Luboš Motl
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[[File:LubosMotlPubMicro.jpg|thumb|Well, he ''looks'' a perfectly normal and reasonable fellow.]] | [[File:LubosMotlPubMicro.jpg|thumb|Well, he ''looks'' a perfectly normal and reasonable fellow.]] | ||
| − | '''Luboš Motl''' is a physicist specialising in [[string theory]]. He is a competent scientist and an author of mathematics textbooks. What he is mostly, however, is a | + | '''Luboš Motl''' is a physicist specialising in [[string theory]]. He is a competent scientist and an author of mathematics textbooks. What he is mostly, however, is a ''raging asshole from hell''. It's like he thinks this was the secret of [[Isaac Newton|Newton]]'s success. |
Motl was an assistant professor at Harvard University. He got the job through competence and talent, and lost it by being a raging asshole. | Motl was an assistant professor at Harvard University. He got the job through competence and talent, and lost it by being a raging asshole. | ||
Revision as of 12:26, 25 July 2010
“”Your humble correspondent realizes that many readers are left-wing, anti-string-theory fighters. So they probably smoke marijuana and this is my modest attempt to help them.
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Luboš Motl is a physicist specialising in string theory. He is a competent scientist and an author of mathematics textbooks. What he is mostly, however, is a raging asshole from hell. It's like he thinks this was the secret of Newton's success.
Motl was an assistant professor at Harvard University. He got the job through competence and talent, and lost it by being a raging asshole.
Motl is smart, therefore everyone who disagrees with him is stupid, probably to the point of criminal negligence.[2]
Motl's Wikipedia article is anodyne, but proudly lists all his arXiv submissions.
Contents |
The Reference Frame
His blog, The Reference Frame, consists of abuse and insults hurled at anyone he disagrees with, mostly concerning physics. He has an annoying habit of continuing to edit posts for months after making them, making citation difficult, but at least he doesn't change his stated opinions and makes the abuse and insults more refined. PZ Myers has called Motl a "crackpot"[3] (which is also Motl's favoured word for anyone who disagrees with him). It is true that Luboš is willing to embrace crackpot ideas[4][5][6] when it suits his politics. However, his science is generally good within his sphere of competence. It's his personality that's the problem.
And God help you if you've ever implied anywhere that string theory is anything less than the revealed secret of the universe, particularly Lee Smolin, Peter Woit, and "similar breathtakingly dishonest far-left anti-scientific subhuman activist garbage" [7]. He has so far failed to keep their papers entirely off the readable categories of arXiv, but not for want of effort.
Political views
Motl is a climate change denier, having realized that "left-wing groups want to use this carbon theme as a tool for wealth redistribution." [8]
He's a not a big fan of academic feminism either: "Show me a single influential scholar in a department of women's studies who understands the very basic insight about that discipline, namely why virtually all of scholarly feminism is intellectual garbage." [9]
External links
- The Reference Frame - bring your own hazmat suit.
Footnotes
- ↑ Marijuana creates holes in lungs (The Reference Frame, 2007-06-04)
- ↑ "I am myself under significant pressure from large groups of crackpots and an effectively infinite sequence of online idiots, many of whom are anonymous and possibly using many pseudonyms to improve their case according to optics of people who are not capable of independent thinking and who judge the truth according to the number of pseudonyms signed under a particular opinion, without realizing that one Motl signature is still more than 50,000 signatures of idiots." Comment, BackReaction, 2006-06-13
- ↑ Shakin’ the nuts (Pharyngula, 2010-07-23)
- ↑ Tamino vs Goddard (The Reference Frame, 2010-05-11)
- ↑ Venus if you will (CapitalistImperialistPigdog, 12 May 2010)
- ↑ About Lapse Rates in Planetary Atmospheres (CapitalistImperialistPigdog, 14 May 2010)
- ↑ Hep-th papers on Thursday
- ↑ Poland rejects global carbon communism
- ↑ Noisy picnic and political correctness