Talk:Freeman Dyson/Freeman Dyson's Views

This is a workshop page for describing the scientific and political views of Freeman Dyson. Wikiquote has some good material from his books.

Religion

What is your religion?

Christianity, but of a very watered-down kind - essentially, what's left over after you get rid of the theology. The Church of England is pretty close to it. (Salon)

Economics

"As I've said before, I don't believe in the market economy. To me it's surprising it works as well as it does." (Salon)

Funding of scientific research projects

He told me that the Superconducting Super Collider was not cost-effective science, and that he was going to make sure that it got killed. I think he was right, and he obviously succeeded. RussNelson 18:07, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

The PhD system

Says the PhD system is completely broken. Suggests handing out PhDs at birth [tongue in cheek] (see From Eros to Gaia).

How would you stop this intellectual snobbery?

I would abolish the PhD system. The PhD system is the real root of the evil of academic snobbery. People who have PhDs consider themselves a priesthood, and inventors generally don't have PhDs.

Are those getting PhDs rewarded in any other way than as an honor?

It's much more than an honor. It's a ticket to a job.

So is anybody buying this? Are PhDs being abolished or disregarded?

No. The stranglehold has gotten even tighter over the years. It's become essentially like the MD - with much less justification. It's simply a barrier you have to climb over before you can make a career, and it's being imposed on more and more jobs. At even the smallest liberal arts college, nowadays, they say with pride, "All of our faculty have PhDs." Many of the best teachers are thrown out because they don't have a PhD. It's a paper qualification that poisons the whole field. (Salon)

From Wired magazine ([1]):

"What also strikes me is that the culture we see here [at the PC Forum, the annual computer conference run by Dyson's daughter Esther] is far friendlier to women than the academic world I come from; it's largely because you don't have to have a PhD. You don't even have to have an MBA to run a company. Many of these women, in fact, start young, own their own companies, and are doing well at the age of 25. They then have plenty of time to raise a family if they feel like it. It doesn't interfere with their careers.

In academic life, it is a terrible problem. Women are forced to go through this PhD rigmarole, which takes far too long. By the time they get the PhD, they're already middle aged, and then the problems of trying to combine a career with a family become really fierce. To me, that's the greatest evil - that women are discriminated against much more as a result of this. I love it when I come to these meetings of computer people. The women are really going ahead, and there's a higher fraction of them, and they're much less inhibited. "

Climate change

Dyson has questioned the scientific reliability of current models of climate change ([2]). He has said, "Climate change is a real problem, partly caused by human activities, but its importance has been grossly exaggerated." ([3]).

Dyson describes himself as a "heretic" for holding this view.

(To put this into context, Dyson has been generally skeptical about models of complex phenomena. We should include some examples.)

I think it would be a very bad idea to include that quote out of context.

Agree. I've added a heading above for "self-professed heretic." Clayoquot ^Sound 16:35, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, someone keeps adding this stuff in and has finally sourced it, so I think best we can do at this point is make it accurate and add context as fast as we can. Clayoquot ^Sound 03:07, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"Climate change is a real problem, partly caused by human activities, but its importance has been grossly exaggerated. It is far less important than other social problems such as poverty, infectious diseases, deforestation, extinction of species on land and in the sea, not to mention war, nuclear weapons and biological weapons. We do not know whether the observed climate changes are on balance good or bad for the health of the biosphere. And the effects of atmospheric carbon dioxide as a fertilizer of plant growth are at least as important as its effects on climate."

I think many people would agree that poverty and war are bigger problems than climate change. I certainly don't think the view is heretical. Do you have a source for the "heretical" thing? Furthermore, I'd prefer to avoid horribly designed sites. Do we have any reliable sources on this? e.g. From his books etc. - FrancisTyers · 08:37, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

The first source is a keeper. ;) The LiveScience one no. It isn't that he is questioning the science of the models, it seems to be that he is questioning their ability to predict climate change. This quote would be good to include:

"The good news is that we are at last putting serious effort and money into local observations. Local observations are laborious and slow, but they are essential if we are ever to have an accurate picture of climate. The bad news is that the climate models on which so much effort is expended are unreliable because they still use fudge-factors rather than physics to represent important things like evaporation and convection, clouds and rainfall. Besides the general prevalence of fudge-factors, the latest and biggest climate models have other defects that make them unreliable. With one exception, they do not predict the existence of El Niño. Since El Niño is a major feature of the observed climate, any model that fails to predict it is clearly deficient. The bad news does not mean that climate models are worthless. They are, as Manabe said thirty years ago, essential tools for understanding climate. They are not yet adequate tools for predicting climate. "

It is kind of long though :) - FrancisTyers · 08:48, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it's great, and not too long Clayoquot ^Sound 16:41, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Here's the source for the "heretical" thing and his views on global warming in general. Well-designed site too: [University of Michigan 2005 Winter Commencement Address]. Clayoquot ^Sound 16:35, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Thats a much better link. And a good source. - FrancisTyers · 16:46, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Sources

• Salon.com - Freeman Dyson, frog prince of physics
• Wired - Freeman Dyson's Brain