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Proud to be...
...the first person to post an entry on Ms. Mersini-Houghton's talk page, sort of like being the first to post on Albert Einstein's talk page before he was Albert Einstein. What I wanted to say was that the lede should have more data about her important contributions, imnho. Will do some of that a little later if a more knowledgable science geek doesn't come around and do so. Aleister Wilson 12:43 April 17, 2012 (UTC)
foot note 4
I can't see where the said predictions are made in the referenced paper. Please could we get a more detailed reference or corrected reference? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.241.51.77 (talk) 20:37, 13 October 2012 (UTC)
Mersini's alleged predictions
I've copied the following from the Multiverse article's Talk page, as it seeems relevant here too:
Can anybody check whether she even claimed in 2007 to have predicted the CMB Cold spot in 2006, let alone whether the 2006 paper contains such a prediction? I can't access the 2007 reference at all, and can only access the summary of the referenced 2006 paper which does indeed predicted possible voids, but it's unclear how well the detailed predictions match what was detected. In any case, due to my limited knowledge of Physics, I probably wouldn't be sure what detailed predictions had been made, even if I could access the full paper. But at least one anonymous contributor to the Mersini Talk page claims he sees no clear predictions in 'the referenced paper', though I don't even know if it's the same paper as the one currently referenced. There's also the problem that I seem to recall a 'great void' having being discovered long before 2006, admittedly by direct observation rather than via CMB data, but it would suggest that a vague prediction of possible voids might not be particularly impressive. This is similar to the problem with 'predictions' about Dark Flow, where a flow towards the so-called Great Attractor had been known about since the 1970s, as pointed out in the Dark Flow article. And I'm unable to even find where to link her third alleged prediction, nor to find any discussion of its significance. But I remember looking at the WMAP article yesterday, and if I understand right, the Mersini article has her 'predicting' in 2006 a fluctuation value below 1, when it was already 0.9 +/- 0.1 before 2006 on the WMAP data. I think it's important (due WP:NPOV) to balance claims that Multiverse theories are untestable, and so on. But I am a bit worried that I may be unwittingly spreading some questionable fantasies of some Mersini fan club (one of whom already implies on her Talk page that she's the next Einstein).Tlhslobus (talk) 14:45, 8 February 2013 (UTC)
I have now had another look at the WMAP article. The fluctuation (sigma_8) picture seems just as unsatisfactory:
The Laura Mersini article says:
In the same year (2006) WMAP reached agreement with SDSS experiment, that the overall amplitude of fluctuation is less than 1. If these observational findings, predicted in the 2006 papers by Mersini-Houghton et al. are confirmed over the next few years, then they may offer the first evidence of a universe beyond our own.
The summary of her referenced December 2006 paper says:
We show that the effect of the string corrections is to suppress $\sigma_8$ and the CMB $TT$ spectrum at large angles, thereby bringing WMAP and SDSS data for $\sigma_8$ into agreement.
But the WMAP article gives the following sigma_8 data:
1year data (released Feb 2003) Fluctuation amplitude at 8h−1 Mpc (sigma_8) WMAP data only 0.9±0.1 — data from all sources 0.84±0.04
3 year data (released Mar 2006) Fluctuation amplitude at 8h−1 Mpc (sigma_8) WMAP data only 0.761+0.049 −0.048 — data from all sources not given
5 year data (released Feb 2008) Fluctuation amplitude at 8h−1 Mpc (sigma_8) WMAP data only 0.796±0.036 — data from all sources 0.812±0.026
7 year data (released Feb 2010) Fluctuation amplitude at 8h−1 Mpc (sigma_8) WMAP data only 0.801±0.030 — data from all sources 0.809±0.024
9 year data (released Dec 2012) Density fluctuations at 8h−1 Mpc (sigma_8) WMAP data only 0.821±0.023 — data from all sources 0.820+0.013 −0.014
Far from the Mersini article's assertion that WMAP reached agreement with SDSS in 2006 that fluctuation was less than 1, the fluctuation was seemingly always less than 1 (or just possibly equal to 1 at the upper end of the 2003 range of possible WMAP-data-only values), so this was hardly something 'predicted' by Mersini et al.in 2006 as claimed in the article. But the WMAP value dropped dramatically in March 2006, suggesting that WMAP and SDSS no longer agreed (though this is not actually stated), and that in December 2006 Mersini et al are offering an explanation for why they are different and how they can be brought back into agreement. But any such disagreement doesn't persist, as the 2008 to 2012 data shows. So quite likely the data shows that Mersini et al are wrong. Quite likely this means that their theory was a testable and falsifiable theory which has been tested and falsified - which, if correct, would actually be a rather important answer to the criticism that Multiverse theories are unscientific because they make no falsifiable predictions. And a similar conclusion may also be available from some of her other predictions. But I don't know enough to say whether any such conclusion is actually warranted. Does anybody else know enough to say so? Tlhslobus (talk) 16:39, 8 February 2013 (UTC)
Structural POV error
Section Research, paragraph two claims:
- Soon after the discovery of the landscape,
sounds like some natural phenomenon was discovered. Instead, what was discovered was that one in string theory can find 10 levels of false vacua. From my sceptical POV, this means that what was discovered, was that the string theory lost one other prediction value, rather than that it described a multitude of universes. The multiverse hypothesis used to detect the existence of foreign universes? Even though the article actually describes testable theories that have some prediction values, a reader may get the impression that the text provides some kind of circular reasoning covered up behind some reification fallacy. Rursus dixit. (bork!) 12:48, 12 September 2013 (UTC)
This article needs serious work
It seems to me that the tone of the article is problematic. The description of her areas of interest also seems poorly organised.
Also, why is her education written in bullet form when most other wikipedia articles do it in standard prose? (unsigned by User:24.44.0.54.
COI, sources
Agree with sentiment of last few comments here - this article needs a WP:NPOV / WP:OR / WP:SYN / WP:V check, and rebasing on secondary sources. I tagged as such. Widefox; talk 09:24, 13 June 2014 (UTC)
Move for article speedy deletion
This article is irrelevant. Not every educator can get their article on Misplaced Pages, see Misplaced Pages:Notability (academics). This individual doesn't seem to meet the notability criteria and contents such as claims of prediction lack credibility. Besides, the article has been suffering from numerous problems for too long to be ignored any further; the tags make it look like a Christmas tree. The bragging is prevalent, namely the way "achievements" are blown out of proportion without reliable references to support the claimed "prediction genius" of this individual, and so on. It all points to turbo POV, bordering on delusional even. So I move for speedy deletion of this junk. Holybeef (talk) 03:44, 4 July 2014 (UTC)
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