Re: Terrence Howard on JRE #2125.
Could someone become an MMA fighter with not even a beginner’s belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and having never stepped into an Octagon?
Well, that’s the equivalent of Terrence Howard without even a Bachelor’s degree in anything, pretending to be a mathematician, and a physicist, and an astrophysicist. The idea is as absurd as all of his pseudo-scientific rantings.
Dear Mr. Rogan,
Terrence Howard lied to you, to Jimmy Kimmel, and to millions of people in your combined audiences that he had a PhD in Chemical Engineering. He doesnt, and never even finished a Bachelor’s degree.
He lied both times on your show that he has 97 patents, when at most anyone can find is 20-30.
He lied on your show that he had a patent on Virtual Reality, when all he had was an application that he let expire, not even responding to the first round of clarification/request for information.
He lied also about every claim he made in science and math.
You should acknowledge these facts in an episode to your listeners. You owe it to them, not to be giving any credence to his absurd ideas. You should set the record straight. He is not some misunderstood genius. He is a good actor, but an openly dishonest one that uses his skills to scam people without shame, without remorse, into thinking he is some sort of visionary genius, who is just plain wrong about everything he babbles on about in math and science.
You had Eric Weinstein, who does have a PhD in a field that is relevant to many of Terrence Howard’s claims (Mathematical Physics), fact-check him on Howard’s second appearance on your show. Weinstein shot down the vast majority of Howard’s claims in math and science. They are wrong. Completely. Sometimes Weinstein was blunt, using the terms bullshit and horseshit, other times rather conciliatory and leaving it unclear as to how wrong Terrence was.
Similarly Weinstein wouldn’t directly answer your question with Howard sitting right next to him:
“Is anything that he is saying correct?”
He didn’t answer. Instead he paused, and went into talking about Howard’s influences and his (Weinstein’s) possible misunderstandings of Howard’s diverse ideas.
He avoided your question and did not answer “Yes” – Weinstein could have if anything was correct, but he didnt, because nothing is.
He dodged saying “No” as well. Weinstein bent over backwards throughout the entire discussion to be rather gracious to Howard.
It was another tell that Weinstein strenuously avoided discussing Howard’s patents claims.
Weinstein did however, eventually verify all the same critiques Neil DeGrasse Tyson had made years earlier, but at times he was difficult to follow and it took the entire podcast to develop. In some moments Weinstein made it very clear that Howard was totally wrong, at other times, while being too nice, or going off into his own tangents of terminology few listeners could understand, or voicing his own beef with academia over publishing science, Weinstein merely added to the uncertainty of whether what was being said was nonsense or not. You owe it to your listeners to set the record straight clearly. There are plenty of qualified people who have already debunked Terrence Howard’s utterly wrong math and science pronouncements, and fact-checked his blatant lies, without being ambiguous about it.
When you asked, seemingly incredulous of Howard: “Then everyone else is wrong?” He immediately replied:
“Everyone else is wrong”…with absolutely no hesitation…almost laughing about it, he didn’t miss a beat.
The arrogance of Howard’s statement is astounding. The guy has phony credentials, very little science or math training, no publications – just a beginner’s education in but one field. The idea that Howard, or anyone else even with even a proper education and experience being stupendously correct and revolutionary across a dozen different scientific fields at the same time, while everyone else in those fields are stupendously wrong, and have been for decades, even centuries, is beyond ridiculous.
You owe that understanding to your listeners as well: that even a genius could be wrong about things outside their expertise. A modern-day Nobel prize winner doesn’t make spectacular discoveries or even propose theories in a dozen different fields of science or math. They often work for their entire careers to accomplish their one great breakthrough in their chosen field. The odds that an actor with the most minimal education – and no work at all in science or math, ever – could be spectacularly right in even one field – are next to zero, much less him having revolutionary insights in a dozen. It is completely absurd for any one, even at the genius level. Your audience deserves to hear that.
I received a PhD in Developmental Psychology late in life. I published my thesis and dissertation, but did not continue a research career. I have been a teacher for over 15 years now. I do know some things about teaching and Developmental Psych. But despite having a PhD, I am not a physicist, chemist, or mathematician. I am off my turf in any of those fields and readily acknowledge my lack of expertise. That is how those in science understand and talk about their limits. They defer to their colleagues who spend their lives in those fields and have expertise in them. Not Terrence Howard. This guy knows everything about everything in so much of science and math? How likely is that?
Consider this comparison of the education and expertise that go along with degrees in science or mathematics, to belts in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) which demonstrate similar levels of knowledge and expertise in that discipline:
1. White belt – similar to no more than a High School diploma. Just a BJJ beginner.
2. Blue belt – close to an Associates degree – 2 years of college-level study with an emphasis in some field. 2 years of BJJ training.
3. Purple belt – kinda like having a Bachelors degree – 4 years college study majoring in some field. 2 more solid years of BJJ training.
4. Brown belt – equivalent to a Masters degree – around 6 or more years of focused study in a field – and passing competency exams. A Masters takes another 18 months or more past a Bachelors – like earning a Brown belt beyond a Purple. Both are at a higher level of training and competition, and you must prove what you know.
5. Black belt – roughly equivalent to a PhD in a science or math, close to a dedicated 10 years of your life – the last 6 at the graduate level of intense study in that field. You can be a “Professor” in academia or in the academy gym with a black belt, and like a PhD, it may have taken 10 years to get to this level of knowledge and expertise.
6. Red Belt – Comparable to a full or Emeritus Professor, you’ve spent 30 years or more of dedicated training, and instruction in BJJ or in some field of math or science – fully immersed in it. Both are seasoned experts; one with often hundreds of publications, the other with hundreds of competitions, and training sparring “under their belt”.
I personally know nothing of any fighting style, never took any lessons of any kind. I have watched the occasional UFC bout on TV or YouTube – and that’s it. I enjoy watching MMA fights, and I understand the incredible hours these guys put in to achieve the skills needed to dare to step into the Octagon. It is the same way in academia: in science, math, chemistry, astronomy – what have you. You cant just read a few books or watch some YouTube videos to contribute to the advancement of science. You need to study and learn as hard as any MMA fighter learns and trains – and put in the same incredible amount of hours and dedication to know what you are talking about in science and math.
As I said Ive done no MMA training of any kind, but for sake of argument, suppose that I had ALMOST finished a purple belt in BJJ. That would be similar to Terrence Howard never quite finishing his Bachelors in Chemical Engineering. Further suppose that I came on somebody’s podcast and I started claiming how all of MMA is doing it wrong and I know how BJJ really works better than anyone – and they just wont listen to my ideas!!! And I claimed “everyone is wrong” just like Terrence Howard did on your show.
Maybe I sparred in training, but I never competed, never stepped into the Octagon for even one bout, ever. That would be equivalent to Terrence Howard’s never “getting in the ring” either: having never submitted a manuscript for getting a science paper of his research/ideas published – not even once!.
Think about it, someone like me with no actual knowledge or experience, other than being able to speak with some technical jargon and using some completely made-up nonsense terms as well, got on a podcast and rattled on just as confidently as Terrence Howard, but not about science or math, but about MMA and the many different fighting styles used in the Octagon. And everything I said was completely wrong – and implied that all of you who teach, train, practice, fight, judge, promote, referee, and commentate on MMA fighting styles have got it all wrong instead.
From what I have read about you, you were a tae-kwando champ and hold black belts in BJJ and have witnessed hundreds of UFC-MMA bouts and various other competitions. I doubt if I or anyone else could bullshit you about any of the fighting styles used in MMA. You and all your colleagues that have been involved in that field daily for years, for decades, would understandably be incensed if I went out and hosed people on another podcast about fighting styles, and got things completely wrong. Terrence Howard couldn’t bullshit all the scientists and mathematicians who have thoroughly trashed his nonsense either, and they are every bit as angry you and other MMA experts would be.
If the podcast was hosted by someone who had none of your MMA, BJJ, or other fighting style knowledge and experience, and they let me blather on making nonsense sentences which sound real plausible (and for 3 hours)- by using all the right fighting buzzwords to give the impression not only that I knew what I was talking about but that I was proving to the world that all of you in MMA – all you black belts and red belts included, were doing it all wrong…I think you’d want to set the record straight just as much as scientists and mathematicians do on Howard’s beyond ridiculous claims.
Imagine I just made stuff up – and not just about BJJ, but made ridiculous and obviously (to you and other experts) wrong claims about a dozen fighting styles—and Id never stepped into a ring anywhere, never competed, never finishing an intermediate belt in but one style. With that tiny bit of training, enough to throw around a lot of fighting style jargon to sound like I knew what I was talking about to the average person with little to no knowledge of any of the MMA disciplines: “armbar”,”chokehold” “Peruvian necktie” “heel hook” “triangle” and I’m telling the world that I’ve discovered things about BJJ, Tae Kwan do, Karate, Boxing, etc., etc., that nobody else knows!!!
And on top of it, I lied to this podcaster and his audience that I had a Black Belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, when I never got my purple belt. Just like Howard bullshitted everyone for a while that he actually earned a PhD.
Joe, you said it yourself that if some MMA ring announcer labeled a kick wrong, you’d be like…
“You dont even know what that is…you incorrectly referenced something that we have been using for years”.
EXACTLY! And you would know right away:
“This guy doesn’t know what he’s talking about”
THEN what if he continued and did it over and over again, not just mislabeling kickboxing, but BJJ holds or karate punches etc., and refused to be corrected and then went off on unrelated tangents to justify what he is talking about until he wasn’t even talking about that same kick or punch anymore – claiming things that made no sense or had no relevance…That is exactly what Terrence Howard does with every topic he dives into. He avoids any real answer by spewing more meaningless techno-babble.
Every educated person who has critiqued him: Weinstein, De Grasse Tyson, Sabine Hosenfelder, Professor Dave, Dr. Blitz, and many more – all PhD’s and/or science educators with Master’s degrees, have called him out on the misuse of terms that belie he really doesn’t understand them, and that his claims are either wrong or just plain nonsensical. Howard throws around terms like “angles of incidence”,”super-symmetry”, “Platonic Solids” “tones” “morphic resonances” and his mysterious “wave conjugations”(which dont exist). To the public, it may sound impressive, but it is as Weinstein said: horseshit.
Terrence Howard doesnt know anything more about science and math than I know about MMA. That is a fact that you should acknowledge.
Joe, I think you definitely owe your listeners a thorough debunking episode from one of the knowledgeable science communicators whom you have had on your show before; maybe Sean Carroll, or Lawrence Krauss, or Brian Cox, or someone like them – people who actually know something about physics, astrophysics, cosmology, astronomy, and mathematics – who have been practicing scientists and without their own personal axe to grind about the academic system (unlike Weinstein), and who haven’t critiqued Terrence Howard’s claims before.
You owe that to your listeners. They have been scammed by a good actor with little real knowledge beyond acting. You know as well as anyone in MMA how much expertise really matters. It is no different in science and math.
Sincerely,
bill z
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