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by coldtea 2768 days ago
>Jaynes was a professor at Princeton University, so he must've built up enough credibility to get this appointment

Well, Pauling got two Nobel prizes, but still had crackpot theories about Vitamin C
1 comments
rjplatte 2767 days ago
Both Jaynes and Pauling are extremely intelligent and not gullible people. Why are we so quick to dismiss their "Crackpot" theories, simply because they don't fit with the dominant paradigm?
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goto11 2766 days ago
It is quite possible for intelligent people to be wrong, especially when they venture outside their area of expertise.

And the cliche about "dominant paradigm" ignores the actual reasons the theory is rejected. Quantum Theory shows that a theory will be accepted even if fundamentally breaks with the dominant paradigm - as long as it can be confirmed by evidence. So that is not really the issue.

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coldtea 2767 days ago
Isn't the question taking what it supposed to prove for granted (that we do a facile dismissal of those theories? Who said we didn't do a thorough dismissal?)

Well, is it "simply because they don't fit with the dominant paradigm" or rather because they have been discredited time and again?

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