Are you a quack?

This page is dedicated to the many people who have occasionally drifted into my office, or sent me e-mail, or even mailed me their books, eager to tell me about their new theory, which they know will turn all known physics on its head, even though they have only studied an infinitesimal fraction of the latter. Some of them are just ignorant or naive, but are willing to learn; this page is not about them. It is easy to distinguish the quacks; although they may seem reasonable at first, they degenerate into absurdity progressively with any conversation.

Quacks want only to talk and not to listen. They are paranoids with delusions of grandeur: Their theory could never be wrong; therefore everyone else's must be. Eventually the true quacks make the same remarks, some version of almost all those listed below. Generally, their comments are of 3 types:

Attacks on established theories, based on distaste

1. "I have proven that special relativity/quantum mechanics/... is wrong."
   You mean you did an experiment whose results disagree with the predictions of that theory? I didn't think so. You mean you proved it is self-contradictory? Not possible: Mathematically it's an elementary system, whose consistency is easy to check. You might as well claim that you can prove 2+2=5. (If you think you can do that, I'm willing to give you $2+$2 change for a $5 bill.) If you think you have found an inconsistency, you have probably made an assumption that is not implied by the theory. The fact is that these theories are not only well confirmed by experiment, but practical use is made of them every single day.

   Note: You will not dispell a quack's distaste for modern physics by relating it to classical physics, since they usually do not understand that either. This is an unusual example of "Familiarity breeds contempt."

2. "But it's obvious nonsense!"
   Then why does it work so well?

3. "You're wrong!"
   That's just contradiction, not an argument.

4. "BUT I HAVE PROVEN YOU WRONG!!"
   I already responded to that remark. And your caps lock key is stuck.
   (Maybe you should use a bigger font.)

   Promotion of a new unified theory, based on laziness and pride

5. "My theory is prettier than the accepted one."
   Take it to an art dealer.

6. "But Einstein/Feynman/... himself said that a theory must be pretty."
   You have already admitted you reject their theories.

7. "My theory is better philosophically".
   Take it to church.

8. "My theory agrees with the Bible/Quran/..."
   The author of that book has not written any papers with testable predictions. Furthermore, many of the claims of that book are disputed (quite violently) in most parts of the world.

9. "My theory cures the common cold".
   Take it to the hospital. (You now qualify as a quack in the strictest sense.)

10. "My theory makes more sense."
    What could possibly make more sense than to have a theory that agrees with nature, as determined by experiment? If your theory only makes you feel better about its subject, it is a placebo, not a cure.

11. "Experimental verification isn't important in science."
    Look up "scientific method" in the dictionary. Science is the study of the real world. If you make a claim in court, you need real evidence to back it up. If you make a bet, you have to provide a way to test that bet in a way that is unambiguous. It must be either right or wrong; there is no third alternative for a meaningful statement.

    Note: The quacks I get are always theorists. I don't think that's just an accident, or because I'm also a theorist, but because theory is easier for quacks than experiments. (People who do cold fusion or sell snake oil are a level above these sorts.) It never occurs to them that there are a large number of experiments with which their new theory must agree.

    The only response I have never gotten from a quack to that criticism was that all the experimenters had purposely misinterpreted their raw data to make it agree with accepted theory. This was in spite of the facts that:

    1. He had never seen the raw data.
    2. He had no clue as to how the experiment was done.
    3. He didn't know any of the experimenters, at least not enough to slander their integrity.
    4. The experiments were performed by many groups of people over a period of 60 years.
    5. The first such experiment preceded the first theoretical calculation of the quantity.
    6. His own prediction was 10,000,000 standard deviations off of the most recent experimental and theoretical ones (although it's doubtful he knew what a "standard deviation" was).
    7. His theory was not capable of describing the dynamics necessary to perform any experiment to measure the quantity.
    Apparently this quack was under the impression that all experimenters and theorists were part of a huge conspiracy, dating back decades (if not centuries), to unanimously support one theory. (If only cooperation between scientists were that good...) This is another example of how quacks are ignorant not only of physics, but also of psychology.

12. "My theory doesn't need any complicated math."
    Then how do you calculate anything? Science is not just knowing "what goes up must come down", but when and where it comes down.

    Note: Quacks come in slightly different levels of sophistication in math. Some use only words, and no numbers whatsoever, but lots of pictures. The worst one I ever corresponded with claimed that dimensions did not physically exist, but were just abstract mathematical concepts, and you could never prove the existence of anything unless you could do it without equations. After giving him the examples of directions, he claimed that "up" and "down" did not physically exist.

    Better ones actually know arithmetic, but no algebra, so even E=mc² is usually beyond them. They will quote lots of numbers, which they "predicted" by some numerology, but never functions (like cross sections). They don't understand units, or conventions, and will not appreciate that some constants of nature may be more natural with extra factors of 2π or so, or that some are actually not constants (like running couplings).

13. "Numbers aren't important in science."
    I guess you can throw out your clock.

14. "How you explain something is more important than the numbers."
    Try that the next time you pay a bill.

15. "You have to spend some time studying my theory."
    How much time did you spend getting an education in physics?

16. "Why don't you spend some time telling me what's wrong with my theory?"
    Why don't you take a course? That's what they're for: So that many people can be taught the same thing at the same time, making more efficient use of the instructor's time. The instructor's office hours are for those who already took their own time studying the course material.

17. "My theory totally replaces the accepted one."
    Sorry, science doesn't work that way. Why do you think theories get accepted in the first place? Because scientists like them? No, because experiments verify them. And if some experiment agrees with some theory, that fact isn't changed by the invention of a new theory. The worst (or best) that can happen is that a new experiment disagrees with that theory, or an old experiment is done more accurately and is no longer in perfect agreement. Then the old theory is recognized as an approximation to the truth, that doesn't apply in all situations, or works only to so many decimal places. That's why classical mechanics is still taught in spite of quantum mechanics, and nonrelativistic mechanics is still taught in spite of special relativity, and your neighborhood butcher didn't throw away his scales when general relativity was discovered. And even if you or someone else eventually finds a replacement for special relativity or quantum mechanics, it will not change the fact that experiments have already proven nonrelativistic physics and classical physics to be wrong. You can only go forward, not backward; there is no nostalgia in physical law, it is not fashion.

18. "I know my theory is right, without wasting my time learning the accepted theories."
    Science doesn't work that way, either. The fact is, the accepted theories already work, so why replace them? To start with, you have to reproduce all the correct results of the established theories: That means you first have to learn those theories, then check that your new theory can successfully reproduce their correct results. After all, if they're so wrong, why do they work so well? Secondly, to replace the old theories, you have to do better: Successfully predict something the old theories don't. In other words, your new theory has to agree with the old theories where they agree with experiment, and also agree with experiment where the old theory disagrees. But how would you know all that if you haven't studied the old theories in the first place? Would you read a movie review by someone who didn't see the movie?

19. "I can explain all of physics, and I didn't need to go to graduate school or study any graduate textbooks."
    Would you allow yourself to be operated on by a surgeon who never went to med school? "Oh, yeah, all that medicine they teach in college is a waste of time. I learned surgery all by myself at home! Yeah, from the internet! Oh, lots of practice -- every Thanksgiving, when I carve the turkey! I even removed my own X-organ! That's what those stupid M.D.'s call a liver -- or is it a spleen? And I didn't even need an anesthetic! Now just hold still while I make the initial carv-, er, incision..."

    Personal attacks

20. "That's what they told Galileo."
    I know Galileo, and you're no Galileo. On the contrary, you're one of "they", people who, without any evidence in their favor, contradict real scientists. (Actually, "they" to whom you refer have been dead for over 300 years. The world has changed a bit since then.)

21. "The establishment always rejects new ideas."
    2+2=5 isn't new, but it is wrong. Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean you're right. Actually, there is no "establishment" in science: Scientists often disagree, until nature (through experiment) determines who's right, just like people making a bet. But quacks always welsh on their bets, never admitting they're wrong.

22. "I knew you were going to say that!"
    1. Then why are we having this conversation?
    2. Then that is the first prediction you have made that has proven true.

23. "I knew you wouldn't listen, you scientists are too arrogant and closed-minded."
    Look in the mirror.

    Note: If you try to explain to a quack the actual physics at even high school level, he will immediately claim that you are the one who is ignorant.

24. "I'm going to talk to a real scientist instead."
    Good luck.

    Note: Long ago a professor of mine told me that he got letters from 2 quacks, so he forwarded each's letter to the other. He got back an angry letter from one saying, "Why did you introduce me to this quack?"

25. "I spend my time helping humanity, you waste your time on garbage."
    No, you waste your time trying to convince people who know their theories work that they don't, when all the evidence is in their favor. I only spend part of my time on garbage, and only when it contacts me first.

26. "You %$#@@%# $% #%#* *#%!!"
    You catch more flies with honey than you do with vinegar.