ZapperZ said:
And using that methodology, you should also believe in supernatural phenomena and other pseudosciences.
I don't see why. Note that a typical social scientist isn't interested in researching whether there are UFO's or not, they are interested in researching what people *believe* about UFO's, and the research methods for figuring out what people *believe* are quite different from the research methods for figuring physics problems. There are some interesting philosophical issues here, and if you really think that qualitative social science methodology leads to pseudoscience, put on your asbestos suit, and there are people that can argue the issue better than I can.
Just picking some books off my wife's bookshelf. Bogdan and Bilken's Qualitiative Research Methods for Education. Strauss and Corbin's Basics of Qualitative Research. If you believe that "anything not statistical is pseudoscience" you can argue with them.
(And if social science is pseudoscience, then why are we teaching it in universities? For that matter, universities often have theology and religion departments in which you have pretty smart people that *do* believe in the supernatural. Should we get rid of those?)
The other thing is that it's common in astrophysics to "forget statistics." A lot of what we believe about stars is based on one sample (the sun) and a lot of what we believe about supernova is also based on one sample (1987A). It would be nice if we had 100% data on all supernova and all stars, but we don't, and the fact that we really have no reason to think that neutrino emissions in the sun are typical of other stars doesn't mean that HR diagrams are "better." I use my life to figure out what is going on with other people in the same way that I use the sun to figure out other stars. Other stars are different, but they are just too far away for me to get good data.
Also one thing that I like about money is that it makes things more objective. One reason that I believe that there aren't many people willing to pay cash money for pure enjoyment of astrophysics is that if there *were* such a market demand, I'd quit my job tomorrow and become a free lance tutor of astrophysics. What I'd do is to take the courses that I've taught at the University of Phoenix or University of Texas at Austin, and if people were willing to give me the same money that they give UoP or UT Austin and I were able to spend the same amount of time doing it, then that would be more than enough to lead a comfortable life.
The problem with that plan is that I can't give them the piece of paper that they can use to get cash money, and if they can't get cash money, they can't pay me cash money, and the number of people that are willing to pay me cash money for astrophysics as a hobby isn't enough to make things work. One other data point is Fathom and similar efforts. Around 2000, a number of major universities started online initiatives to teach enrichment courses and all of these were shut down after massive losses. It seems that people won't pay money for these courses if there isn't money to be made. By contrast there are tons of online MBA's, of various quality.
There's also the experiment I did at UT Austin. I taught a one unit class, which a lot of seniors used to get the one credit they needed to graduate. So what happened was that on the first day of class, I told everyone that if they just wanted to take the class for the credit, this would be the minimum amount of work that they needed to do, and they could finish it all in one month. If they wanted to learn more stuff they could stick around after that one month. Typically, the enrollment numbers went from 200 to about 10 after that month passed. (Also UT Austin is still teaching the class, so you scan ask people there for current numbers.)
About reality, we can argue a lot about the nature of reality and evidence. What matters is when you go up to the edge of a cliff and are willing to jump onto a dry lake bed to avoid a herd of stampeding buffalo. I'm not because I think gravity exists, and if I do it, I will die. Similarly, if you could convince that most university students were interested in pure learning then there is water at the bottom of the cliff, and I'd quit my job tomorrow and go into free lance tutoring. (Seriously I would.) Now, personally, I think it would be economic disaster for me if I did this, but if you convince me that gravity doesn't exist, then I'll jump. (Also, I know of a number of Ph.D.'s that make a good living teaching physics free lance. They don't live in the US but rather work for cram schools in East Asia.)
Now, I'll jump eventually. If they problem is that people want to turn my tutoring into cash that they can pay me with, I suspect that someone will figure out how to do that in the next five to ten years. If the US goes to an East Asian type testing system, then everything blows open.
Once someone figures out the cash part, then then concrete at the bottom of the cliff becomes water, and there's a herd of stampeding buffalo running toward me, so at that point reality says to jump.
Now I'm crazy. Sometimes people think I'm delusional. Other times, people think I'm visionary. I think I'm both, but one thing I care a lot about is the nature of truth and reality. Because, if you are not seeing the truth, you end up dying, either figurative or literally.
I don't think we can keep doing things the way that we've always done then. We can't go back to the 1950's because in the 1950's, the internet didn't exist. I happen to think that at some point there will be water at the bottom of the cliff, and the buffalo are going to come, so I'm preparing to jump, just not now. If that's not your reality, then go with what you see, and we'll see what happens.
! This place will serve you well as a physics major. 
). 
