• 0 Posts
  • 307 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: June 22nd, 2023

help-circle


  • I mean that’s everything. There isn’t a “movie of the summer” anymore really, no I Love Lucy / Cheers / Friends / Simpsons that basically everyone is watching or familiar with. It’s been true for longer with books/music because of the lower gateways to entry and being able to be a “local artist”, but not by much, and even for them it’s exploded since the Internet became mainstream.

    The democratization of publication has dramatically broadened the type and quality of things being made and no industry titans really have figured out how to promote around that. At least not consistently.







  • You are describing Indiana Jones. Graham is talking about getting funding for what is effectively Crystal Skull research. These are not opposing sides of the same coin. Ancient Apocalypse is not an outreach program for more general archeology funding.

    This is not about calling the people watching the show idiots. It’s about Graham and his ilk being more beholden to their pet stories than actual research and trying to convince people that they are the One True Archeologist.

    A conspiracy theorist complaining about how “the establishment” won’t take him seriously is not a gateway to people seeking out education. It’s an avenue for those people to mistrust actual research in a field because it doesn’t mesh with their preconceived notions. Much like Flat Earthers the problem is not a simple misunderstanding that will self correct. It’s a belief that the “Truth” is being hidden for nefarious purposes because a story is more intriguing than knowledge.

    This is not how people get more interested in Archeology, or whatever discipline, or what drives funding for that discipline. This is what cuts budgets and drives people away because “the establishment is a hidebound in-crowd.”


  • Star Trek is attention grabbing. It doesn’t mean we should depend on time travel to save the whales. Not being able to separate fantasy from reality is not a scientific viewpoint. Actual education about any of this would be steering away from it, not into it.

    The answer to all questions about advanced ancient civilizations existing is “probably not”. There are interesting examples that push back the earliest evidence of some things, like the Antikythera mechanism, but the only thing that is evidence of is that gears are older than previously thought. “Could there have been an ancient globe spanning civilization that only used wood or was on Antarctica or for some other reason has surviving no evidence?” is the same level of question as “Could there be a Discworld?”. The infeasibility of proving a negative is not the same as “yes this existed”.

    Ancient Aliens level speculation on ancient civilizations is religion without a sacred text, inventing fantasies of a utopian past out of whole cloth because of an imagined fragment of a thread.


  • turmacar@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzWe lost Keanu
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    46
    arrow-down
    4
    ·
    edit-2
    5 days ago

    “What if every star was a human soul?” is not an interesting astronomy question to get people into astronomy. “Big Astronomy” not awarding grants to study that, is not a conspiracy. It’s due diligence.

    Using a platform to say “What if [random speculation that has no basis and can’t be tested]” is not useful science outreach. It’s someone pretending to be science-y.

    A person’s sole redeeming aspect being “being an engaging speaker” doesn’t make them a useful object lesson, it makes them yet another snake oil salesman. That’s not new or unique. That’s being a charlatan. Which is what people don’t like about Graham.





  • The study is talking about overall numbers of jobs, not specific companies. Get fired from McDonalds closing a location, get a job with higher pay somewhere else that’s paying the new minimum wage, is a net zero result.

    McDonalds is gutted that their 2024 earnings are on track for only a 5% increase over 2023, which saw a 10% gross profit increase for the year.

    Remember when there was a “shoplifting crime wave” that it turned out was just profits were down so they had to blame something?