dagblog - Comments for "It's Science, Jim, But Not As We Knew It!"

Sorry Emma, I didn't see any

Michael Wolraich — Fri, 06 Dec 2013 00:01:24 +0000

Sorry Emma, I didn't see any need to pull punches on what I found to be a sloppy article by a stranger. I know nothing about his philosophical work--just responding to this piece.

IMO, a confession of ignorance does not relieve a writer of responsibility to understand and effectively communicate his subject, especially if he draws grand conclusions from it. I appreciate that he's attracting readers to an unfamiliar field of study, but he should do justice to the discipline by describing it as accurately as possible rather than reducing it to science fiction.

PS I'm no scientist either--in fact, my degree was also in philosophy--and my wife's explanations of her work often leave me baffled. I only know enough to see that the flaws in this post.

Ha. My revisions are

Michael Wolraich — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 23:47:12 +0000

In reply to I fear MW was having trouble

Ha. My revisions are basically done, which is why you're seeing more of me around here. I'll start posting again as soon as get the itch to write again.

Woah, save that stuff for a

Verified Atheist — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 23:26:51 +0000

In reply to Computational model of the

Woah, save that stuff for a dissertation!

I fear MW was having trouble

Peter Schwartz — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 21:02:39 +0000

In reply to Interesting

I fear MW was having trouble with a particular paragraph in his new book.

His publisher wanted changes, and he was damned if he was going to make them.

So he took out his frustration on your article.

Unfair.

Interesting

EmmaZahn — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 20:59:25 +0000

In reply to I hate it when science

Interesting reaction.

Obviously you are very familiar with the field and just as obviously the writer is not. He admitted as much in his first sentence. Also, he is not a science writer. As his blog title indicates he is a philosopher but not just a virtual one. He has published a number of books on philosophy -- including textbooks -- that are written with a clarity unusual to that field. He also tends to write in an upbeat and enthusiastic style but describing it as hyperventilating seems rather harsh.

So what if he got excited about something new to him. He introduced me to an intriguing almost-new-to-me arena of research where what was once only science fiction is rapidly evolving to science fact. I do think it likely that the modeling will progress faster than you seem to think not simply because of the involvement of Gen-Yers (whoever they may be). The computer power and big data collection capabilities already exist. They are just not as generally available to researchers as they perhaps should be. But they are to Google's Sergey Brin and his wife, 23andMe's Anne Wojcicki.

Computational model of the

Michael Wolraich — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 20:33:54 +0000

In reply to Speaking as someone whose PhD

Computational model of the human body... ;)

Speaking as someone whose PhD

Verified Atheist — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 19:58:24 +0000

In reply to I hate it when science

Speaking as someone whose PhD dissertation was on computational models of the hippocampus, I completely agree with your assessment. I'll add, however, that how much of the human body we can model depends on what degree of fidelity we desire. I.e., we now have the computational power (using super-computers not available to me, alas) to model the entire human brain, if we're OK with using very simple models of the neurons. Personally, I am OK with it because our knowledge of how the neurons really work in vivo is so poor that adding more detail to those models is like putting lipstick on a pig.

I hate it when science

Michael Wolraich — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 19:21:00 +0000

In reply to It's Science, Jim, But Not As We Knew It!

I hate it when science writers hyperventilate. I hate it even more when they obfuscate.

My wife has PhD in bio-physics. Like the GenY subject of the article, she models biological processes to study cancer and other diseases. But my wife is solidly GenX, and her boss is a baby-boomer. Though computational biology is still a young field, it easily predates Twitter and all the other e-bullshit this writer tries to drag in.

Reading his article, you might think we're a couple Intel versions away from a digital model of a human body. The truth is that my wife has just enough computing power to model a few amino acids. She can't even model a full protein molecule, let alone "virtual recreation of human body parts."

Computation biology is a very exciting field, but Mr. Virtual Philosopher would better serve readers and scientists by accurately describing its achievements and potential rather than gushing about new scientific paradigms and doctoral students wearing Google t-shirts.