Talk:Stephen Wolfram
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This article was externally reviewed on December 14, 2005 by Nature. It was found to have 2 errors. |
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[edit] Personal attacks
Remeber the Holy Roman Empire? All you had to know about it was, it wasn't holy, it wasn't Roman, and it wasn't an empire. Now think about a New Kind of Science. Now you're getting it.
ALL PERSONAL ATTACKS HAVE BEEN PURGED FROM THE FOLLOWING EXCHANGE:
Concerning the recent edits on this page, it is simply not the case that existing complexity researchers have been following the same research agenda that Wolfram advocates in the NKS book. They do not systematically enumerate each and every computational system of some particular class, and run them to see what they do. Usually they have an agenda - eg, artificial life, "emergence" , evolution, whatever -- just go to the complexity page to see the mishmash of things that fall under the complexity umbrella. Usually, they either use mathematical methods, or do computer simulations on systems that are more complicated that those in NKS. This is not what Wolfram advocates at all.
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many people have been studying cellular automata for many decades. And complexity theory is *centrally about* the notion that simple rules generate complexity, with low-dimensional pattern formation.
It is nice that wolfram has enumerated all the cellular automata - but that is hardly a new kind of science.
There are *thousands* of research articles on cellular automata.
Duracell 17:13, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
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Complexity theorists typically do not systematically enumerate every computational system of a particular class, simply exploring it to see what they do.
Complexity theorists typically have a specific agenda, for instance artificial life, or the behavior of some specific natural or social system -- in contrast to studying simple computational systems in their own right, for their own sake.
Complexity theorists, when talking about abstract systems, typically rely on mathematical methods rather than exhaustive, very simple computer experiments.
Who is the last complexity theorist to have enumerated all 4096 s2k2 Turing machines (or some similar system) and classified their behavior? What complexity theorist concentrates on computational systems for their own sake, without biasing their research to topics like genetic algorithms, pattern recognition, artificial life, etc, etc? What complexity theorist has the goal of experimentally mapping the computational universe rather than trying to deductively come up with a mathematical equation or theorem about some limited class of systems? Finally, are these all the same person, or scattered items with no overall intellectual framework to tie them together?
I know about the thousands of papers on cellular automata And some of them are actually good. But what defines a field is not only its subject matter, but how the subject is studied and the principles that drive the field's intuition. Its like saying biology and cooking are the same because they can both talk about vegetables.
Your assertion that complexity theory is "centrally" about simple rules leading to complexity is a piece of wishful rhetoric. If complexity theory was truly based on this phenomena, why do they not systematically enumerate (and experimentally study in detail) the very simplest rules possible and see what novel behaviors unfold from them? This is the scientific philosophy of studying simple programs. this is a fruitful enterprise potentially on par with a physics or a mathematics,
24.61.40.124 21:01, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] "eight hallmark signs of crank science"
What are the eight hallmark signs of crank science? If no reference is provided, then this should be deleted.
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The hallmarks of crank science are listed in the article crank (person). Ones that in my opinion apply to Wolfram are:
- Grandiose claims for the validity and scope of the theory
- Stated belief that a conspiracy by the scientific establishment is hindering uptake of the theory
- Direct communication of the idea to the media, typically holding a press conference before going through the usual peer review process of publishing in scholarly journals
These ones are pretty obvioius. One might also add:
- Comparison of the originator with Einstein, Newton, Galileo, or Copernicus
Certainly, popular media coverage of Wolfram's "New Kind of Science" was full of comparisons of him to Newton and Einstein, though I do not know if he himself has made or directly encouraged those comparisons (he certainly doesn't discourage them). --GaeusOctavius 18:08, 26 October 2005 (UTC)
Ok, lets look at these more carefully:
- Grandiose claims for the validity and scope of the theory
True. Wolfram's claims are far-reaching and he is upfront about it.
- Stated belief that a conspiracy by the scientific establishment is hindering uptake of the theory
False. In recent public appearances Wolfram has stated that he is quite pleased how his ideas are being taken up.
- Direct communication of the idea to the media, typically holding a press conference before going through the usual peer review process of publishing in scholarly journals
False. Many of the core ideas in the book were in fact published by Wolfram in the 1980s. Something like the Principle of Computational Equivalence, which is new to the book, is known as a conjecture supported by known evidence; things like it get published all the time.
- Comparison of the originator with Einstein, Newton, Galileo, or Copernicus
This is hard to interpret the original meaning of this claim. I'll give this a .5 .
Given that we are batting 1.5/8, I am going to remove the material on crank science. Folks, just cause you read it on the internet doesn't mean that it is true. Point to some published review that calls wolfram a crank, rather than a random internet diatribe, and I will take it more seriously.
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There is voluminous documentation of Wolfram's crank-like behavior on the web. You can start here [1] if interested. The entry in the article appropriately states these as allegations of critics and not fact. Censorship of views one does not like is not appropriate for Wikipedia.
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I agree that censorship is not the wikipedia way.
However, this "other people say" thing is a classic smear tactic. Given that any reasonable person would agree that 2 and 3 are on their face false, this line of criticism basically boils down to "criticism for ambitious self image" , which is already covered in that paragraph. This is a strike against it in my book.
Furthermore, generally speaking, the space afforded to a topic should be proportional to its importance. If there was a significant community that believe this "crank" nonsense, then one could make an argument for including it. But this is a **very** minority view, held by a few people (such as that author of that url) who often feel personally threatened or offended by some aspect of Wolfram -- often not even the scientific content aspect. The overwhelming majority of published reviews (both positive and negative) treat it as a legitimate scientific work, and attempt to engage its results and ideas. That is just a fact.
I will add the following paragraph as an attempt to include this information.
"A handful of very vocal critics--almost without exception self-published online rather than in peer-reviewed journals--have pointed to Wolfram's ambition as a proof that he is a crank. Supporters find this ironic and misguided because Wolfram's central point is that it is essential that we approach computation with very straighforward, transparent experiments that can be verified by anyone."
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I am a reasonable person and I do not agree that 2 and 3 are false on their face. Nobody has claimed Wolfram was not a legitimate scientist in the 1980's, but alot of time has passed since then. If the best defense of an alleged pseudoscientist or crank is published work from two decades ago, that says a lot.
John Hagelin is another example of a former scientist who once had a legitimate record of publication. Now he is an advocate of Yogic "flying". Is he a crackpot? Hell yes! Have any of his fellow physicists ever called him a crackpot in a refereed publication? Hell no!
Any reasonable person will recognize the absurdity of denigrating critics of a non-peer-reviewed work, simply because their criticisms are themselves not published in peer-reviewed journals.
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Well, reasonable and *informed*.
Concerning 2: He's said things are going very well at many recent public appearances, for instance http://www.acm.uiuc.edu/conference/speakers.php#StephenWolframAbstract .
Concerning 3: The core of the book is about 1) simple, sytematic computer experiments, 2) their relationship to nature, and 3) philosophical underpinnings like computational irreducibility - all ideas that Wolfram and others published about before. It is utterly misleading to compare this to a case where the "new" research bears no relationship to the old, reputable research. Of course scientists won't say that Hagelin is a crackpot - why would they write papers about meditation in physics journals.
I believe it is absurd to complain about others not being peer reviewed, when one himself is not being peer reviewed. For instance, there are many basic factual - let alone conceptual - errors in many NKS reviews (there seems to be a correlation between the number of errors and the negativity of the review).
I do believe the new formulation on the "con" side is more or less acceptable. I have heard no "pro" wolfram person say that he is too brilliant to be peer reviewed, so I will change the straw man into something sensible about the ideas being a direct outgrowth of earlier research.
[edit] rumor of stolen work?
I heard back in my math department from a professor a while back that most of the original work on mathematica was done by some other mathematicians, then wolfram did some trick with stock options, moved the ip to another company, and shafted them. is there any citable source that can confirm the existence of this rumor? anyone know the names of these other scientists? Dsol 21:48, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
- Please email the professor in the math department for details, if he/she is where you heard it. GangofOne 04:00, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Theo Grey, who still works at Wolfram Research, says in his online bio that he "Co-founded Wolfram Research, Inc with Stephen Wolfram and 4 others." I believe (but can not find references) that those others include mathematicians Henry Cejtin, Igor Rivin, Dave Bowman, and Daniel Grayson, and that they were largely responsible for early development of Mathematica.
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- It was rumored that some disagreement existed among the early developers about credit and compensation (especially in the form of stock options), which revolved around intellectual property issues (ironic considering Wolfram's earlier legal wranglings with Caltech over SMP).
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- However, I highly doubt that there will ever be a citable source. The matter was rumored to have been legally resolved, and I'd be surprised if gag orders and other legal restrictions weren't in place.
- 20:48, 18 July 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Errors ID'd by Nature, to correct
The results of what exactly Nature suggested should be corrected is out... italicize each bullet point once you make the correction. -- user:zanimum
- Paragraph 6, line 1: Change “The initial reviews” to “The reviews”. Why? Because the way it is written implies only initially were there negative feelings.
- Paragraph 6, line 3: Delete “its ambitious self-image” and replace by “lack of correctness”. i.e., the work was criticized for being wrong, not because SW is ambitious.
- Looks like both of these have been fixed at this point. Wile E. Heresiarch 03:06, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Assertions in need of references
It would help a lot to get references for the following.
- Often described as a child prodigy ... Who describes him as such?
- he published an article on particle physics at age 15 ... Presumably it will be easy to get a citation for that. Actually a list of all of his peer-reviewed publications would be interesting.
available here in his 'Scrapbook' http://www.stephenwolfram.com/publications/articles/particle/75-hadronic/index.html
"Hadronic Electrons" S. Wolfram, Australian Journal of Physics 28 (1975) 479-487.
includes as a citation [24] Wolfram, S. (1975). Eton College Preprints, January and March.
I find Wolfram a source of some amusement, so I note that here http://www.stephenwolfram.com/scrapbook/internals/page1/6.html
he spent the summer when 12 summarizing someone elses book. With lots of diagrams!
- He received his Ph.D. in particle physics from Caltech at age 20 ... We should get a citation for that too.
- ... and joined the faculty there. This is a big one. What, exactly was his position at Caltech? Post-doc, lecturer, adjunct professor, tenure-track, what? Which classes did he teach?
- Richard Feynman considered him to be phenomenally brilliant and would "use him to bounce ideas off of". This is another big one. How do we know this -- did Feynman write somewhere "Wolfram is phenomenally brilliant" or is that an extrapolation? Did Feynman say "I used to bounce ideas off him" or did someone else claim Feynman did that?
- Wolfram won the MacArthur award. Was his award for his work on some particular topic? If so the topic should be mentioned here.
- He developed a computer algebra system at Caltech, but the school's patent rules denied him ownership of the invention. This is another big one. The system is question was called SMP, we should say that. Wolfram wasn't the only developer; there were at least a few more people. We need to mention those other people and clarify their roles and Wolfram's. Was he the primary designer, project manager, primary coder, what? Wolfram had a dispute about ownership of the system, although I would be surprised if patents had anything to do with it (copyrights more likely). Wolfram eventually settled with Caltech; we should try to find out what the terms of the settlement were. Caltech and/or Wolfram licensed SMP to a commercial venture, although I don't know if we want to go into that here.
- He left for the School of Natural Sciences ... When was that, exactly? We should attach dates to other events as well.
Stephen Wolfram is fairly controversial; it would help readers at large a lot if we could pin down some details here. There's more, but I'll let that be enough for now. Wile E. Heresiarch 03:02, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Self-restraint and improved readability
Recent edits to this page by Wolfram detractors are making the text unreadible and incomprehensible.
Ample space is dedicated to criticism.
Nevertheless, passages that even attempt to present the basics of Wolfram's argument have been defaced, resulting in content that is neither informative, nor readable, nor even presenting a single coherent opinion whatsoever.
I am going to fix some of this nonsensical editing.
- Perhaps grabbing some text or linking directly to A New Kind of Science would be helpful? 128.195.108.92 05:46, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
- This is an interesting approach. I'll think about it
[edit] Continued vandalism of this page
I've reworked sections of this page to properly include both pro-wolfram and anit-wolfram sentiments.
Now, a few individuals have been systematically deleting the pro-wolfram content (while letting the anti-wolfram side stand). Worse, they continue to do so without making any comments as to why these deletions are justified. Besides deleting pro-wolfram comment, they've been litttering the page with highly opinionated and non-factual nastly little comments.
Besides being childish and petty, this is a blatant violation of the wikipedia NPOV policy and should be considered vandalism. If it continues stronger measures will have to be taken.
[edit] Feynman's opinion of Wolfram
Feynman did have a high opinion of Wolfram -- among other evidence Michelle Feynman's comments and the letter of recommendation Feynman wrote for the MacArthur Foundation in her recent selection of Feynman's letters, Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track -- and the reason this is not "puffery" is because if Richard Feynman knew you and your work in mathematics/theoretical physics/computer science and thinks you are very smart then it is likely that by human standards you are indeed very smart. It is like Eugene Wigner's oft-quoted comment that he was never in the same intellectual class as John von Neumann -- the opinion of a highly-qualified observer who was not given to hyperbole. Similarly, if Mikhail Baryshnikov (sp?) had ever remarked of someone that "they moved very gracefully" I would consider this suitable to put in an encyclopedia article about that person. 137.82.82.137 02:29, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
- You've completely missed the point. The puffery in question is this magazine piece [2], which claims that Feynman said nice things about Wolfram, but has no references itself. If you can find a suitable quote in Feynman's letters, feel free to paste it into the article -- with a reference, of course. The value of Feynman's opinion is not in question. 64.48.192.67 06:15, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
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- O.k.. (Same as 137.82.82.137 above.) I'm quite familiar with Wolfram's career and have seen Feynman's (and Murray Gell-Mann's) praise of him repeated in many sources (possibly beginning in the initial news articles in Science and Physics Today ca. 1982/1983 reporting on Wolfram's conflict with Caltech over SMP, but I don't have these at hand). Since I regarded Feynman's high opinion of Wolfram as beyond dispute for an informed observer (nyah, nyah) I charitably assumed that the objection was to the praise per se -- as many people do object to Wolfram's abjuration of false modesty regarding his own intellectual powers. 142.103.168.16 04:15, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
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- Let's leave the whole Feynman opinion/Wolfram thing alone for a while since it's getting to be a major drag. I deleted both sentences. The second sentence meta-commenting on Feynman's "accuracy" is deeply disingenuous since it is Feynman's informed opinion on Wolfram's work as he knew it then that is at issue, not any prediction of his future. I think the person adding this meta-comment probably got that prediction wrong, too - Feynman predicted (in a letter which is displayed on Wolfram's personal website under Scrapbook) that Wolfram would not be happy *organizing* and *administering* a research group in academia -- and Feynman was absolutely right about this! 142.103.168.24 04:05, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
How did it work? Did Feynman think people were very smart if they published work he had done ONLY in the last 10 years or something? And then, not quite as smart if you're publishing stuff he had done 20 years earlier and all that?
[edit] References
The explicit reference to the Science (AAAS - American Association for the Advancement of Science weekly magazine -- the U.S. equivalent of the British Nature, with both research publications and science news and science politics) magazine article on the Wolfram/SMP/Caltech controversy is the 27 May 1983 (Vol. 220, No. 4600) issue, pgs. 932-934, a "News and Comment" section article titled "Caltech Torn by Dispute Over Software" by Gina Kolata. 137.82.188.68 01:29, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
