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Even Physicists Are 'Afraid' of Mathematics

posted by janrinok on Sunday November 13 2016, @04:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the you-can-count-on-it dept.

AnonTechie writes:

Physicists avoid highly mathematical work despite being trained in advanced mathematics, new research suggests. The study, published in the New Journal of Physics, shows that physicists pay less attention to theories that are crammed with mathematical details. This suggests there are real and widespread barriers to communicating mathematical work, and that this is not because of poor training in mathematical skills, or because there is a social stigma about doing well in mathematics.

Dr Tim Fawcett and Dr Andrew Higginson, from the University of Exeter, found, using statistical analysis of the number of citations to 2000 articles in a leading physics journal, that articles are less likely to be referenced by other physicists if they have lots of mathematical equations on each page. [...] Dr Higginson said: "We have already showed that biologists are put off by equations but we were surprised by these findings, as physicists are generally skilled in mathematics.

"This is an important issue because it shows there could be a disconnection between mathematical theory and experimental work. This presents a potentially enormous barrier to all kinds of scientific progress."

http://phys.org/news/2016-11-physicists-mathematics.html

[Abstract]: Statistical Analysis of the Effect of Equations on Citations

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday November 13 2016, @09:53PM

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday November 13 2016, @09:53PM (#426356) Journal
    The next harmonic for a square wave would be at 34 kHz. So if you can hear that high a frequency, you would hear some sort of difference. It's worth noting here that 17 kHz is near or past the edge of most normal human hearing.