Pseudoscience
From HvWiki
Pseudoscience is anything that pretends to be science but fails to actually be rigorous science.
Contents |
Common Characteristics of Pseudoscience
Method
- Claims with no supporting experimental evidence.
- Claims which contradicts experimental evidence.
- Claims that can't be proved false.
- Failing to consider all the facts.
- Failing to provide an experimental possibility of reproducible results.
- Violating the principle of choosing the simplest explanation when multiple viable explanations are possible.
Some of these may be part of the scientific method at one stage but should be eliminated through iteration of the process.
Behaviour
- Avoiding scientific peers while chasing media
- General evasiveness with regards to data
- Reference to conspiracy of some sort
- Dismissive comments about "closed" sceptics, etc
Common Examples of Pseudoscience
Perpetual Motion and Free Energy
It is well accepted in mainstream science that:
- energy cannot be created or destroyed
- no system can run forever or at 100% efficiency.
These are the first and second laws of thermodynamics.
A perpetual motion machine of the first kind is a free energy machine - one that runs by creating energy. A perpetual motion machine of the second kind is one that simply runs forever by being perfectly efficient.
Free energy enthusiasts often follow a common trend, at least to some extent. First, they'll come up with a "genius" machine design with more output than input. In fact, the inventor always just doesn't know the physics well enough to do the sums properly (some even claim this as a virtue - "Freedom from the closed-minded mainstream"). Someone who does know the physics will point out the correct way to add up the energy. The inventor then either comes to his/her senses or simply tries to come up with a more complicated machine. The invention usually spirals in complexity, each time getting harder and harder to analyse or measure, and the inventor usually leaves the burden of proof that it isn't a free energy machine to others.
Other people simply claim to have a free energy machine but refuse to give any details.
Free energy nuts will often dismiss nay-sayers as being part of "the" global fossil-fuel status quo conspiracy.
Patent offices around the world have filed loads of patents for free energy and perpetual motion devices. Patent offices do not build plans they are given to check they work so an inventor boasting of patents is simply bragging about having the money for a patent and originality in delusion.
Magnetic Monopoles
Everyone knows that magnets have a north pole and a south pole. But what happens if you take a bar magnet, with north at one end and south at the other, and cut it in half?
Mainstream science says that the cut faces become new south and north poles, and you have two new magnets half the size of the original, but otherwise identical. If Maxwell's equations are true, then it's not possible for a north or south magnetic pole to exist in isolation. The relevant equation is div B = 0, which amounts to saying that sources and sinks of magnetic flux do not exist, and hence flux must exist in closed loops, and hence every north pole must be matched by a south somewhere else.
Needless to say, some people don't believe this. But if magnetic monopoles did exist, Maxwell's equations would necessarily be wrong. However, experiments have proven them to be valid so far.
Note, this is a classical physics explanation that does not attempt to include the effects of quantum mechanics or relativity.
Non-Hertzian or Scalar Waves
A debunking of magnetic monopoles naturally leads to non-Hertzian waves. These are supposedly electromagnetic waves that exist outside of the kinds of electromagnetic waves described by Maxwell's equations. They are often implicated in extremely colourful conspiracy theories, including weather modification, telepathy, and transmission of destructive energy for military purposes. A whole book was written about these theories by a famous pseudoscientist who will not be named here.
The original non-Hertzian waves were proposed by Nikola Tesla as a result of the theories he developed during his Colorado Springs experiments. He claimed the capability to transmit power to any location on the Earth, using the ground and ionosphere as conductors, without "wasting" power by the generation of what he called "Hertz waves".
This was a totally reasonable claim in 1899 when radio engineering was not even born yet, the ink was barely dry on Maxwell's equations, and nobody quite understood what was going on. However, we now understand electromagnetic theory a lot better, and the experimental evidence agrees with the theory that every electrical or magnetic phenomenon without exception can be described as a "Hertz wave". In other words, there is no evidence that scalar waves exist. Paul Nicholson's epic paper "The Real Science of Non-Hertzian Waves" sums up the case against scalar waves far better than I could.
Again, of course, there are people who believe that scalar waves do exist but are kept secret by a world conspiracy.
