As part of a recent (unrelated) thread to a question I asked, a perceptive colleague answered as quoted below:
"I'd hesitate to label anyone a "crackpot" without a precise definition of the term.
See John Baez Crackpot Index. This could be developed into a proper psychometric questionnaire, in which case I expect it to discriminate between crackpots and criterion groups of famous and average scientists, and particularly between cranks and those with new, challenging and unconventional but well-thought out ideas. If a well-standardised version of this with proper norms were available on the internet, it might well deter some of the nuisance crackpots."
My question is related to answering the position of 'are high-flying academic notables (past and present) extremely talented at what they do or did - or are they merely average 'crackpots' who are at the right place, at the right time?' I'm wondering, is there a fine-line between the concepts - or are they 'miles apart' - or can they be a mixture?
is an academic genius not just and academic 'crackpot' whose ideas are accepted? Or the other way arround; is an academic 'crackpot' not just and academic genius whose ideas are not excepted?
Etiher way, as long as their research is solid, their ideas have to be taken in to account
Hi Maarten,
I think that what you are highlighting is that there is a fine line between the contexts. As to what is 'solid' research may well be a subjective concept that differentiates between the two. One side may agree as to what is solid; the other may not
It depends on the metric that might be used to determine the classifications.
In general, I would presume that it is highly subjective, that is, entirely arbitrary.
Agreed Michael - it is subjective - but is that subjectivity of the individual in question or the institution itself?
Rightly or wrongly, society tends to determine how an individual might perceived.
Society and institutions are the sum of their parts, whereby individuals may well have significant differences among themselves as to how the individual in question might be perceived, but these parts are aggregated into a whole.
As long as no one suffers from the (mis)labelling as a genius or crackpot, does it really matter whether an academic is designated at one end of the spectrum or the other?
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