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The Sokal Hoax - a scholarly hoax that succeeded in showing peer reviewed journals are filled with absolute nonsense and are accepted uncritically as long as they align with people's own ideology

submitted by HughBriss to whatever 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 12:51:39 ago (+61/-0)     (en.wikipedia.org)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair

From the article:

"The Sokal affair, also called the Sokal hoax, was a demonstrative scholarly hoax performed by Alan Sokal, a physics professor at New York University and University College London. In 1996, Sokal submitted an article to Social Text, an academic journal of postmodern cultural studies. The submission was an experiment to test the journal's intellectual rigor, specifically to investigate whether "a leading North American journal of cultural studies—whose editorial collective includes such luminaries as Fredric Jameson and Andrew Ross—[would] publish an article liberally salted with nonsense if (a) it sounded good and (b) it flattered the editors' ideological preconceptions."

"The article, "Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity", was published in the journal's spring/summer 1996 "Science Wars" issue. It proposed that quantum gravity is a social and linguistic construct. At that time, the journal did not practice academic peer review and it did not submit the article for outside expert review by a physicist. Three weeks after its publication in May 1996, Sokal revealed in the magazine Lingua Franca that the article was a hoax."

Sokol wrote it with good intentions and succeeded well beyond what his expectations. All in all, it was a pretty good troll.


14 comments block


[ - ] deleted 5 points 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 15:47:19 ago (+5/-0)

deleted

[ - ] deleted 2 points 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 21:58:59 ago (+2/-0)

deleted

[ - ] 3Whuurs 0 points 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 04:13:30 ago (+0/-0)

Of course he was.

[ - ] 3Whuurs 1 point 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 04:44:16 ago (+1/-0)*

I remember this, it didn’t get nearly enough attention.

Honestly most modern science must be like this now, it just doesn’t require itself to be tricked, it only needs to be told what the outcomes are supposed to be by its benefactors.
Either way every scientist on earth seems to be perfect willing to be suddenly told the earth is flat, as long as their superiors accept it.
Look how many evolutionary biologists like Richard Dawkins just opt completely out of the total inversion of biology by the lgbtq faggots to larp about religion and nationalism.
There’s millions of scientists openly performing pseudoscience every day.

[ - ] blit416 0 points 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 06:34:48 ago (+0/-0)

"the earth is flat"
Why that's just like something Obama would say. Nice clichee. So that means "An outmoded way of thinking" ?

[ - ] big_fat_dangus 2 points 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 00:17:30 ago (+2/-0)

Excellent post. In premed they make a point of exposing "the myth of the noble scientist", a misconception in the mind of the public re: physicians and scientists.

Anyone in a position of authority is still just some schmuck. Fallible, corruptible, lazy. Especially in professions overrun by pajeets and chinks.

[ - ] Backfromthedesert 1 point 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 01:40:53 ago (+1/-0)

Very much agree

[ - ] Boardallday3 2 points 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 16:18:30 ago (+2/-0)

Science says boys can become girls and HRT is totally safe - all of r/science

[ - ] donald_d_donaldson 1 point 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 05:36:39 ago (+1/-0)

https://wtfhappenedin1971home.files.wordpress.com/2022/03/peerreview.jpg

peer review is a spook, its something that became popular in the late 1960s

[ - ] uvulectomy 2 points 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 14:28:57 ago (+2/-0)

Apparently he did two more journal trolls, the last one just this past October.

[ - ] HughBriss [op] 1 point 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 14:58:46 ago (+1/-0)

That makes me very happy, although I'm sad that he needs to continue making this point.

[ - ] nc22 0 points 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 13:22:49 ago (+0/-0)

[ - ] HughBriss [op] 0 points 2.0 yearsMay 19, 2022 14:01:25 ago (+0/-0)

This is a great link. Just started it, so I don't know the writer's conclusion, but it's interesting nonetheless.

[ - ] Belrick 0 points 2.0 yearsMay 18, 2022 18:44:34 ago (+0/-0)

Rip science.

My ancestors created the methodology with good intentions but had no clue that in the future corruption and colonizers would steal science from their descendants