[janjan]

For this kind of stuff there should be a way to flag a submission as 'sensationalist title' or 'likely false'. I just don't have the time to read all the comments for all submission just to find out if the submission is true or not.

[ionfish]

Then don't read them; the community will figure out over the next few months whether Nelson's proved what he's claimed. The Peano axioms have stood for 120 years, it's probably not imperative that you find out whether they've been shown to be inconsistent right this minute.

[ramchip]

> Then don't read them

I think that's his point: it's difficult to differentiate things that are likely wrong/false and things that have been verified by the community. Flags could help that.

I prefer simply relying on the comments, personally. In the comments you can see who's knowledgeable about the topic and often they'll explain what's wrong with the article. Votes and flagging can't do that.

[ionfish]

Flags are a binary mechanism just like voting, and as such are vulnerable to precisely the same epistemic problems. As you say, comments offer a way of demonstrating expertise, not merely asserting it.

For this reason someone interested in a disputed topic such as this will either have to read the comments, in the hope of discovering the main lines of argument and improving the likelihood that the picture they form is correct, or suspend their judgement until such a time as better evidence (in this case, peer review of the claimed proof) is available.

[_jak]

Even so, I don't think most people would mind a disincentive for posts with titles that drastically overstate their content

[ryanklee]

What a stinking horrible idea.

How do you think scientific authority works, by the way? Why would you trust any given person with powers of "flagging" to flag something correctly? How would such people even be evaluated? Don't you think think the process of peer review is complicated for a reason?

If you want knowledge served up on a silver platter, you are going to starve to death.