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Informed opinion, clearly labeled so, on interesting but non-controversial non-ideological topics can be great instigators of curiosity.

What might have come before the Big Bang?

Do quantum superpositions really collapse somehow based on some as yet uncharacterized law, or does our universe produce a web of alternate futures, still connected but where straightforward links are quickly statistically and irreversible obscured?

There is a science friendly basis for interesting opinions of particular experts, in areas of disagreement or inconclusive answers, when clearly labeled as opinion, whose opinion, and why that experts opinion is of special interest.

Also, opinion on the state of science education, funding or other science relevant non-scientific topics, with all due modesty of certainty makes good sense.

But injecting ideological opinions, and poorly or selectively reasoned ones, or unestablished conjectures falsely posed as scientific truth, into a format that claims to be representative of science based information, is a tragedy level disservice.

Not to mention, with respect to Scientific American in particular, a betrayal of many decades of higher standards, work and reputation.

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devindotcom 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

>interesting but non-controversial non-ideological topics

this category is itself hopelessly controversial and ideologically delineated, as you have demonstrated. not to mention this is type of "stay in your lane" or argument is generally deployed by defenders of the status quo against dissenters.

>falsely posed as scientific truth, into a format that claims to be representative of science based information

but this didn't happen.

look, scientific american is a general-audience science magazine, not a journal for serious scientific inquiry. it has an editorial remit for commentary and exploration of themes and trends related or adjacent to science. you may not like the opinions or ideologies expressed in the opinion pieces they published, but they are clearly labeled opinion and in the opinion section. it is completely appropriate and dare i say non-controversial. it really seems like you just disagree with their selection of opinion pieces.

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GoblinSlayer 7 days ago | parent | prev | next [-]

>What might have come before the Big Bang?

Singularity.

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suzzer99 7 days ago | parent [-]

'Singularity' is just a placeholder for 'we have no idea what's going on here'.

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GoblinSlayer 7 days ago | parent [-]

Huh? AFAIK singularity is a dense object of zero size.

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suzzer99 7 days ago | parent [-]

Infinitely dense, which is a math term for "some other realm of existence that makes no sense in our physical world".

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GoblinSlayer 6 days ago | parent [-]

It may not have all properties you want, but it can have properties appropriate to its state, makes perfect sense to me, why not. Also it's not infinite density, it's zero size, infinities don't exist. Mass is a property of inertial motion, singularity doesn't have inertial motion, thus no mass.

	▲	Nevermark 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		If taking infinite density and an infinitesimal point seriously resulted in a clear and consistent ability to model it, then it would be as you say. But that isn't what happens. Division by zero and other mathematical breakdowns occur, meaning that whatever actually happens is not in fact the same laws operating in an extreme situation. The laws don't actually work. This is further backed up by the fact that we have two models with which to model the "singularity". Quantum mechanics and general relativity. They both break down, but in inconsistent ways. So clearly our equations don't work in that situation. In addition, both from theory and experiment, there is strong evidence that space and time have a minimal length, the Planck unit of space and time. You can't get mass on a point if that understanding is true, because it will always involve unit distance connections. Finally, uncooperative singularities like these have been found in scientific models many times, and the result has always been that the addition or adjustment of our models resolved mathematical mayhem. The mayhem just indicated the models were incomplete for the situation. A toy example is Newton's force of gravity between two masses, F = Gm1m2/d^2. The force being a constant times the product of masses divided by the square of their distances. This model implies that at a distance of zero the force is infinite. Yet that creates mathematical problems, modeling problems, and we never see it happen. That mess is easily cleaned up with the realization that as the distance between the centers of a mass of m1 and m2 falls under the radius of one or both, r1 and r2, the forces of any mass of m1 and m2 outside distance d now cancel out. So as the position of two masses converge, the force of gravity actually goes to zero, not infinity. Newton's Law was still a good model for non-relativistic gravity forces, but needed to take account of more information to work in that particular case without blowing in a "singularity". TLDR; where math blows up you can't just accept the model as operating in an extreme situation, because the model generates incoherent, inconclusive, undefined and inconsistent results. But the problem isn't magical, mysterious, or evidence of something unknowable. It is just evidence that our math and models don't yet capture everthing relevant to the breakdown case. It is a clue pointing toward something more for us to learn.

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rbanffy 7 days ago | parent | prev [-]

> Not to mention, with respect to Scientific American in particular, a betrayal of many decades of higher standards, work and reputation.

It's hard to deny science itself is under attack by the same people who try to establish alternative facts and truths based on what's politically convenient to them, even if nothing of that is backed by objective reality. Science will always be a force pushing against such agendas.

How is the best way to serve the higher standards of SciAm? Would it be ignoring the elephant in the room, this new shiny fake reality where vaccines cause autism, the Earth is flat, that scientists have been hiding perpetual motion machines from the public? Or would it be to risk being labeled "biased" or "political" and actively label and fight against these anti-science movements?

Science is politics. It is the strong belief that there is one single objective reality, that anyone with the proper tools can observe and verify, and that going against these cornerstones for political expediency is wrong and, ultimately, against the interests of our species.

	▲	rayiner 7 days ago \| parent [-]
		Science can touch on politics, but that doesn’t mean science is coextensive with politics. You selected examples where science bears on politics, but Helmuth’s fixation wasn’t on how many people believe vaccines cause autism. As demonstrated by her closing screed, it was about non-falsifiable moral assertions (“sexism,” “racism,” and the “moral arc of the universe”). Indeed, the point of the Reason article is that if scientists want to have credibility on questions where their expertise applies, they should avoid opining in their official capacity on political questions where their expertise doesn’t apply. Science has much to say about politically important issues like climate change and vaccines! But people will blow off those assertions if scientists lend the imprimatur of their authority to advance social causes, for example by opining that it’s “racist” to vote to deport illegal immigrants.