You are regurgitating almost pure grievance against people who just want to study the universe.
Every researcher in every field all the time wants more data, better studies, more evidence. That is basically what science is.
This attitude about "those damn smug scientists who think they know everything" emerges from authoritarian nationalists selling resentment politics, and it has led to widespread violence against scientists in the past. Its prevalence in Germany is one part of why the US got the bomb first, and its prevalence in the Soviet and Chinese systems is part of why were not able to keep up with us economically (until recently).
This political project actively intends to defend enterprises like JWST (sometimes even after building and launching the damn thing!), and current budgets have dozens of existing projects being shut down for good.
Another thing people are unaware of is that the majority of scientists are experimentalists, not theoreticians. Why would we want to be experimental scientists at all?
"Scientists having to face the fact that their theories aren't perfect" - I think you fundamentally misunderstand how science works, or else you hang out with some extremely arrogant astronomers.
Why do you think they put the JWST up there, if not to get better data and thereby improve our understanding of the universe? If we thought our theories were already perfect, what would be the point in doing more research?
> Why do you think they put the JWST up there, if not to get better data and thereby improve our understanding of the universe?
Think about how much effort scientists had to make, to bring JWST into existence. The funding proposals, the design, the engineering to get it launched. Generations of effort, entire careers dedicated just to making it happen. All of that effort sings one song: we don’t know, and we want to learn.
"Face the fact"? These scientists are very excited to find a whole new era of the universe that they don't understand:
> QSO1 and the rest of the little red dots “tell us we don’t know anything,” said John Regan, a theorist at Maynooth University in Ireland. “It has been really exciting and very electrifying for the field.”
This is pure candy to a scientist. "Holy crap, we have no idea what this object is or how it formed" was always the hoped-for outcome for the JWST. Nobody wanted to see more of the same, especially not for the price.
JWST didn't just "happen". It was conceptualized, designed, built and launched by the very scientists who wanted to test and improve their theories. No serious scientist thinks that their theories are perfect or that they have all the answers. Quite the opposite, usually. They're constantly challenging each other and themselves with the common goal of approximating reality with their models better and better. Science would never have come as far as it did if it were any different.
Where does this sheer ignorance come from? Clearly you've never worked with scientists in any capacity.
mapt|5 months ago
Every researcher in every field all the time wants more data, better studies, more evidence. That is basically what science is.
This attitude about "those damn smug scientists who think they know everything" emerges from authoritarian nationalists selling resentment politics, and it has led to widespread violence against scientists in the past. Its prevalence in Germany is one part of why the US got the bomb first, and its prevalence in the Soviet and Chinese systems is part of why were not able to keep up with us economically (until recently).
This political project actively intends to defend enterprises like JWST (sometimes even after building and launching the damn thing!), and current budgets have dozens of existing projects being shut down for good.
analog31|5 months ago
Another thing people are unaware of is that the majority of scientists are experimentalists, not theoreticians. Why would we want to be experimental scientists at all?
danparsonson|5 months ago
Why do you think they put the JWST up there, if not to get better data and thereby improve our understanding of the universe? If we thought our theories were already perfect, what would be the point in doing more research?
PantaloonFlames|5 months ago
Think about how much effort scientists had to make, to bring JWST into existence. The funding proposals, the design, the engineering to get it launched. Generations of effort, entire careers dedicated just to making it happen. All of that effort sings one song: we don’t know, and we want to learn.
roywiggins|5 months ago
> QSO1 and the rest of the little red dots “tell us we don’t know anything,” said John Regan, a theorist at Maynooth University in Ireland. “It has been really exciting and very electrifying for the field.”
This is pure candy to a scientist. "Holy crap, we have no idea what this object is or how it formed" was always the hoped-for outcome for the JWST. Nobody wanted to see more of the same, especially not for the price.
analog8374|5 months ago
mr_mitm|5 months ago
JWST didn't just "happen". It was conceptualized, designed, built and launched by the very scientists who wanted to test and improve their theories. No serious scientist thinks that their theories are perfect or that they have all the answers. Quite the opposite, usually. They're constantly challenging each other and themselves with the common goal of approximating reality with their models better and better. Science would never have come as far as it did if it were any different.
Where does this sheer ignorance come from? Clearly you've never worked with scientists in any capacity.
unknown|5 months ago
[deleted]
exe34|5 months ago