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Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by mikeash on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @12:01PM (#11572986)
I'm not sure what there is to be careful of here. A brief search will reveal that it was named after Gell-Mann in an attempt to make it sound better, and I don't see any particular implication from it that it's a scientifically supported phenomenon.
Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by metaphorm on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @12:10PM (#11573061)
I'm saying you should be careful because it is easy to give a false impression that you are discussing a scientifically supported phenomenon where really it is basically the musings of a fiction writer.

the name "Gell-Mann Amnesia" was, in fact, chosen by Crichton self-consciously so that this false impression would be more likely in discussions such as this one. Lack of context and a fancy sounding name serve to obfuscate the truth here.

Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by mikeash on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @12:40PM (#11573377)
Is it really? People throw around fancy-sounding names like Betteridge's Law of Headlines and Sturgeon's Law without any qualifiers and nobody seems to mistake those for scientific principles.

I'm not sure it's worth defending against people taking a fancy-sounding name and taking that as an indication that it's scientific principle without even bothering to take five seconds to look it up.

Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by metaphorm on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @01:08PM (#11573658)
Betteridge's Law is named after Ian Betteridge, a technology journalist, who wrote directly on the subject.

Sturgeon's Law is named after Ted Sturgeon, a fiction writer, who actually basically coined the phrase originally (I think he did anyway).

Michael Crichton, on the other hand, did not call his idea "Crichton's Law of Media Analysis". He deliberately gave it an obfuscatory name and attempted to associate it with a well regarded physicist to give the impression that the law was scientific in some way. It was a deliberate misdirection, done for effect.

Because of the intrinsically duplicitous nature of the name "Gell-Mann Amnesia" I think its inappropriate to continue referring to the effect under that name. Call it Crichton's Law or whatever. Lets not repeat the original misdirection though. It is fundamentally dishonest and does a disservice to the legacy of Murray Gell-Mann.

Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by spinlock on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @10:44PM (#11577513)
Oooo, oooo, do Jurasic Park next.
Re:“American Scientist” Understands Nothing about the Travel... by chris_wot on Tuesday April 26, 2016 @12:06PM (#11573025)
You only need to be careful because some smart-alek will point out it is an example of Stigler's law of eponymy.