is in everybody's interest to keep the established members happy. And that means: no spoonfeeding and no crackpottery.
This is a science forum. And people signing up for it should note that a scientific mentality is one of the most important things on this forum. If you do not respect science or the scientific method, then please do not come here. There are many other forums where you can express your opinion.
Furthermore, we only talk about mainstream science here. No speculative ideas allowed. The purpose of this forum is to help current science students understand the science of today. The purpose of this forum is NOT to try and formulate an innovative new theory. Even if Einstein were to use this forum to formulate his new relativity theory, he would still get his post deleted. We know that it will never happen that a groundbreaking theory appears and says: "This was first published on PF." This will not happen and we're ok with it. We're ok with it because it is simply not the purpose of this forum.
And finally. Are our rules so strict?? Really? I think we allow a lot here. A lot depends on the very attitude of the poster. Take for example the simple misconception: "If a spaceship flies at 0.9c and I fly inside the spaceship with 0.2c, then in total I will fly with 1.1c. So I go faster than the speed of light." If somebody comes here and says: "Look at this. This shows that Einstein was wrong. You are all arrogant physicists" then this is not allowed. If somebody comes here and says "Look at this. It seems to violate physics, but I know that physicists consider it to be ok. Where did I go wrong?" then this is perfectly allowed.
Do not come here and assume you are the smartest person who ever lived. We have PhD's and grad students here (and other smart members): it can be expected that most of them understand the science quite well. So it would be advisable to listen to these people with an open mind.
Thank you everybody for letting me rant!!
Total Comments 11
Comments
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The only times when I get upset at the rules are when somebody posts a thread that looks like it's going to be interesting but then it gets locked right away. Usually happens around the Debunking and Philosophy sub-forums but I understand that there are certain criteria that have to be met and whatnot and that this forum isn't for everything.Posted Feb11-12 at 12:28 AM by PlayingMonk 
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The problem is a lack of transparency, and a lack of an appeal process. The administrators can delete posts, and end threads, with no more than a comment of "this has gone on long enough" leaving many unanswered questions.
Perhaps the deleted post consisted of crackpottery, perhaps not. I have no way of knowing that, because you delete the post.
When people post on this site, no matter how wrong they may be, they intend their posts for public view, and with rare exception they actually BELIEVE what they are saying. If you delete that post, whether I'm crazy or not, my immediate reaction is that there is some conspiracy to silence the truth, or that you intend to "steal" my ideas, so that you can publish or patent them, and take credit for them yourself. (This is especially true if you delete a comment because "it is not mainstream science.")
I wonder whether there could be a compromise somehow; a couple of suggestions I would have is
(1) When posts are deleted, they should be a matter of public record; the whole post, and the reason for the deletion. And the person who got their post deleted should have at least one opportunity to apologize, retract, or defend their idea.
(2) Instead of permanently closing a thread, it might be appropriate to close it for a week or a month, giving the respective parties a chance to calm down, and reflect on the ideas, so that they can come back to it without anger getting in the way of logic.Posted Feb13-12 at 08:40 AM by JDoolin 
Updated Feb13-12 at 08:53 AM by JDoolin -
^
All of this would be avoided if people just don't post their "innovative ideas". I suppose there is another place for that. The above post clearly says that the PF philosophy does not include that kind of thing. I think that the least us members could do is respect that. ;)
While what you say does indeed seem fair, I just find that it's too much trouble. Just my two cents. Maybe I'm biased because I don't particularly care about posting or reading speculative ideas - I'd much rather learn what's canonical/mainstream first. :-) :-)Posted Feb19-12 at 04:41 AM by Mépris
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Can you categorize these "innovative ideas," though?
(1) Some innovative ideas stem from "reality-doubters" who believe that all of reality is a projection of the mind. (2) Some "innovative ideas" stem from not quite grasping a concept, or making a mathematics mistake. (3) Some "innovative ideas" stem from grasping the concepts perfectly well, and seeing past them.
Probably in 90% of the cases, you have one of the first two situations, but occasionally, you'll have situation number 3.
When you cling to what is canonical/mainstream, you run the risk of confirmation bias, narrative fallacy.
In fact, I have the opposite bias towards canonical/mainstream because I'm well aware of these problems. Whenever I hear the bread-and-raisin analogy for the expanding universe, I feel like ripping out my hair.
Yes, I'm well aware of the canonical/mainstream explanation for the expanding universe. But by the rules of this forum, because that IS a canonical/mainstream explanation, I'm not allowed to point out that the analogy makes no sense. (What category does that go in? Obviously category 2... An "innovative idea" that comes from not quite grasping a concept, but we should analyze the idea carefully, and at least entertain the possibility that it genuinely does not make sense. If it does make sense, then the explanation should eventually follow. If it is nonsensical, it can only be defended by closing the thread, implying that the questioner is "too stupid to understand it.")
There are some ideas that are widely accepted, but genuinely do not make sense. These "widely accepted, yet nonsensical" ideas tend to come from religion rather than from science, but I don't think that the canon/mainstream of science is entirely immune to the same problems of canon/mainstream of religion.
(I should also point out that the raisin-bread analogy is derived not FROM Special Relativity, but FROM the canon/mainstream belief that Special Relativity is valid only locally.)Posted Feb22-12 at 08:54 AM by JDoolin
Updated Feb22-12 at 09:45 AM by JDoolin -
It doesn't matter how you categorize innovative ideas. They are forbidden here.
Everybody knows this when they sign up the forum. And people who don't like this are free to go to another forum.
Is it a good decision for us to ban innovative ideas?? I think the good outweighs the bad parts of the decision by far.
If we were to allow personal theories, then this forum would be overrun by crackpots. We don't want this.Posted Feb23-12 at 02:23 PM by micromass
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Nice rant micro! :D
Posted May15-12 at 04:39 PM by Gad
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micro,
i don't believe the rules are too strict, but i do believe that your administration of the rules are not correct. i didn't say that your administration of the rules was too strict, i am saying that you're not doing it right.
can you talk to Greg or Evo or Zapper or Integral or Pervect or some of the other admins who've been around longer and get some insight from them about this? i mean this in the kindest manner.Posted May16-12 at 04:42 PM by rbj
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Response
rbj, if you have problems with specific moderation of mine, then please send a PM to other mentors to express your problems with me.
Let me assure you that every thing we do is being reviewed by the other mentors. We cannot infract people, lock threads, delete threads, etc. without the other mentors agreeing with it.
I welcome you to PM other mentors about what I might be doing wrong.
Posted May21-12 at 05:54 PM by micromass
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There are times when I feel it might be fruitful to explore more fully the ideas or conceptual rigamarole involved behind an engineering application that is not precisely feasible.
Maybe an example is terraforming threads. There is a lot of hard-science interesting physics, chemistry and geology that can be explained by going through a scenario in terraforming. But, I see these threads being locked because the engineering application is unfeasible.
I argue that where the science is understood, we should discuss, even if engineering application of such is not worked out.Posted Nov6-12 at 10:21 AM by H2Bro
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[deleted by author]
Posted Feb16-13 at 05:15 AM by mitchell porter
Updated Feb16-13 at 07:17 AM by mitchell porter -
Innovative ideas? If they are so innovative, and they are so sure about them, then why don't they patent them?
I'm going to patent my innovative ideas. I'm going to be a trillionaire one day. Or maybe a billionaire. Or maybe, just a millionaire. It doesn't really matter in the end how much money I make. Even if I don't ever make a dime, I just hope that my innovations, make the world a better place.
Kind of like Mr. Tesla. He was kind of funny too.
ps. Are you really from Belgium?Posted Apr8-13 at 12:44 AM by OmCheeto
Updated Apr8-13 at 12:48 AM by OmCheeto (Lies! All lies!)
