I have a t-shirt with those words on it; it's from the Museum of Jurassic Technology exhibit of letters to Mount Wilson Observatory, a fascinating collection of crackpot letters written to astronomers between 1915 and 1935, containing the astounding theories created by people around the world, who all thought they could revolutionize science with their insights. It's an exhibit well worth browsing—here's one sample letter.
To whom it may concern:
This is to certify, That I have found the Key To all Existance. And all I ask of any one Is for them to read What I am about to say. Because it is not my purpose to tell What you already know. And consequently the proof Shall follow and establish My work to make it law.
For the key to all existance Is the key to the Law By which all things Come into existance and therefore my word Is the key to that law to be verified by proof Listen therefore to what I say As follows:
The Moon Is practically all Water frozen or Ice It was formed By water evaporating From the earth Which arose and gathered Between the Earth and Sun It is hollow Like a pumpkin The inside is composed of that part of the air known as Nitrogen And very very cold Consequently its water is frozen.
If the crust of the moon Was removed, it would be a Sun bright enough To destroy the earth. There is no life upon the moon, but Without the moon There would be no life upon the earth.
And it goes on, at length.
Now Pascal Boyer has put together a brief ontology of crackpottery. He seems to have rediscovered the Salem Hypothesis — 'scientists' who claim to have disproven evolution are often actually engineers — in a rather more general form, and has a few other generalizations, like that all crackpots are male, that are only roughly true (I can think of many exceptions: famous ones would be Madame Blavatsky and Ayn Rand). Come to think of it, though, most but not all of my raving mad anti-fan mail does come from males…
It's an interesting read, if you find yourself fascinated by the psychopathology of pseudoscience.
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I guess it's okay if supergeniuses can't spell. Spelling is a bit arbitrary in the English language and supergeniuses have more significant matters on their minds. But it's also possible that "existance" is something distinct from "existence," in which case the letter writer may be correct about having found the key to "existance," especially if "existance" is something trivial.
i wonder how man of them were faking?
Come on, teach the hundreds, if not thousands, of controversies. Every idea deserves to be taught as much as any other idea.
I always wonder how stupid the IDiots really are, since that's exactly what their "pleas for tolerance" would lead to.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
There is a book that explains all knowledge. It is the inerrant word of God. God created the World in six days .... Shit! Someone's already done that crackpottery.
You probably should inform your readers that the MJT is a spoof. It's such a good spoof that it may not be obvious.
Of course if you were to publish a female hate letter on your blog, you would be immediately condemned for picking on a defenseless girl. The shame!
I have to take just a second to plug Boyer's book "Religion Explained." Single best naturalistic hypthesis about religion's origin I've read, easily accessed, entertaining, cogent. Well worth the effort.
John Baez, a mathematical physicist at the University of California at Riverside, posted a "Crackpot Index" that gives a simple point system for "rating potentially revolutionary contributions to physics" which I'm sure could be generalized to any branch of science. You can find it here. Enjoy!
Was the interval between the battle of Ypres and the Abyssinian crisis a particularly prime period for (ahem) originality?
How were the stars and planets aligned during those two decades?
Another very common characteristic of crackpots is when they compare themselves to Galileo or Wegener. Although it is true that some legitimate theories start as a crackpot, the main diagnostic characteristic of crackpot are not in content but in form: the form of attaining a conclusion without any testable premise.
I subscribe to a debate list on the existence of God, and every now and then what I call a "guru" wanders in. These are usually people with a vaguely Eastern version of God which is heavy on the mysticism and poetry, and vague on specifics. They're not religious, they are "spiritual." And they are apparently completely taken aback by the concept of "debate."
They only seek to share. We can accept. Or not. It is up to us. Food for Thought, surely.
Most of the 'gurus' I know in Real Life are female, by the way. They think their crackpot beliefs (whether it be psychic powers, alternative medicine, or progressive evolution) should be placed on a plate for "sharing." Nice people take them and praise them, skeptics refuse them, but nobody should criticize the quality of the Food For Thought Lest they exhibit the terrible Closed-Mind).
Heartily seconded. And as a bonus it's the kind of book from which you learn all kinds of fascinating stuff that you wouldn't, before reading it, even have realized was germane to the subject. Few books I've read in the past couple of years have given me as much pleasure.
The best thing about the MJT, pace Mr. Selkirk (spoiler!) up there, is that in fact some of its exhibits are factual.
It's one of my personal favorite institutions ever in the whole world, and anyone who hasn't been there is missing some serious fun. Makes a good day's outing combined with the LaBrea Tar Pits (chorus:"Taaaar Pits"). The letters to Mount Wilson were on display when we visited, some years back, and it was one of those roadkill-fascination things that one finds in, oh, certain classified-ad venues or PZ's mailbox. We have the book, to read on days when we have seizures of unreasonable optimism about the human species.
Dang. Now I want to jump in the car and head down I-5. Or "The 5" as they so quaintly say down south.
Many -- perhaps most -- physicists receive several crackpot "Eureka" letters over the course of their careers. The last ten to fifteen years, with the inter-tubes, have increased the dissemination of these screeds. Crackpot people seem to really be drawn to physics and physicists. The appeal of having a community of possibly like-minded souls engaged in "figuring Everything out" draws many nutjobs to us. In fact, at ordinary large physics conferences (American Physical Society events, for example) we attract nutjobs to the conference who attempt to present lectures. Sometimes they submit an abstract and do not show up, but sometimes they do show up and give an addled talk. This is an acknowledged phenomenon in our professional organizations.
Many of these people are clearly pathological, while most just seem weird, poorly socialized, but not outright sick. I am glad that the phenomenon is the subject of some investigation.
While the MJT may or may not contain fake exhibits, the museum is a wonderful work of art concerning the psychology of human perception. The curator-founder of the MJT is the artist David Wilson, a MacArthur Fellow. Wilson is keenly interested in how people perceive ideas. One of the things he shows with his museum is that ideas, no matter how ridiculous, seem plausible when presented with the "voice of authority".
You think Ayn Rand was a crackpot, PZ?
I don't think Rand was a crackpot. She was just a rather unpleasant human being in general.
I have to complain a little bit. I'm an engineer and also proud to be a liberal, godless atheist. I think engineers have the same spectrum of belief/non-belief, rational/crackpot that other people in society have. Please don't paint us all with the same brush.
I have a particular fondness for the Hollow Earth theory and the Paleo-Weltschmerz theory of dinosaur extinction.
My theory, which is mine and belongs to me, is as follows...
I am genuinely asking - in what way was Ayn Rand a crackpot? A link will suffice...
I hope you don't mean her economic theories... I would argue, that at the very least, they are not at the level of crackpot of this letter..
I tried to read that whole letter, but couldn't help only skimming near the end. Reminded me of the writing style and ideas of C. David Parsons.
Did anyone else get the 'Time Cube Guy' feeling when reading that quote?
"I Possess Harmonic Cubic Wisdom
that transcends and contradicts the
Bibical 1st Day - Genesis 1.5 - when
the greatest math & scientific scam
of all human existence was deified.
Claim of single 1st Day composed
of Day, Night, Morning & Evening
was a Lie, as they were Static points
as 4 corners and did not rotate as
Time motion.
"Dr" Gene Ray Cubic and Wisest Human"
My question is if the same psychopathology of pseudoscience (lovely phrase) is the same psychology that goes into religious belief?
PZ didn't read carefully enough. Ayn Rand is indeed a crackpot, but not a crackpot of the kind the author is concerned with. He says crackpots are mostly male because of the sort of crackpots he is concerned with: the kind who think they are overthrowing modern scientific theories. Rand doesn't do science, nor does she claim to. She claims to do philosophy, though she does it badly.
said Quantum Consciousness "How do they get away with it all? In this I believe my social science crackpots have something in common with your variety - they obfuscate their writing with verbose, extenuated, and almost unfailingly vague proclamations. This thick epidermis of wording is the perennial adaptation of the bullshitter, enabling him or her to retort back at their antagonists: "no, you just don't understand postmodernism," or the like."
that seems to be true with the creationist as well as our libertarian friends
I had no idea Boyer had a blog. This is excellent news.
The first paragraph sounded, to me, like Walter ReMine.
Ric, let me adjust your comment just a little bit:
Rand claims to do philosophy, though she does it extremely badly.
Ayn Rand was an economic Trojan horse, or at least that was the effective result of her philosophy after it was applied.
What is it about Cranks that Inspires them,,, to Use Strange capitalization AND... punctuation? Do They Teach That At,,, Crank School?
I think there should be a grant to study this phenomenon. There really is an amazing correlation.
I can always tell when PZ is having a tough week when he bates libertarian atheists. Being one, I've often felt out-of-place at atheist meetings where it was assumed everyone was a socialist. As long as we all defend our viewpoints with reason and real argument, we'll get somewhere. If you're reading this as a strong leftist, wouldn't you rather have a debate with a libertarian capitalist who makes arguments from fact and reason, than a religious conservative who says "Jebus said it"?
I wonder if the writer of this letter was a Rosicrucian. In a few of their essays and tomes, Rosicrucians claim that the Moon was created by water rising from the Earth and cooling in space.
Of course everything else is the raving of a complete and total ignoramus...
I find it curious that the counter-intuitive aspects of GR attracts more crackpots than the counter-intuitive aspects of QM. GR is deterministic, its law is local, it has clear interpretation, and it relies on the mathematics of differential geometry. If one doesn't get hung up on things like time and space scaling, it is everything one wants in a classical theory of physics. QM is the theory that says the basic physics of the universe has some fundamental weirdness to it. And Bell's theorem points out that that is a consequence of the observed statistics, rather than the particular formulation of QM.
Ayn Rand didn't write much about physics, but curiously, she rejected QM on philosophical grounds. And she had no hesitation in thinking that philosophy should be able to tell physicists when their physics is wrong.
How weird. The museum of Jurassic Technology is right across from where I work. I've always wondered what the heck it was! It never seems to be open...
So then, Mike Caton @ #31, are you telling me I ought to be more open to your crazy ideas because they are slightly less crazy the other crazy ideas?
Sastra wrote:"Most of the 'gurus' I know in Real Life are female, by the way. They think their crackpot beliefs (whether it be psychic powers, alternative medicine, or progressive evolution) should be placed on a plate for "sharing." Nice people take them and praise them, skeptics refuse them, but nobody should criticize the quality of the Food For Thought Lest they exhibit the terrible Closed-Mind)."
This has been my experience as well, dealing mostly with other women in the self-help field. With a few exceptions female nutters, of whom there are at least as many as the male variety, are less drawn to the hard sciences and conspiracy theories and more to psychology, "healing" and "spiritual" concerns. I too have found you cannot debate them as it hurts their feelings and shows how "closed-minded" or unspiritual you are. They view life as a support group where everyone just listens and accepts anything said, because it is "their reality" which is just as valid as yours. Very frustrating.
One such group is the pre and perinatal psychology folks, who believe that the key to any trouble in life is a bad birth experience and insufficient bonding with mommy. Some even claim mystical consciousness from the time of conception! And yes, they write long, convoluted "scientific" papers on these topics. The closest many of these nutters come to hard science is misuse and misunderstanding of the word "quantum" and "quantum physics". This from people who never got past general science and never took even an elementary physics course.
sigh
fail
I think it's quite remarkable that there are so few people who have crackpot ideas about science. There are a lot more people who have truly weird ideas about law and sociology and these people are not shy about expressing their ideas on the internet.
Unlike science crackpots, however, goofy social theorists end up being elected to congress form Minnesota.
"I can always tell when PZ is having a tough week when he bates libertarian atheists."
I consider myself a libertarian. I even have a business education and contribute to a business mag (science and technology essays mostly). But come on, if you define libertarianism by Ayn Rand's red-baiting woo, there are much better ways to defend your position as a capitalistic entrepreneur. For example; socialists tend to attack greed so point out that a properly maintained market wouldn't support greed for long as is the case with the current financial crisis.
And at the risk of shameless self-promotion, here's a link to a post I wrote regarding the pushing of Ayn Rand's old, trite and dusty tomes to justify a "we don't need no regulation" standpoint which relies of very obvious and transparent spin:
http://worldofweirdthings.com/2009/04/03/objectivism-to-the-rescue/
— Scott Aaronson
#18 . Dear fellow engineer :) : We all know that engineering can be a very noble discipline in which principles of scientific rigor, honesty, rational use of resources and yada yada are absolutely necessary to excel.And of course as you say engineers just like any other large group of human beings have a lot of different people as members. But, I don't have a problem to recognize that there is a highly disproportionate number of quacks who are engineers and this is a very interesting sociological fact by the way. My rambling hypothesis is that the combination of some (very limited) mathematical background, a simple mechanistic world view and maybe old school christian values give some people the idea to develop an algebraic/first degree OD equation which can explain all phenomena.
Um.
Creationists? That's a pretty large group of people with crackpot ideas about science.
I can always tell when PZ is having a tough week when he bates libertarian atheists. Being one, I've often felt out-of-place at atheist meetings where it was assumed everyone was a socialist.
Oh, dude, you went there. "Libertarians" are public enemy number one here, even though many posters are seemingly unaware that there is any distinction between objectivists and libertarians, let alone that there are various stripes of libertarians. Pretty much any argument from an even vaguely libertarian viewpoint will bring forth the howling attacks.
My strategy here is to keep my head down whenever the dreaded "L-word" comes up. The folks here are institutional liberals. It's their blog. They have some fun and useful things to say about religion, etc, but I've found that it's just not productive to try to engage them about that topic.
Let me know how this works out for you. Holler if you need someone to pull the arrows out of your back.
Yes, I find it annoying that the vast majority of atheists are very much left of center, but what you gonna do?
Regardless of the statistics, indeed, all engineers ought not to be painted (tarred?) with the same brush.
Nevertheless, engineers do seem to be over-represented in a variety of crackpottery, from creationism to terrorism. I first learned about the terrorism-engineer linkage from reading an engineering journal (yes, I find it interesting), but for this comment I went to the web to find something more accessible:
Of course a number of possible reasons are given. But this is perhaps the more interesting of correlations between engineers and a variety of issues, including their annoying appearances among the IDiots:
This isn't quoted to stereotype engineers or the religious as evil, stupid, terroristic, or anything else. But it's one thing not to stereotype, it's another to ignore the statistical realities affecting groups. Engineers do crucial work, and they certainly have diverse viewpoints, yet on the whole they still have characteristics that cause them to be over-represented in certain areas.
As mostly an aside, I think that one reason we see so many IDist engineers is that they are trained specifically in design, and not much in the science--especially not biology. Hence many of them see function and assume design.
Which does not change the fact that very many engineers oppose ID and creationism.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
I wonder if our usual Engineer ID supporter / Evolution denier / Not understanding 2nd Law and Entropy'er representative will be showing up soon?
Blavatsky was definitely a crackpot: Lemuria, Mu continent and so on. On the contrary, Rand's philosophy was according to her "a philosophy for living on earth". Objectivism tells us to live on earth in a self-centered way, coping with reality (being submissive to the powerful, being abusive to the weak). A good deal of people deriding objectivism tend to live a very objectivist life.
That would be marvelous. If such a libertarian exists, he/she hasn't shown up here yet...
You might try making a good argument i.e. one employing premises subject to some kind of empirical testing, which are embedded in a logically sound structure. I realize this characteristic is by no means confined to libertarians, but I have observed that all too often they confuse multiple reiterations of ideological points of faith with actual argument.
Well, these oppose ID and other forms of creationism.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
(The following post is a light-hearted joke, not a slam)
I can always tell when PZ is having a tough week when he bates libertarian atheists.
I think you meant "baits," that word you used has a different meaning, and somehow I don't think The Trophy Wife(tm) would approve. (schoolboy snickering)
Dear Sir/Madam,
I would like to register a complaint ...
Re aquaeous moon: I think we've finally found our answer to where all that water went after teh Flud (and came from before).
#41. Yes, I have heard it claimed that a disproportionate number of engineers are quacks. But how many of them are degreed engineers. Years ago, many companies would give the title of engineer to employees who had done good technical work for quite awhile. You can even be called an engineer if you maintain a building or run a train. The word engineer does not ensure that the person has any kind of a degree.
The Museum of Jurassic Technology is my favorite spot on earth.
The web site has a few of letters posted. There's a book that has so many more. I got it when I was there last time.
Bureaucratus Minimis:
To make broad generalizations about the commenters here is hypocritical when you are claim to want to help someone you feel is being stereotyped.
(Just thought you might like to get off your high horse before you gee-up and realize there's a noose between your neck and a thick branch.)
I'd like to add my two cents on the Museum of Jurassic Technology. If you are in LA, do go. It is brilliant and perplexing. It is a museum about museums, a production and accumulation of knowledge about how we produce and accumulate knowledge. It is, finally, about wonder and curiosity and how we think we know what we think we know. I would also HIGHLY recommend Lawrence Weschler's essay on the MJT, "Inhaling the Spore" in Harper's, available here.
That essay was later expanded to a book, Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder, which is also quite good, though for me it gives too much away. I prefer the original Harper's essay.
Choo-choo Charlie comes to mind.
So you got your boilermaker engineers, and then you got your boilerstoker engineers, and then you got your "software engineers" and it's the latter that makes me ask WTF?
I've always noticed that when I come across someone who enjoys bashing Ayn Rand that they rarely have any depth to their knowledge of her writings and those of Objectivism. As for me I'd have to consider myself somewhat the bastard son of Objectivism and Secular Humanism, I would never argue that Objectivism answers all questions etc. but there is a great deal of valuable ideas in that philosophy including a rather noble and not inherently selfish (by the definition that most use) view of the self.
I think that this philosophy has been largely tarnished by greedy idiots with NO clue what 'rational self interest' means using it to excuse their fleecing of others. These jackasses driving the banks into the ground are no Hank Rearden's, and I think her philosophy would lambaste them as being more like Jim Taggart... If you note, Hank Rearden one of the hero's of Atlas Shrugged, was openly noted to pay his workers substantially more than his competitors paid theirs. While merit should produce rewards the degree to which this has been carried today (and the fact that many of those at the top have no real merit) could in no way be considered an exercise in 'rational self interest'.
Any Objectivist who would claim that the failure of the banks was due government regulation and not the criminally negligent and deceitful way that these banks have been doing business is an Ass (insert picture of donkey here) and has no grasp of the philosophy they claim to follow or the very concept of RATIONAL.
Rational self interest- Realizing that we live in a complex economy and anytime the vast majority of the wealth is held in a few hands that economy will imminently collapse.
Irrational greed- "I'm going to do whatever it takes to get as much money in my pocket as i can and everyone else be damned"
Understand the base concepts before you criticize a philosophy who's proponents should shudder at the gross irresponsibility and irrational greed of many modern corporations...
"The Objectivist ethics proudly advocates and upholds RATIONAL selfishness -- which means: the values required for man's survival qua man -- which means: the values required for HUMAN survival -- not the values produced by the desires, the feelings, the whims or the needs of irrational brutes, who have never outgrown the primordial practice of human sacrifices."
Who in their right mind wouldn't put those who would fleece others to get money for themselves in that category of brutes??
Sorry to go off topic here. But I thought this newsworthy.
The website "Free Republic" has given their support to Atheists and Skeptics in the Freeper hometown of Fresno.
You can read about it here.
And until they take it offline, you can see the original forum page here.
uncle frogy @ 25 says:
"said Quantum Consciousness 'How do they get away with it all? In this I believe my social science crackpots have something in common with your variety - they obfuscate their writing with verbose, extenuated, and almost unfailingly vague proclamations. This thick epidermis of wording is the perennial adaptation of the bullshitter, enabling him or her to retort back at their antagonists: 'no, you just don't understand postmodernism,'or the like.'
that seems to be true with the creationist as well as our libertarian friends"
Or, inotherwords, they don't listen to reason.
As an engineer (I consider myself one despite the fact that my degree isn't technically an engineering degree, I am doing the work) I see a lot of religious engineer co-workers, and they seem to need the designer aspect like the report quoted in #44. That makes sense to my why they believe. And they don't really understand evolution. That seems key. If they can see how unnecessary a creator is, they seem to start to come around. I've had some talks and have been relatively successful with engineers.
Didac, I have read almost every book of objectivism attributed to or contributed to by Ayn Rand and I have NEVER come across anything that could be interpreted as "being submissive to the powerful, being abusive to the weak" your comment is a gross mischaracterization of the philosophy.
If you focus on small sections of the philosophy it can easily be made to sound like it's supporting greed, but to do so you have to rely on the same quot mining methods we're always roasting creationists for. The philosophy taken in its entirety and viewed in whole not in part endorses nothing of the kind and actually has a great deal of writing on philanthropy as a good thing. The biggest conflicts come from the fact that the objectivist definitions of both 'selfish' and 'altruistic' are vastly different from those used in modern culture and lead people (including MANY who claim to follow this philosophy) to completely inaccurate conclusions about objectivism.
Uh, what Joel said.
I know you hate Ayn Rand, but lumping her in with these Moon-Ice-bats just makes you look foolish, PZ.
Any of these other lunatics on your T-shirt have .000000001% the influence Rand has had on modern society?
Two words for the Randroids- cram it. Followers of an idiotic cult founded by a fifteenth rate novelist who fancied herself a philosopher have some nerve labeling anyone else as "foolish". And no, I won't argue with you, the whole lot of you put together isn't worth the bother.
Steve
umm... who did i call foolish other than the idiots co-opting Rand's philosophy to justify their own greed and misconduct??
Don't judge the philosophy by some of the idiots who 'claim' to ascribe to it. Read the literature for yourself because any intellectually honest individual would be incapable of saying that there is nothing of value in objectivism. You may not agree with every argument (hell neither do I) but as it stands your argument comes down to "nya nya nya, I can't hear you".
If so many engineers believe in "intelligent design," maybe they view god as the ultimate in celestial engineering?
Joel,
I do not think greed is bad. Greed is bad if you desire things that you cannot reach. Greed is good if you desire things you need. As for reason, reason is only a tool to life. You must do some choices in life and reason is the best tool to made them. One of the question both right and left libertarians discuss is the role of individualism-collectivism. It's a difficult question, but reason shows us that some times being collectivist is a good thing if you can made some individual profit from the collective. I do not think there is a objective morality in all that: you must do as you feel right and hope that other people will do just the wrong things that will benefite you.
To the insulted engineers: you are proving the point. The reason cranks tend to be engineers is that they know the math but not the science. Which is to say they /can/ do the work, but don't know /when/ to do the work, and when not. Which is to say:
Nobody said most engineers are cranks. He said most cranks are engineers, and if you think that is insulting to engineers, you aren't paying attention to the relative numbers in the populations under discussion.
To the insulted libertarians: Ayn Rand was a crank. She developed a naive de novo philosophy to 'explain' everything, and insisted (as the modern objectivists/libertarians often do) that she was being persecuted (rather than just ridiculed in opposition to being ignored).
I know where of I speak. I am myself a crank. Not an engineer mind you (most does not mean all, also) I'm one of those high-school educated cranks. You can read all about it on the Internets if you google "tmax" and look at stuff from a few years back.
Libertarianism isn't a philosophy, or an ethic. It is the lack of one. The only thing that distinguishes libertarians from anarchists would be the libertarians are dumb enough to think civilization would survive their approach.
That said, I am a libertarian socialist. The government is not empowered to prevent me from using drugs, and must in the interest of social order pay for all the damage I do as a result. Or something like that.
Exactly. The failure of objectivism is that it's hopelessly idealistic. In order for it to work, the moguls of the world need to all be Hank Reardens. Unfortunately, Hank Rearden is a fictional character, and that will never happen. Nor does "rational self-interest" necessarily lead to such an enlightened society, as the prisoner's dilemma illustrates quite adequately.
And if you want proof that Rand was a crackpot, just read the ending to Atlas Shrugged.
I often wonder what state civilization would be in if Science had never been allowed to grow and flourish, and only religion and the examples offered in that link had become so enmeshed that it stifled any advance toward what we are and have today. Religion alone would have been the overwhelming factor of stagnation, but when you throw the likes of the varied kooks that have entered the scene and only enhanced the pox of religion, then one wonders the nightmare existence of those trying to stem the rush of complete insanity. Horrors.
Anyway, since two names have been mentioned in the link, here are two fascinating reads:
EXPLORER OF THE UNIVERSE: A BIOGRAPHY OF GEORGE ELLERY HALE by Helen Wright 1966
MADAME BLAVATSKY'S BABOON: A HISTORY OF THE MYSTICS, MEDIUMS, AND MISFITS WHO BROUGHT SPIRITUALISM TO AMERICA by Peter Washington 1995
The failure of objectivism is that it's hopelessly idealistic. In order for it to work, the moguls of the world need to all be Hank Reardens. Unfortunately, Hank Rearden is a fictional character, and that will never happen.
The Other Ian seems right. But, why the moguls of the world are not Hank Reardens? Because sometimes they must be Hank Rearden but most of the time they must be more pragmatic.
Similarly, in the question of big- or small-government, pragmatism is the best counsel. Morally, a government (either big or small) is indistinguishable from any other criminal association. However, if a criminal association is enough powerful is better for you to work according to its laws and even the best thing is entering in its payroll.
Didac(tic): "Greed is good if you desire things you need."
That isn't greed. When greed is good, we have another name for it (several in fact), which isn't greed.
"reason shows us that some times being collectivist is a good thing if you can made some individual profit from the collective."
That isn't 'reason' that's 'immorality'. What you call "being collectivist" is actually "pretending to be collectivist".
I think this is what distinguishes what you would call a "left libertarian" (democratic liberal) and a "right libertarian" (objectivist). It isn't where they fall on the 'individualism/collectivism' debate (by definition libertarians oppose collectivism) but whether or not they think it is ever appropriate to be dishonest in order to serve their own ends.
In crank news today, the crank who treated Martin Luther King's wife is facing charges for practicing medicine without a license
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/apr/10/1m10fakedoc224656-ph…
Boyer says, "...all crackpots are male." Revelatory! This is the explanation for the patriarchal nature of almost all religions! Joseph Smith = Crackpot. Big Etc... The Big Etcetera includes the Man Himself, of course. God is crackpot. Explains everything! If I add more explanation marks and paranoia can I be the biggest female crackpot?
Didac,
If it's something you need it's really not greed... Greed is an exercise in excess; the man who makes 200 million a year yet still has to get company cars, an expense account to use for private lunches, and 8 figure bonuses (all for doing nothing extraordinary) is a creature ruled by greed, not rational self interest... Rational self interest will NEVER sweep the foundation out from under its own feet...
There's also nothing in objectivism that dictates that you have to stand to make a FINANCIAL gain to perform a philanthropic act. If you have a desire to see more of the world lifted out of poverty then acting on that desire (so long as it's not inhibiting your own survival or well being) is an exercise in rational self interest... As I can with my limited financial means I often donate time and money to various charitable organizations (after checking them out for transparency first of course) because combining an understanding of objectivism with an understanding of evolutionary biology comes the realization that we're all in this together and we're all connected and rational self interest doesn't solely apply to outcomes which can be immediately foreseen.
I would like to have children someday, and if I can take actions leading toward a better state of things on this planet it will leave a better society for my children and their children which while it may no directly visible benefit in my lifetime it is still in my rational self interest because i have a coherent reason to place value on the outcome. Objectivism only excuses shortsightedness for those who only want to use the philosophy to support greed and irrational selfishness...
I also often participate in the campaigns for equal rights for the LGBT community in America. I'm straight, I only have 1 friend who's gay and we only met fairly recently (I became active in this long before I met him). So how you may ask does that line up with objectivism? Quite easily, I see a minority group who's civil liberties are being infringed upon and an understanding of history makes it clear that if one groups rights can be taken than any groups rights can be taken. My rights aren't secure unless I seek to secure your rights as well... In addition to that there is a great deal of personal reward to helping someone you don't know, it's hardwired into us to care about those around us. With those two aspects in mind it is the height of rational self interest for me to help in these causes, and it hardly detracts from the fact that I'm helping another person in their goals without direct immediate benefit to myself.
For those of you who regularly bash all things Rand and make snap judgments of all who claim to ascribe to objectivism, please at least try to remember that we're not all irrational idiots who take on this name solely to justify our greed... I have studied a great deal in both objectivism and Secular Humanism (which I imagine many here would be kinder to) and for all of the comments the two philosophies throw at each other when evaluated objectively and rationally I have yet to find any tenants of the two philosophies which are completely incompatible.
Please, don't demonize the philosophy based on those who claim to follow it yet have no clue about the foundations of the worldview and their logical conclusions.
I must read Atlas Shrugged one of these days.
Please tell me you guys can see a drastic difference between myself and Didac right?
Didac
"Because sometimes they must be Hank Rearden but most of the time they must be more pragmatic."
I would beg to differ, paying your employees well and conducting yourself as an honorable business man is not impossible, the issue is that so few are even willing to try today and simply want to get theirs and get out. It sickens me that so many of them claim to adhere to a perversion of objectivism while they do it.
FYI, in light of the way business leaders (note the failing of the banks) seem incapable of acting in the best interests of their companies today I genuinely support effective regulation and oversight to prevent the abuse of lending practices. If it were some rich billionaire making idiotic choices about how to spend his money I really couldn't care less, but the negligent decisions these fools made affected the livelihood of others and that is inexcusable.
And now we know a solid third of today's cranks are guilty of plagiarism.
The man who makes 200 million a year yet still has to get company cars, an expense account to use for private lunches, and 8 figure bonuses (all for doing nothing extraordinary) is a creature ruled by greed, not rational self interest...(#74)
What's wrong with this behaviour, Joel. Thanks to him, other people perform productive work. They get labour wages, he gets management wages, and other people get benefits through different ways (profits, stock values, taxes, welfare, etc.). Of course, this is not an equalitarian distribution. And of course this behaviour contributes to the "recurrent crisis" of capitalism. But if it so horrible, why people let him to be greedy?
"Any Objectivist who would claim that the failure of the banks was due government regulation and not the criminally negligent and deceitful way that these banks have been doing business is an Ass"
You mean like the Ayn Rand Institute?
http://www.businessweek.com/debateroom/archives/2009/04/the_economy_nee…
Greg,
I would take them to task on their understanding of objectivism and just because they bear Ayn Rand's name it doesn't follow that they follow the philosophy to its logical outcomes.
True free market capitalism would be great, unfortunately in an economy where so much is built upon an often misplaced trust that the other guy is being honest in his investments you're left with a situation where oversight and regulation is vital to prevent the collapse of the economy.
It's no coincidence that the economy collapsed after years of deregulation, it's no coincidence that several of the major factors contributing to the collapse once had regulation in place to make sure they didn't happen. Anyone who would try to argue against these base facts either wants to scam the populace themselves or is woefully naive.
Yes Objectivism is highly idealistic because to ever fully realize it's potential would require every person on this planet to truly grasp the meaning of RATIONAL self interest and it's logical outcomes as well as the implications this has for how we should act toward each other and the distaste we should share for greed. This will likely never happen, so while there are those like myself who understand how to apply the constructs of objectivism to the real world in which we live there are also those who rant and rave that they should be allowed to do whatever they consider to be in their rational self interest regardless of whether or not it really is...
Ayn Rand even spoke on this, pointing out that to truly follow this you had to know what your rational self interest actually is, applying the term to whatever whim or desire you have is NOT objectivism.
Didac, I really hope you don't argue your point as objectivism because if you do your concept of the philosophy is juvenile and fallacious.
Joel, I do not argue my point as objectivism. In fact, I have no point at all. Like most sane people in this world I live without points. If anything, I'm a proud Panglossian. Moral and justice are only tools inflicted against us by most powerful individuals, very much like "God" is. Outer obedience is almost unavoidable but inner obedience is pointless.
???????? umm wow....
so your point is that you're pointless???
In practice the libertarian capitalist who makes arguments from fact and reason will always be outnumbered and out-shouted by libertarian capitalists who make arguments filled with all sorts of logical fallacies and betraying gross ignorance of even the most basic scientific fact. (I like to think of them as Simonists, but these days it seems few people have read Julian Simon (and are brave enough to admit it), so perhaps I need a different word. )
Ayn Rand even spoke on this, pointing out that to truly follow this you had to know what your rational self interest actually is, applying the term to whatever whim or desire you have is NOT objectivism.
And yet, everyone from the big shots at the Ayn Rand Institute to the garden variety Objectivists do that. It was Rand's grand(est) failing. She was so obtuse and vague, she didn't make a concrete definition of what her philosophy really was.
Do you know what two words best apply to a philosophy that can be turned into anything anyone wants depending on how they define a fluffy and vague term made by someone with a big ego? Demagoguery and sophistry.
Lynna @ # 73: If I add more explanation marks and paranoia can I be the biggest female crackpot?
If that's your goal, you probably also need to chow down, unless you already surpass Mme. Blavatsky's approx 200 lbs.
Greg,
I honestly think that their interpretation has to be read INTO it instead of derived from it... 'course that may very well be proving your point lol.
My main hope here is to show that objectivism isn't inherently the evil doctrine of greed that so many here seem to think. Taken in the full scope of her work it is very easy to derive a truly noble and honorable way of conducting your life. Unfortunately it is also a philosophy easily perverted by those who would use it for their own sense of justification. However, taken in its full scope I would argue that it is impossible to LOGICALLY come to those arguments from Rand's writings. Taken piecemeal any philosophy can be twisted.
Didac, the reason people "let him to be greedy" is that CEOs sit on the boards of directors that set the salaries for other CEOs. It is in the interest of their greed to set the industry standard of executive pay high, so that they get paid more. And on hand washes the other-- the CEO they set pay for may set their pay one day.
The more junior executives also get the executive treatment because they are 'one of us' to the other executives.
I too have found the Key to All Existence!
Oops, sorry, it's the key to my minivan...
"I honestly think that their interpretation has to be read INTO it instead of derived from it... 'course that may very well be proving your point lol.
Actually, yes. Yes it would be and I think you deserve a tip of the hat for recognizing that.
My main hope here is to show that objectivism isn't inherently the evil doctrine of greed that so many here seem to think.
Objectivism isn't evil. It's just a bad attempt at philosophy by someone who thought way too highly of her mental faculties and ended up with a whole lot of important sounding nothing.
Taken in the full scope of her work it is very easy to derive a truly noble and honorable way of conducting your life."
I read her books. I honestly don't think she knows how to write like a normal author who wants to tell a story. Her arguments mainly consist of red-baiting and any benefit or nobility is solely in the eye of the reader who wants to add his or her interpretation to whatever dense tome is being read.
Well, Samantha, this is one of the reasons. In fact, the main reason is the class structure of our society. Class solidarity is stronger in the capitalist class because its inner competition is not for the mere survival as in the working class. However, most workers accept this situation. The role of philosophy is to convince everybody that There Is No Alternative, and this is the social function of, say, the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights. Of course, there is. The problem is that this alternative demands sacrifices. And for the moment being that sacrifices are far more greater that the supposed benefits of the alternative. Your rational self interest, Samantha, is to accept CEOs privileges... either you can be exposed to political oppression or social ostracism.
I went to the MJT for my birthday a few years back; honestly one of the best birthdays I've ever had. I don't know if their exhibits are of real bullshit that someone somewhere thinks is true or of bullshit bullshit that was made up for the purpose of the Museum, but the contrast of the somber, serious setting with the ridiculous ideas being presented is supremely satisfying. If you're in LA, you really must visit them.
The problem with Rand is that she starts with a false definition of altruism
and then ineptly demolishes this strawman.
Greg,
"any benefit or nobility is solely in the eye of the reader who wants to add his or her interpretation to whatever dense tome is being read."
I'll just choose to take that as a compliment and leave it at that ;) ... errands to run and an apartment to clean before it's overrun with a party of godless heathens from my Free thought group tomorrow night ;)
Also, a great deal of the depth of Objectivism is fleshed out in the non fiction writings... e.g. The Virtue of Selfishness (explains the definition of selfishness as she uses it and shows the difference from how most view it).
"Also, a great deal of the depth of Objectivism is fleshed out in the non fiction writings... e.g. The Virtue of Selfishness"
Oh I know.
I'm still trying to decide whether her non-fiction is worse than her fiction or if it's the other way around...
Joel; there is certainly a noticeable difference between you and Didac. But that isn't saying much.
I appreciate your straight-forward and calm explanation (as opposed to his wild attempts at snark), but I must dissuade you of the notion that there is a 'good side' to objectivism.
You see, all you require to be active in the civil rights community is enlightened self interest. That activity is compatible with just about any philosophy. Objectivism may be included in this, depending on which objectivist you talk to, but it isn't objectivism that motivates your actions (though that may be the way you think of it or the way you explain it). Not all enlightened self interest is objectivism. In point of fact, objectivism is not enlightened self interest, but unenlightened (very purposefully unenlightened) self interest. Very similarly, religion is not enlightened morality, but purposefully unenlightened morality. Which is what makes religion immoral, and what makes objectivism repugnant.
"Please, don't demonize the philosophy based on those who claim to follow it yet have no clue about the foundations of the worldview and their logical conclusions."
The worldview you are describing is that of the Enlightenment, not objectivism. The logical conclusion of objectivism is summed up well by George W. Bush's infamous line, "A dictatorship wouldn't be so bad, as long as I'm the dictator."
In reading the claims of "The Moon = Ice" man, and applying creationist "logic", I must note that --since I can't prove his "theory" wrong-- his woo must be true.
(Of course, according to post-modernism, if I truly believe the moon is made of cheese, then it is.)
Rand's objectivism is bankrupt. Ebon, from www.daylightatheism.org has written several very good essays illustrating the problems with it. But equally bad, Rand is a shitty, shitty writer. And yes, I have read her all her seminal works. I one: suck.
Well, my dictionary's definition of altruism has: "The belief in or practice of disinterested and selfless concern for the well-being of others," which doesn't seem that far off from Rand's.
My training in Christianity, occurring prior to the modern apotheosis of the Supply-Side Jesus, was pretty much in line with what you claim is Rand's "strawman".
bonze@82: the key difference is that Rand made it absolute - as if it is only altruism if it is ultimately self-destructive.
Oh, come on, ric: just recently while driving aimlessly through the wilds of Wisconsin, I happened to stumble upon a perpetual-motion machine lying around unused in an abandoned factory. As far as I'm concerned, Rand's fiction is the very model of verisimilitude.
I think this is how I'd put it:
As a philosopher, Ayn Rand's writings are almost totally worthless.
As a novelist, in stark contrast, Ayn Rand's writings are absolutely totally worthless.
It seems like they have a strange tendency also to get into political conspiracy theories. In:
http://www.softcom.net/users/greebo/main.htm
there seems to be a lot of... being stuck in the cold war era. Here is an example:
http://www.softcom.net/users/greebo/triumverate.htm
So the moon is made of ice, and yet it's a star at the same time...wait, what?!
If you want to see I web site of engineers who are cranks go over to "thunderbolts of the gods" website.
There's a slight difference between Rand's kind of crackpottery and pseudoscience crackpottery. Rand's is normative, 'this is how it SHOULD be' (unrealistic ideals), and pseudoscience is descriptive, 'this is how it IS' (false statements about the nature of reality).
The first kind is always harder to combat, since it is much harder to prove or refute a normative statement than a descriptive one.
Joel,
You have fallen into the most tiresome and oft-repeated mistake of people commenting here: the "no TRUE Scotsman" fallacy. I.e. - "Objectivism is good, therefore, all of those people using Objectivism to justify, codify, and reward their bad behaviour are not actually Objectivists."
Unfortunately, this leaves you among the 1% (or less) of Objectivists who are not sociopathic hate-beings. A movement is the sum of the actions and statements of its believers; by that measurement, the Objectivist Movement is represented by greedy, short-sighted, misanthropic, emotionally-stunted dickheads, who, paradoxically, are allowed to live only and precisely because their present environment is NOT libertarian.
Mike Caton writes:
What makes a lot of libertarians tick is the notion that economic systems should be derived from moral first principles. It's that approach, rather than their conclusion, that strikes the rest of us as decidedly odd. As a liberal, I recognize capitalism as an extremely productive form of economic organization that generates innovation and the practical technology of the modern world. When thinking about political issues, a liberal views capitalism as something like an engine in a car: it's an essential component, but not the end-all and be-all of car design. It's perfectly reasonable to also want air conditioning and air bags, even if the air conditioner puts extra burden on the engine, and even if the effort that goes into designing air bags means less effort put into souping up the engine. The thing that seems odd about market fundamentalists isn't that they value capitalism -- of course, so do we! -- but that they make it a measure of things rather than a matter of what's practical.
Russell @ 106
A very good analogy. 4 stars!
"When thinking about political issues, a liberal views capitalism as something like an engine in a car: it's an essential component, but not the end-all and be-all of car design. It's perfectly reasonable to also want air conditioning and air bags, even if the air conditioner puts extra burden on the engine, and even if the effort that goes into designing air bags means less effort put into souping up the engine."
And if we can eventually design an engine that is more efficient and less polluting than internal combustion, we don't worry that not using internal combustion is somehow "immoral."
Any developer can throw a good program together exactly the way anyone who can use tools can build a skyscraper.
Hairhead #105:
Ironically, your argument parallels the argument some theists make against atheists.
Tom #100:
Lots of folks try to claim that Rand is a uniquely bad writer, but I'm not convinced. There are all too many gifted authors who manage to write a couple of classics complemented with a load of dreck (not to mention those who never rise above that level). I also consider the genre: I think that among the subset of authors who are 100% committed to grinding a socio-philosopho-political axe in the form of a utopian/dystopian novel, she's well above average.
And for absurdity... can anyone really beat The da Vinci Code?
Jafafa Hots:
True. But before thinking there's going to be a wholesale replacement any time soon, give some thought to the fact that capitalism implements a kind of genetic algorithm. The spontaneous order it produces is remarkable partly because of its unpredictability and complexity.
Which isn't to say we shouldn't tinker with it. In either case. I'll be mostly glad when mosquitoes go the way of the polio virus.
One non-crackpot engineer reporting for duty. And for what it is worth I put a lot of work into getting my bachelors degree in Systems Engineering from the Australian National University. Some one said it above that the title of engineer seems to be bestowed on individuals without the formal training. This is a pet peeve of mine, call them techs or somthing else but until you get an engineering degree you shouldn't call yourself an engineer.
Actually, bonze, I did not and would not say that Rand is a "uniquely" bad writer. But there's absolutely no question that's she's a horrendously terrible writer, even if someone is worse: the cardboard-caricature "characters;" the ludicrous coincidences that drive the narrative (like the accidentally-discovered free-energy machine that's the central Maguffin in Atlas Shrugged that I referred to back in #100); the tendentious disquisitions that form the dialogue; etc.; etc.
Still, I have heard to my horror that there is such a thing as Randian fan fiction, compared with which I imagine Mme. Rand was a veritable Proust.
Doug #112
'Engineer' is an occupation not a title. Your degree is a title; it is the designation of your accomplishment. If, a few years down the road, you enter the teaching profession instead then you will no longer be an engineer, you will be a teacher (I am not currently a kindergartener, even though I once was one).
Denying someone who does the same job as you the right to identify themselves by that profession just because you want to have a way to brag about your education ("well *I* have a B.S. in Systems Engineering") doesn't seem fair or particularly mature to me.
So, what I want to know: Why do crackpots always go for Einstein or Darwin (or maybe Boltzmann and the 2nd law of Thermo), and never for Niels Bohr. Is quantum mechanics just too difficult for the average crackpot to even touch?
So, what I want to know: Why do crackpots always go for Einstein or Darwin (or maybe Boltzmann and the 2nd law of Thermo), and never for Niels Bohr. Is quantum mechanics just too difficult for the average crackpot to even touch?
Doug Little @ # 112: ... until you get an engineering degree you shouldn't call yourself an engineer.
Rename the category, and the degree. Save "engineer" for those who actually, you know, work with engines.
Joshua BA #114:
I think the problem that Doug was referring to is that the bar gets set rather low for somebody being called an "engineer". I'm sure this has no small influence on the apparent observation* that many IDists/creationists/miscellaneous cranks self identify as "engineers".
* does anybody have any actual data on this, btw? I know it's boring and I always ask this when this particular discussion comes up, but really? Anybody?
Another area that often draws out the kooks is astronomy. These deep theories formulated by novices are often funny but at the same time sad. This one fellow came to one of our local astronomy society telling of his great discovery. He had been downloading reduced resolution Hubble deep space images, greatly enlarging some empty space using Photoshop then printing it on a common inkjet printer. He would then stare at the image intently from a close distance and was utterly convinced that he could see the super string structure of space. I tried to explain about pixilation and aliases that were produced by undersampling but to no avail.
I think the engineer thing is also about ego.
When I worked at Fisher-Price, we regularly got calls from people not understanding something simple but asserting that WE in fact were the ones not understanding how it should work because "I'm an engineer."
The suggestion being that merely being an engineer makes them more likely to be correct about just about any subject than any "regular person" they encounter.
In fact, the power of unlimited intelligence conferred on engineers apparently rubs off on those in close proximity, because the comment we heard the most was along the lines of "my husband is an engineer, so I know what I'm talking about..."
That's it -- I'm changing careers.
:-P
WE took a friend to the MJT some years back. She kept getting more and more confused, as we kept grinning, and then finally she smiled and said, 'oh, I get it. Its all fake.'
Then she proceeded to smilingly laugh through some exhibits (while we kept grinning) until we came to the insect-infecting, behavior-altering fungus exhibit, where she frowned and said 'but this one is way too far over the top. No one could ever believe this.'
So we told her that some of the exhibits were real, and this was one of them. Her brain 'sploded.
Great museum.
Joshua, being an MD or Lawyer are also just professions but last time I checked you can't wake up one day and bestow the title upon yourself. You said,
So I'll assume that you would go to a Doctor or Lawyer who hasn't been trained, for medical or legal counsel.
Brian is right, The bar does get set low and as such my profession suffers. People bestow the title of engineer (they do in the US anyway) on people who have some form of technical job, say an applications engineer who trains customers and runs the help desk.
Obviously not an engineer then, see what I'm talking about.
The Ayn Rand Institute is indeed becoming a font of pseudoscience, attempting to disappear not only quantum physics but also Einstein. We haven't got around to fully drilling into this trend - the ARI has a strange penchant for releasing their earthshattering scientific and philosophical insights in expensive tape-only form, making it rather difficult for non-believers to parse - but a few interesting examples have floated to the surface. You'll also find some of the more cranky of her followers (eg James Valliant, author of the deeply weird "The Passion of Ayn Rand's Critics" ) like to claim Rand has been a major influence on many important scientists such as...um...Petr Beckmann. You get the drift. There is definitely a cult/pseudoscientific bend to orthodox Objectivism, though it is not well recognised.
Science changes and evolves. It is literally riviting (as well as instructive) to see that the pronouncements of crackpots haven't changed an iota in a century.
Same old same old, again and again.
That stale pungent aroma reminds me of religion.
Ray Ladbury #115: In a way, yes. Quantum mechanics is too difficult even for quantum theorists to deal with.
In a fit of anti-indeterminism one of it's loftiest founders Erwin Schrödinger, originator of the Schrödinger Equation (in 1926, that formulated the most complete POSSIBLE description of a physical system under the rueles of quantum mechanics) told Niels Bohr:
"If all this damaned quantum jumping were really here to stay then I should be sorry I ever got involved with quantum theory".
Richard Feynman had also frequently attested, "I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics".
There isn't much of any handle on quantum theory which crackpots can grab hold of in order to refute it...but isn't it interesting how often crackpots UTILIZE the weirdness of quantum theory for all it's worth in order to bolster their "ideas"? (Just check out "The Secret")
What, still entertaining thoughts of suicide?
Oops. Please excuse the obvious mispellings.
I wonder if the number of crackpots trying to overturn relativity has gone down since there are now so many convinced they've shown climate change is a hoax. The climate change deniers really have the same symptomology and a whole lot of those guys are engineers (or programmers) as well. Are more crackpots being drawn to climate denial or have we struck a whole new mother lode?
Tom #113: "there's absolutely no question that's she's a horrendously terrible writer..."
But somehow she induces millions of people to voluntarily read a 60-page lecture? I think on the contrary this is evidence of mad skillz!
Please don't bring that up. After my outburst, I was sufficiently embarrassed that I considered disappearing and coming back with a different handle (in the end I didn't because I don't want to be dishonest, and because it wouldn't have been hard in the end to figure out who I was). I was being stupid, and I certainly had no right to blame anyone else's ideas for my own mental issues.
Now, please, let's not discuss this any further.
Ya, I could've have been a crackpot. I had a mad experience on shrooms where I thought I "saw" the 10th dimentsion, I was seeing tons of geometric paterns that matched 2d dipictions I'd seen of 10 dimentional structures. Luckily I realized I was being stupid the second I came down, (I was tripping what do you expect) but if it had been someone else, I could imagine how the experince would have caused them to think they were now an expert in string theory.
P.S. I don't endorse drugs, in fact I think my psychedelic experiences were probably the worst mistakes I ever made.
But somehow she induces millions of people to voluntarily read a 60-page lecture? I think on the contrary this is evidence of mad skillz!
How many people have actually read all the way through that little speech? Like folks that claim to be "completely familiar with the Bible" usually don't seem to be up on the "begats".
Just a different Holy Book, after all.
"Salem Hypothesis — 'scientists' who claim to have disproven evolution are often actually engineers "
Or, you might apply the Peter Principle -- men rise to the level of their incompetence. It seems more likely to me that these men become cranks because they try to extend their knowledge and thinking beyond the point of rationality -- that is, they attempt to exceed their competency limit.
Another idea, religious zealots often turn to engineering because it's approved in their religious milieu -- it's safe for them. Or at least it's safer than taking up a field that might lead you to challenge the existing religious social structure.
Engineers by no means have a monopoly on crackpot status. Among climate denialists, programmers and even some physicists (Lubos Motl, Freeman Dyson...) are prominent. Engineering, programming and physics are all very powerful disciplines, and those who have been trained in these disciplines can sometimes exaggerate their powers of understanding in their own minds. One of the surest ways to make a fool out of yourself is to venture well outside your expertise.
Ray Ladbury #129 asks, "I wonder if the number of crackpots trying to overturn relativity has gone down since there are now so many convinced they've shown climate change is a hoax."
Man. Yeah...it's hard to say. I think whatever is a Big Issue in the realm of the intellectual discipline or anything to do with a smoldering world-wide concern (especially if it's "controversial", which comes about with minds incapable of accepting data together with a pernicious habit of suspicion) it will reliably draw the flies. It's almost like a magnet, and once it begins to pile up with popularity, it gets tenacious as a GROUP, as something to be ADVOCATED for.
Despite lots of great work by sceptics and their organizations over decades, their efforts have simply been overwhelmed. My guess is that crackpottery is constantly on the increase due to a combination of factors: from an increasing number of cracked minds due simply to population increase, a lack of decent primary education, the public's focus of attention towards commercially-served pablum (which has I think done the most harm to a society that can't survive without good information - a cultivation that has already bitten a large chunk out of our collective asses, if political spiel is any indication), and the vast increase of "communications" technology afforded by technological advances.
I'm not a psychologist, but in my view the symptomology is currently fueled like gasoline thrown on a candle. The net as a primary example. I wish it didn't have that stain, but no matter what anybody imagines as it's astonishing utility and world-changing betterment (yes yes, all of that's true!) it's ALSO the very best vehicle for nonsense-information fire ever devised, and no-nonsense rational and pro-education people - the "firefighters" - are getting their asses thoroughly kicked. They just can't seem to get in to those nasty pockets of conflagration to get any chance of quenching them...we may be in for a long spell of the equivalent of coal-mine fires, having to breathe in decade after decade of putrid smoke
The net is a made-to-order platform for these folks, and it also tends to insulate users. Many people fry out on a meme posed by a particular wackaloon site, linking over and over to similarly-themed sites, getting thoroughly indoctrinated. It even inspires them to set up their own sites. It grows like a cancer - or like a wildfire boosted by winds. They hardly ever come up for air, but whenever they do, they're aghast at how wrongheaded everyone else seems to be compared to what they've allowed themselves to be conditioned on. They never consider how fried by a meme THEY are...to THEM, everybody ELSE is kaput.
I think there are an increasing number of crackpots on every front. Even such nonsense as Flat Earthery, which MAY have seen a decline before the net boosted them back into vigorous health. I suspect that looks like a decline in any sector may actually just be a relative thing...
Sometimes I think my optimism is a wretched candy-lure and I want to cry. But then I see some new outrage (it only takes a few moments) and I get back into the fight.