Personal theories (ideas and innovations)

[Ali Abbas]

Passionate students for science are loaded full of innovational ideas, and are in search of an opportunity to express themselves. Everybody should be given a chance to speak up their understandings on different concepts, if they r wrong in a way, then its ur responsibility to clear things out for them. And i think PF is the right platform to nurture such talents. After all, aims should be set from the beginning, to achieve it in the future, wasting not much time. This is how science and technology could be accelerated through early innovation and milestones wouldn't actually be miles ahead.
Who knows anyone theory from among thousands of undergraduate students prove to be revolutionery.

Crackpots can be beared and ignored too... But i don't think mankind can afford any such minds or talents go in vain

When their theories prove to be faulty, they would gradually turn up to mainstream science and correct their mistakes.

I am an 11th grader... And all this what i have said is on behalf of all the young students who are passionated about science, as i am one of those.

 

[DrClaude]

It is not PhysicsForums' mission to be a place where such ideas can be discussed. It has been tried before and it just doesn't work.

Let me point out that bad ideas are 13 to the dozen, especially when one is just beginning to study a field such as physics. I know I had many of them when I was younger. It is only by learning more physics first that one can weed out the bad ideas and progress.

There might be another Einstein out there, but I am quite sure that not allowing them to post their ideas on PF will not stop them from reaching their full potential.

Further reading:
https://www.physicsforums.com/insights/wont-look-new-theory/

 

[Orodruin]

Passionate students for science are loaded full of innovational ideas, and are in search of an opportunity to express themselves.

Unfortunately, these "innovational" ideas are generally flawed and full of conceptual errors with regards to where the front-line of the field is. In order to contribute in a meaningful way to a field, you need to know the current status of the field, and if you do you have every opportunity to publish your findings in a peer reviewed journal. The reason many fail to do this is because they are not in contact with the current front-line status and their ideas are therefore easily identified as going nowhere by an expert in the field. Physics Forums does not strive to be an outlet for such ideas, we believe in fostering people's curiosity for science by actually teaching it rather than encouraging people to pursue their own misguided ideas, because generally that is what it is.

Everybody should be given a chance to speak up their understandings on different concepts, if they r wrong in a way, then its ur responsibility to clear things out for them.

No it is not. If someone is curious about how science and scientific theories work, I am more than happy to explain it to them. However, do not for one moment think that this proper understanding will come without significant effort from the student and it will certainly not result from the student producing personal theories before understanding the field. Furthermore, a common trait among these people is to not see reason and continue to argue upon their own misconceptions even after getting a proper explanation - simply because of unwillingness to accept that the issue is more complicated than they have the stamina to learn. There are also several outlets for publishing your own findings if they are relevant, they are called peer reviewed journals. Physics Forums does not strive to be a place for discussing original research.

And i think PF is the right platform to nurture such talents.

Most people making up their own personal speculative theories are not talents. Physics Forums is definitely not the right platform for this. It has been tried in the past and it has been a disaster. There is a reason that we have a good community with several knowledgeable people who can teach people about actual science here and a large part of that reason is that we do not accept personal speculative theories. Accepting them would therefore go directly against the purpose of Physics Forums.

Crackpots can be beared and ignored too...

If the dose was small, perhaps. Empirical evidence suggests that this is not the case and that the forum would get flooded with crackpots, completely counteracting the main purpose of Physics Forums.

When their theories prove to be faulty, they would gradually turn up to mainstream science and correct their mistakes.

With all due respect to your age, this is rather naive. Again, empirical evidence suggests that this is not the case. Crackpots generally defend their personal theories with every breath, refuse to succumb to reason or empirical evidence against their theory, and often start fabricating conspiracy theories of how the "establishment" are trying to prevent them from taking their rightful place beside Einstein in the history of science.

I am an 11th grader... And all this what i have said is on behalf of all the young students who are passionated about science, as i am one of those.

If you are really passionate about science, learn it properly. By all means, think about how things work and come up with ideas, but realize that they are very likely to be misguided due to your limited understanding of the field.

 

[Ibix]

Crackpots can be beared and ignored too... But i don't think mankind can afford any such minds or talents go in vain

When their theories prove to be faulty, they would gradually turn up to mainstream science and correct their mistakes.

You haven't been to many science sites on the web, I take it? Crackpots never learn (by definition), are always hurt at how quickly their "novel ether theory" (identical to the last fifteen, with identical flaws, none of which were actually theories) gets dismissed, and they generally spout their nonsense with increasing venom until they are banned. Some of them are very superficially convincing, and a newcomer to a forum cannot necessarily tell who is giving them honest scientific answers and who is spouting nonsense.

Crackpots cannot be ignored because they actively attempt to poison others' chance to learn science. This is a huge and very real problem, weighed against a tiny risk of overlooking some hypothetical theory for a few more years. The universe will still be there, obeying the same laws.

If you think you have a new idea, write it down (but not on PF). Then learn about the relevant parts of science - learn what we know and how we understand it. Then look at your idea again. Maybe it's worth something and you can develop it. Most likely, though, you'll just smile at how little you knew when you wrote it.

 

[Ali Abbas]

Thnx for the clarifications experts! if you can help me get with peer reviewed journals, i would really be grateful. And i undoubtedly accept the fact of the "limited knowledge" thing, since i am inadequately qualified and educated. But I've done quiet a lot of research and gained knowledge about astrophysics and cosmology through net surfing, blogs, books and documentaries till the extent of the spheres of my interest and i am aware of most of the till date discoveries and accomplishments of modern physics and the raised mysteries in my fields and subjects of interest and curiosity. For which I've thought of theories and hypothesis with proofs that are supported by universally accepted laws.

 

[Ibix]

If you are familiar with the cutting edge of your field you must be reading journals. Choose one that has papers on topics similar to what you want to publish. Go to its webpage - it will tell you how to submit a paper.

 

[jtbell]

It is not PhysicsForums' missing to be a place where such ideas can be discussed. It has been tried before and it just doesn't work.

Our previous attempts to accommodate "new ideas" are described here:
https://www.physicsforums.com/help/speculation/

 

[DrClaude]

Our previous attempts to accommodate "new ideas" are described here:
https://www.physicsforums.com/help/speculation/

Thanks. I was looking for that link but didn't find it when I was writing my post. I also corrected the "missing" into "mission" in that quote of mine.

 

[Orodruin]

if you can help me get with peer reviewed journals, i would really be grateful.

The sad message here is that if you do not already know where to submit your theories, you are probably not well enough connected to the field to make a meaningful contribution. In order to have sufficient knowledge of the front-line to be able to contribute, you must follow the front-line research in the very same journals. Reading popular science and watching documentaries is not going to give you sufficient knowledge as they generally work with similes and analogies which have limited applicability.