Re: The Einstein Effect

On 07/01/2025 00:48, john larkin wrote:

On Mon, 6 Jan 2025 22:17:20 -0000 (UTC), Cursitor Doom
<cd999666@notformail.com> wrote:
 

On Mon, 06 Jan 2025 07:36:05 -0800, john larkin wrote:
>

https://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/einstein-and-adam-grant-agree-the-

puzzle-principle-will-make-you-instantly-smarter/91102339

>
Cohen's book looks interesting, so I ordered it.

You do realise that the Title of the book is actually taken from a paper about how total gibberish prose attributed to a scientist is more often believed by the general public than the same gibberish prose attributed to a mystic guru (aka religious leader proxy).
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-021-01273-8
That is behind a Nature paywall but the orginalpaper is free access here:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/347290885_The_Einstein_effect_Global_evidence_for_scientific_source_credibility_effects_and_the_influence_of_religiosity
Religious leaders will just have to get used to the idea that scientists and rational thought now hold sway over ignorance and superstition.

I'm now reading Gleick's short biography of Isaac Newton, who was a very
weird guy.

>
Not just weird but deeply unpleasant.

 Which explains why he never had a girlfriend.

It is interesting that Oxford university now host the Newton Project which is slowly building up a picture of his private and public life in as much as it is possible from the very limited historical records available.
https://www.newtonproject.ox.ac.uk/his-personal-life
His physics research is well documented and copies of his published works with additional annotation in his own hand are known.
He was intensely private and somewhat insecure which led to some of his spats with Hooke (who was a brilliant experimentalist) and Leibnitz (who was a brilliant mathematician). We should all give thanks that Leibnitz notation for calculus ultimately won out although fluxions f, f' and f" live on.
Modern diagnosis might be something like manic depressive genius (he did have what would today be considered a mental breakdown in 1693 after not sleeping for 5 days). He thought his friends were conspiring against him.
OTOH his alchemical interests meant breathing mercury fumes and other noxious gasses from time to time probably didn't help either.
--
Martin Brown