Comments on: Breaking: Academic Writes a Book on Social Media that Doesn’t Reflect the Real World

By: Jimmie

Jimmie — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 20:32:24 +0000

As you can tell, I'm closer to the "flight of fancy" way of thinking, at least on this. The professor did write a whole book on the subject, so I assume she has more than "Internet BAD!" as an argument, but I'm not really sure what else she can bring to the table aside from that, given the quotes she's given.

By: Mr. Science Guy

Mr. Science Guy — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 15:17:48 +0000

Fortunately, science can be advanced even by the 'pick a hypothesis and ignore opposing evidence' method. When this theory is published, other sociologists will cut it to ribbons, either destroying it completely, or paring it down to some essential nugget that can't be disproved, and that future scientists can build on. It's not good for the scientist's ego, nor the most effective way to make progress, but it's not completely useless. In my opinion, the trouble is in communication–ideas like this are released to the public with no indication of what level of confidence they merit, and that means the reader can't tell where it falls in the spectrum between a law, and a flight of fancy.

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Mon, 24 Jan 2011 02:57:58 +0000

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