He cannot handle equations, and when one points out his errors by changing the mathematical equations he still fails to grasp his errors.
The difference between the practitioner and the beginning student is that the former seamlessly shifts between a conceptual knowledge of the problem and the formulation of the problem quantitatively.
For example, the computation of energy lost to braking and the kinetic energy of a particle have quantitative formulations that describe the relationships among all the quantities. But the conceptual understanding is the knowledge that braking subtracts from kinetic energy because that's what it means in the natural world for something to have -- and lose -- kinetic energy. A knowledgeable practitioner understands why you divide in a particular case, or subtract, or do whatever algebra is required to embody, represent, and comprehend the actual behavior. Students who never develop that third-eye clarity of why the formulas work to describe the actual observable behavior never become competent practitioners.
In layman's terms, this is what we mean when we say something has "clicked." The comprehensive gestalt understanding of any body of knowledge and its various representations simultaneously seems to occur most often as an epiphany. Off topic, but I think one of the best examples is that moment when you finally realize how the eccentric works in a Wankel rotary engine.
I've taught physics to 1st and 2nd year undergraduates, and at that stage they are developing models and concepts, not analysing real world problems. The latter happens much later, and cannot happen until they achieved the former.
I too have taught physics without calculus and it's much harder to convey appropriate concepts. Still, you want to start people as early as possible in their intellectual development with, as you say, the models and concepts. But the notion of integrating flux over time or integrating energy over a distribution of wavelengths is an important basic concept. Seeing those patterns in the formulations and realizing that it corresponds to a somewhat abstract concept in the underlying behavior: It has to happen at some time before the student graduates to practice.
Jarrah has shown (again) what happens when one has a little knowledge but no real practical understanding.
I.e., when one just Googles but never actually
does. That's why, when I ask for a person's background as it becomes relevant, I ask for "adjudicated" training or education in a field. The adjudication is what helps determine whether the person has mastered the topic. Adjudication can be real-world experience if, for example, one's successful mastery of a skill or concept correlates to something important -- say, one's livelihood. As I said, some of the best engineers I've worked with don't have engineering degrees. The one I'm thinking of, however, builds racing engines and competes with them. For the purposes of his (related) employment, that was sufficient to adjudicate his knowledge of mechanics, chemistry, thermodynamics, and all the relevant things you learn in your first few years of engineering school. Trophies and ribbons suggest he really does know how to build high-performance engines basically from scratch.
Academic credentials are also important. They certify a suitable survey of the breadth of the field. And the credential implies the adjudication of knowledge, if only at the propositional level. At least in engineering, a degree exemplifies a fair amount of lab and shop work that should suffice. But obviously the best knowledge comes from suitable rigor in both the propositional understanding and the practical execution.
I don't wish to sound like I am blowing my own trumpet, but as a physicist with 25 years experience I have a deep understanding...
That's a tune worth tooting. What Jarrah and other conspiracy theorists fail to understand is how easy, comfortable, and downright familiar these concepts can be to the people who use them daily and must succeed at them by mastery. I gather the typical conspiracist, fumbling his way through the problems as Jarrah does, genuinely believes what he's attempting is as hard for everyone else as it is for him, and that the uncertainties he encounters and the simplifications he applies are status quo for the field. The conspiracist never grasps how intuitive the accurate and true behavior of the universe appears to those with appropriate practical understanding, and thus how abysmally naive and wrong their efforts actually appear to the trained practitioner. In the worst case he may actually believe that his bumbling foray is no worse for wear than any other treatise in the field -- i.e., that he can simply throw a lot of mud and handwaving against the wall and that "somehow" it will still amount to a serviceable conclusion.
He's been banging his drum long enough. It is time for him to defend his work.
I agree, but for obvious reasons he won't. He has set himself up in strong opposition to the mainstream. So his rhetoric is and must be that the mainstream will do whatever it takes to unseat him. He doesn't need to face the mainstream in order to keep his fans, so he has no incentive. In other words, he treads a path calculated to achieve the benefit of the doubt among his fans that he is some sort of Wunderkind, whereas an actual adjudication would obviously resolve the doubt rather forcefully.
Fair point and one I agree with.
To be sure, he has called out me, Phil Plait, and others by name. For now his antics simply amuse my clients. But at a certain point, whether abstractly or concretely considered, his actions impugning another's reputation must be shown to have a factual basis. He is not entitled to build his reputation dishonestly forever at the expense of others, but there is a threshold below which any formal censure is impractical. I suspect he intends to fly just under the radar indefinitely.
To clarify, I feel sorry for him as I think something has clearly gone wrong in his life given the emotional investment he has with two relative strangers such as Ralph Rene and Bill Kaysing. If he were a relative of mine, this alone would give me cause for concern.
Yes, there's that. All his rhetoric aside, there is enough visible in his life to argue that his choo-choo jumped the track in a pitiable way. His fanatical fixation on Rene and Kaysing as mentors, and his equally fanatical fixation on me and others as enemies, his foul mouth and uncontrolled temper. I would retreat a bit and agree these are likely signs of something possibly beyond his immediate control.
However it is difficult at times to separate what may be an unfortunate condition in his life from aspects that are clearly contrived and deliberate, such as his constant misrepresentation of factually discernible things. It is one thing to act out for some reason that makes sense to him. It is quite another thing to look directly into the face of a fact and deny it, or to take other actions more likely explicable as deliberate attempts to gain or save face.
[Van Allen's opinion] [d]ismissed out of hand by Jarrah at the beginning of his video...
Case in point. Jarrah knew of and had ample opportunity to verify the quote himself with Dr. Van Allen. However, attempts to suggest the quote was fabricated didn't arise until after Van Allen died. I view that as specifically and deliberately disingenuous. It's not the action of a troubled mind, but rather than of a deviously misdirected mind. Ditto Wade Frazier and Brian O'Leary -- Jarrah was directly challenged to confirm with Frazier the nature of our group correspondence over which he quibbled, but he expressly refused to do it. He had to have suspected the strong likelihood that Frazier would confirm my evaluation, and thus Jarrah devolved into the sort of ham-fisted tap-dancing that characterizes his
unwillingness to face facts.
There is, in my experience, a vast difference between the obfuscatory rhetoric of someone laboring under a valid delusion, and that of someone simply looking to deceive. The former prevarications are well-honed and considerably airtight, while the latter are especially ham-fisted and clumsy. I believe most of Jarrah's awkward evasions of verifiable fact are explained by deliberation, not by delusion.
