[mvhvv]

Assumptions and reductions are always required, there is no researcher in the world that reads every book or paper released in their field, and for those that do read voraciously, only a tiny fragment of that is remembered or understood on the grounds that the author intended.

Part of learning is to deciding which parts to ignore. The book is rejected on it's face because its core claim is essentially "I solved a major issue in another field by reducing it down to the one I know", which is a big red-flag for crank claims.

The article's focus on spreadsheets is part of why it's so easy to brush it aside. The author doesn't realise that the fidelity of the spreadsheet is less important than their own ideological assumptions.

It's possible they cover this in detail in the book, but it's not in this article, nor in any description of the book I've encountered. If something appears as crank-science on it's face (and is getting little traction), then why waste your time on it?

[mdoms]

> Assumptions and reductions are always required, there is no researcher in the world that reads every book or paper released in their field

It's good practice to read the ones you're commenting on.

[mvhvv]

I read the article, and I even read through the presentation linked in the article. I didn't read the book, but I'm also not giving a qualitative review of the book.

I'm talking about why people don't think it's worth engaging with to begin with. It's not that his critics are afraid or incapable of engaging with him, but that he's being dismissed out of hand because (regardless of whether it's true or not) he presents as a crank who doesn't appear to understand the field he's attempting to critique.

There's an infinite supply of cranks in the world, and it's usually good practice to avoid engaging with them.

[Brian_K_White]

I think you couldn't have really given that comment much thought.

It takes no imagination at all to poke a hole in that.