Forum seems less active compared to 10 years ago?

Mulz · Aug 29, 2023

I remember this forum being very lively and active about 5-10 years ago. What has happened since then? Sorry if this posting is inappropriate, I'm not frequently active myself so I've been out of the loop.

DaveC426913 · Aug 29, 2023

Oh, that's because we've answered all the questions.

“There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.”
- Lord Kelvin

Bystander · Aug 29, 2023

Mulz said:

I remember this forum being very lively and active about 5-10 years ago. What has happened since then? Sorry if this posting is inappropriate, I'm not frequently active myself so I've been out of the loop.

Weellllllll now, are you talking about "resolutions/enumerations" of "forbidden topics," climate/philosophy/politics/PMMs/et alii, or something else?

ProfuselyQuarky · Aug 29, 2023

Ha I joined when I was 15yo and it was definitely more lively then, it was like talking to friends at one point. That was the era of micro mass' math challenges and ProfuselyQuarky thinking math was the coolest thing ever. Now it's just a tool

I still come back periodically though

BillTre · Aug 29, 2023

Mulz said:

I remember this forum being very lively and active about 5-10 years ago. What has happened since then? Sorry if this posting is inappropriate, I'm not frequently active myself so I've been out of the loop.

Maybe everything just died when you abandoned the forum.
Thanks a lot!

hutchphd · Aug 29, 2023

Mulz said:

What has happened since then?

Perhaps you are are simply less easy to impress now. Cheap thrills and razzle dazzle just don't cut it anymore.......

?

Frabjous · Aug 29, 2023

You obviously have not read this thread
https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/wordle-lovers-play-the-nyt-daily-game

Borek · Aug 30, 2023

That's what happened to all forums, traffic moved to other sites. Switch to mobile devices changed demographic of the users and preferred site formats, google search results (which were always main source of newcomers) followed.

My understanding is that lately all sites from the Stack Exchange network lose their traffic, probably because people switch with their questions to ChatGPT based sites.

Bandersnatch · Aug 30, 2023

In other words, youth these days think forums are for cringe ah ah boomers.

PeroK · Aug 30, 2023

There do seem to be fewer homework threads. I don't know whether the numbers back that up.

Vanadium 50 · Aug 30, 2023

Why ask for help when a bot will give you the answer? Well, an answer.

fresh_42 · Aug 30, 2023

I guess it's partly because MathJax / LaTeX isn't very phone-friendly. And I have the hypothesis that many students have forgotten how to learn.

DaveC426913 · Aug 30, 2023

Vanadium 50 said:

Why ask for help when a bot will give you the answer? Well, an answer.

:engineering student of the future: learns from ChatGPT

:engineering of the future:

fresh_42 · Aug 30, 2023

DaveC426913 said:

:engineering student of the future: learns from ChatGPT

:engineering of the future:
View attachment 331237

They built a bridge between Germany and Switzerland and didn't meet in the middle. Both countries used a different definition of N.N.

BWV · Aug 30, 2023

DaveC426913 said:

Oh, that's because we've answered all the questions.

“There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement.”
- Lord Kelvin

But has there been any significant discoveries in physics over the past 10 years, or just more and more precise measurement?

ProfuselyQuarky · Aug 30, 2023

Personally I've gotten into the habit of just emailing people and asking to have one-on-one conversations for help or guidance. I'm consistently impressed with how many individuals are willing to simply converse, even though I'm no longer their student or never have been.

Bystander · Sep 3, 2023

PeroK said:

There do seem to be fewer homework threads. I don't know whether the numbers back that up.

Vanadium 50 said:

Why ask for help when a bot will give you the answer? Well, an answer.

fresh_42 said:

I guess it's partly because MathJax / LaTeX isn't very phone-friendly. And I have the hypothesis that many students have forgotten how to learn.

Wouldn't that imply an increase in the number of "drive-bys?"

fresh_42 · Sep 3, 2023

Bystander said:

Wouldn't that imply an increase in the number of "drive-bys?"

There are - in my opinion - several reasons for the decrease in the number of posts. E.g. I had answered a post and wanted to start a dialogue but minutes later the thread was deleted by another mentor despite my attempt to help. No chance. Not even a chance to explain our rules. We delete threads and user accounts at a level that is insane. We are way too strict with newbies if you ask me. And yes, I addressed those things before but was outvoted each time. This means that our customers apparently changed their internet behavior over the years but we do not. But as I said, this is only my point of view and other mentors do not share this opinion.

jack action · Sep 3, 2023

Just saying ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump#Political_career said:

Trump announced his candidacy in June 2015. His campaign was initially not taken seriously by political analysts, but he quickly rose to the top of opinion polls. He became the front-runner in March 2016 and was declared the presumptive Republican nominee in May.

[...]

Trump was inaugurated on January 20, 2017.

strangerep · Sep 3, 2023

BWV said:

But has there been any significant discoveries in physics over the past 10 years, or just more and more precise measurement?

Sheesh. Have a read of the past few years' worth of posts on Stacy McGaugh's Triton Station blog, then read some of the related astrophysical research literature. You'll see that we're currently being hurled around in a simmering sea of "WTF" discovery and controversy in the area of Dark Matter vs MOND. This is embryonic new science, still in the confusing, chaotic process of being made. (Insert cliche about sausages.)

"just more and more precise measurement" is a large part of what's keeping this fascinating sea on the boil. E.g., new Gaia data releases fuel intense debate about what's really going on with wide-binary star systems.

strangerep · Sep 3, 2023

ProfuselyQuarky said:

Now (math) is just a tool

Oh, c'mon. I reckon (advanced) math is still a "cool tool". :oldsmile:

lavinia · Sep 4, 2023

Maybe there is a decline in young people's interest in STEM.

nuuskur · Sep 4, 2023

Conclude that students, en masse, have become better at solving their homework or other resources have emerged or interest in natural sciences has been decreasing.

Frabjous · Sep 4, 2023

This topic is hard to discuss without statistics. Will they be released?

Vanadium 50 · Sep 4, 2023

Frabjous said:

This topic is hard to discuss without statistics. Will they be released?

The messages are all here. Feel free to count away.

Frabjous · Sep 4, 2023

Vanadium 50 said:

The messages are all here. Feel free to count away.

According to post #18, they are not.

StatGuy2000 · Sep 4, 2023

lavinia said:

Maybe there is a decline in young people's interest in STEM.

@lavinia , I am personally dubious of your claim that there might be a decline in young people's interest in STEM, mainly because you are presuming that people interested in STEM would necessarily come to PF first, as opposed to other sites on the Internet.

That being said, as @Frabjous has pointed out, it is difficult to assess the speculation you made without statistics on the following:

1. The posting history over the past several years (which, according to @Vanadium 50 as per his post #25, is available in raw form in terms of number of messages, and someone will have to actually count the number of posts).

2, The age distribution of the posters on the forums (which as far as I know is not consistently available).

Vanadium 50 · Sep 4, 2023

Is every single message from 10 years ago here? No.
Is every single message from 10 days ago here? No.
Spam gets removed, and crackpottery sometimes gets removed, and rarely non-crackpot instances of bad behavior get removed.

But counting seems like a better plan than "it seems to me".

Two things to watch for - one is that there have been reorganizations, so some sections didn't exist then, and another is that MHB content has been merged into PF.

Frabjous · Sep 4, 2023

Vanadium 50 said:

But counting seems like a better plan than "it seems to me".

That isn’t your argument. Your argument is that someone with only limited access to the processed data should do the counting.

Vanadium 50 · Sep 4, 2023

Hmmmm... I always thought I knew what my argument was, I guess I was wrong.

Greg Bernhardt · Sep 4, 2023

Mulz said:

I remember this forum being very lively and active about 5-10 years ago. What has happened since then? Sorry if this posting is inappropriate, I'm not frequently active myself so I've been out of the loop.

PF was likely a bit more active 10 years ago. There are many reasons for that, like Google algos, ChatGPT, Stackoverflows, social media etc, etc. However, we're still absolutely the single dominant science community on the internet. The quality of discussions continues to increase and community relationships are stronger than ever.

lavinia · Sep 4, 2023

StatGuy2000 said:

@lavinia , I am personally dubious of your claim that there might be a decline in young people's interest in STEM, mainly because you are presuming that people interested in STEM would necessarily come to PF first, as opposed to other sites on the Internet.

That being said, as @Frabjous has pointed out, it is difficult to assess the speculation you made without statistics on the following:

1. The posting history over the past several years (which, according to @Vanadium 50 as per his post #25, is available in raw form in terms of number of messages, and someone will have to actually count the number of posts).

2, The age distribution of the posters on the forums (which as far as I know is not consistently available).

You are absolutely correct. I was throwing it out there partly because my anecdotal experience has seen what appears to be a shift in the interests of young people. I did look for articles and there does seem to be data that shows a decline in interest in STEM but I didn't post any links because I have no way to evaluate the surveys. Still if you like it would be interesting to see if any of these studies carry statistical significance.

My observation in the mathematics forum is that the frequency of good questions and follow up dialogue has declined.

I have no opinion about the other forums .

A thought I had after watching Oppenheimer was that the success of the A Bomb and the onset of the Cold War made STEM a national priority and young people were inspired to be part of the great national STEM project. Today I see pessimism about the social benefit of science. There is a huge change. The bomb is no longer sexy as it was in the 1950's (In fact, the bikini bathing suit was named after Bikini Atoll. Talk about a woman being a bombshell.) Rather it is the instrument of doom. Monsanto's maxim "Better Living Through Chemistry" has been exchanged for pessimism about industrial agriculture, food additives, Big Pharma,and so on. Today, applied science is seen to be destroying the planet whereas in Oppenheimer's day it was seen to be increasing well being and personal freedom. Many people I talk to even see "Western Science" as a failure for humanity. So it would not surprise me if the interest in STEM has declined.

StatGuy2000 · Sep 4, 2023

lavinia said:

You are absolutely correct. I was throwing it out there partly because my anecdotal experience has seen what appears to be a shift in the interests of young people. I did look for articles and there does seem to be data that shows a decline in interest in STEM but I didn't post any links because I have no way to evaluate the surveys. Still if you like it would be interesting to see if any of these studies carry statistical significance.

My observation in the mathematics forum is that the frequency of good questions and follow up dialogue has declined.

I have no opinion about the other forums .

A thought I had after watching Oppenheimer was that the success of the A Bomb and the onset of the Cold War made STEM a national priority and young people were inspired to be part of the great national STEM project. Today I see pessimism about the social benefit of science. There is a huge change. The bomb is no longer sexy as it was in the 1950's (In fact, the bikini bathing suit was named after Bikini Atoll. Talk about a woman being a bombshell.) Rather it is the instrument of doom. Monsanto's maxim "Better Living Through Chemistry" has been exchanged for pessimism about industrial agriculture, food additives, Big Pharma,and so on. Today, applied science is seen to be destroying the planet whereas in Oppenheimer's day it was seen to be increasing well being and personal freedom. Many people I talk to even see "Western Science" as a failure for humanity. So it would not surprise me if the interest in STEM has declined.

It is interesting what you seem to have witnessed, because I have seen other anecdotal reports indicating that young people have had an increased interest in science and technology, at least in terms of which fields to pursue their studies. Some of this may be motivated due to the perception of better career opportunities with a STEM degree, but there is also a genuine interest I detect in applying the understanding developed from science to help address and solve the pressing problems of our day, such as climate change.

So I do not see the extent of the pessimism of the social benefit of science that you speak of.

What I do see is the questioning of the social benefit of big business (e.g. Monsanto, Big Pharma) and to a certain degree of capitalism more generally, often due to legitimate cases of abuses over the years (with the caveat that this is also anecdotal -- I do not have data or statistics to back up my speculation here). This pessimism you speak of is not new (in fact, aspects of this can be traced all the way back to the 1970s and 1980s), and which I feel is separate to people's attitudes to science (especially the younger generations today). I won't speak much further about this, as this would veer the topic toward broader political issues which are outside the purview of PF.

Nugatory · Sep 4, 2023

lavinia said:

A thought I had after watching Oppenheimer was that the success of the A Bomb and the onset of the Cold War made STEM a national priority and young people were inspired to be part of the great national STEM project.

A bit of digression....
It was indeed the Cold War, and the specific catalyst was the Soviet Union's Sputnik launch.

Tom.G · Sep 5, 2023

lavinia said:

Today, applied science is seen to be destroying the planet whereas in Oppenheimer's day it was seen to be increasing well being and personal freedom.

A case of more data points yields more accurate conclusions? (I hope not!)

Forum seems less active compared to 10 years ago?

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