Re:The Unbelievable Skepticism of the Amazing Randi
by sampo on Sunday November 09, 2014 @05:41AM
(#8579597)
About your sources:
1. GeneWatch is an NGO. They don't have any scientific credibility.
2. Taleb is an economist of sorts, he has no scientific publications or credentials in biosciences. Also, twitter is not a very scientific reference.
3. and 4. Blogs and arXiv publications are not peer-reviewed, and they are not generally considered scientific publications. (Of course when an arXiv manuscript is submitted and accepted to a scientific journal, then it will be.)
Also about Taleb, he actually says "I, for my part, resist eating fruits not found in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean" [1], so his level of conservativeness seems to be to avoid any crop & food innovations younger than 1000 years.
This is my point: In these matters people don't listen to the opinions of the actual scientists, but all kind of activists and preachers. Just like Randi said. You just demonstrated this.
1. GeneWatch is an NGO. They don't have any scientific credibility.
2. Taleb is an economist of sorts, he has no scientific publications or credentials in biosciences. Also, twitter is not a very scientific reference.
3. and 4. Blogs and arXiv publications are not peer-reviewed, and they are not generally considered scientific publications. (Of course when an arXiv manuscript is submitted and accepted to a scientific journal, then it will be.)
Also about Taleb, he actually says "I, for my part, resist eating fruits not found in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean" [1], so his level of conservativeness seems to be to avoid any crop & food innovations younger than 1000 years.
[1] Quoted in: http://livepaola.wordpress.com/2013/07/22/nassim-nicholas-ta...
This is my point: In these matters people don't listen to the opinions of the actual scientists, but all kind of activists and preachers. Just like Randi said. You just demonstrated this.