That’s not a dissenting view; Vassar is pointing out ideas that we now know to be correct, and suggesting that we study how they were created in order to be better at creating new good ideas. That would be impossible if we didn’t have the present vantage point of knowing which ideas turned out correct and fruitful: at least for humans, solution checking is way easier than solution finding… that’s why we still don’t know if P=NP.
The history of science is very romantic and inspiring, precisely because we know which works to look to for inspiration. And of course, we should do that.
Vassar is pointing out ideas that we now know to be correct, and suggesting that we study how they were created in order to be better at creating new good ideas.
I believe Vassar’s point is that some of the ideas we now believe could actually be wrong (and in fact a lot of them probably are), and some older ideas might be closer to the truth.
Keep in mind that societies frequently reject ideas for reasons unrelated to their truth values.
Somewhat dissenting view: For progress to be by accumulation and not by random walk, read great books.
A really dissenting view from Robin Hanson.
That’s not a dissenting view; Vassar is pointing out ideas that we now know to be correct, and suggesting that we study how they were created in order to be better at creating new good ideas. That would be impossible if we didn’t have the present vantage point of knowing which ideas turned out correct and fruitful: at least for humans, solution checking is way easier than solution finding… that’s why we still don’t know if P=NP.
The history of science is very romantic and inspiring, precisely because we know which works to look to for inspiration. And of course, we should do that.
I believe Vassar’s point is that some of the ideas we now believe could actually be wrong (and in fact a lot of them probably are), and some older ideas might be closer to the truth.
Keep in mind that societies frequently reject ideas for reasons unrelated to their truth values.
I was making both points, the former for physics, the latter for almost all other fields.