On science sounding.
You all know what Italian sounding means. It is that habit of some brands, especially food and fashion brands, of giving things that seem Italian names, using the credibility of Italy to give credibility to themselves. So let's go, Fingerfussimo, the finger food with the Italian style. Lieferando, home delivery of food with an Italian sound. And Giovannoso Caterpilli, fashion designer. Frisoriana, the hair salon chain with Italian style. And so on.
This thing is obviously a scam, because it's about increasing the value of something that has little, stealing credibility from those who have built it by working seriously for a long time.
But it only happens in some Italian sectors. It is also happening to technology and science.
That is, it happens, and it happens more and more, that when a person is about to say something completely aprioristic, all he has to do is insert words taken from the field of technology or science to win the discussion.
- Arancine is more carrier grade than arancini.
- Boobs are less scalable than ass.
- Guanciale has more failover than pancetta in the case of carbonara-high-demand.
- It has been scientifically proven that tortellini needs broth and not cream.
- Alba Parietti is not portable.
- The Meloni government is not stochastically independent.
This science sounding is gaining ground because science and technology have made great strides in recent decades. In doing so, they have acquired credibility to the point that many, lacking in credibility, are considering stealing a little bit from the STEM world, taking advantage of sound.
Thus was born the fraudulent world of STEM-sounding.
Like the Italian sounding, those who buy it usually have no problems whatsoever. I mean, if you go to Koenigsallee and pay a fortune for a Caponardo Spinterogeni dress, you're normally also stupid enough to be happy to dress "Italian".
If anything, the problem is when you're Italian, you pass through Koenigsallee, and you see the boutique with the words “CAPONARDO SPINTEROGENI”, and you stop to take a selfie for your friends, to capture that fucking name.
Likewise, you happen to live in a technical industry. And when someone, usually a supplier, mentions how efficient something is, they figure it out, and usually tell you how. It is therefore normal to say "how did you calculate it?" or “under what conditions?”.
There are many STEM fields where efficiency is used as a quantified, or quantifiable concept. If outside these fields the lump sum use of these words is entirely questionable, the problem is that one should avoid breaking into a technical discussion and making a lump sum use of them: in the world of technology words have a precise meaning . Or we are in the world of fluff.
An example is the concept of "biodegradable". Although a general definition is clear (as you find "efficient" in the dictionary, before discussing – matter by matter – how a given efficiency is calculated), one is led to think that "biodegradable" indicates a unique and measurable characteristic of a material.
In contrast, biodegradability has a rather loose definition:
https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodegradazione
The problem with this definition is that it leaves several options open:
- There is an enzyme that biodegrades a given plastic, and the result is a biological by-product capable of exterminating all life forms within a radius of kilometres: it is still biodegradable.
- There is a biological mechanism capable of biodegrading the material, but beyond a certain amount secondary damage appears: pig shit is biodegradable, but when millions of cubic meters were poured into the Po, mucilage appeared in the Adriatic.
- The material is biodegradable and disappears when mineralized, but the surrounding ecosystem is heavily modified.
In practice, that is, plastics can all become biodegradable, end up in the sea and be digested, but if the small side effect is that the sea tastes like Albano and Romina, maybe even better not.
The concept of biodegradable, that is, is centered on the fact that a given material disappears in a certain amount of time, completely forgetting the consequences that this process has on the environment.
But it sounds scientific: “there is at least one enzyme that consumes it”. WOW. EWWIWA enzymes?
In reality, a biodegradable material can devastate the environment both in the act of biodegrading itself and due to the products of biodegradation, depending on the quantities, without the "scientific" criterion being touched.
But "biodegradable" sounds scientific enough to suggest that it means, with absolute precision, that the material in question is environmentally neutral.
Another trick that has recently become more and more common is the use of terminology and techniques typical of big data analytics.
An example is the column of Gabanelli. I used to read this “data room” in the past, for one reason: it hadn't entered the IT field yet. And until an in-depth program enters YOUR sector, you really can't figure out if he's telling the truth or if he's cooking bullshit together, so few are the experts.
Then, at a certain point, she entered my field several times. And there I saw piles of bullshit and data with professional cherry-picking, which lost all credibility for me. Because I can't know how serious Gabanelli is when she talks about giraffes, all I can know is in my field. But once you establish that he's lining up bullshit in one field, it's hard to believe he's speaking the truth in other fields.
However, his articles are a science-sounding masterpiece, which Starbucks' Frapuccino Venti Latte makes its home.
First of all, in the name "dataroom" he put "data" in it, and not that I know "data": a guarantee of objectivity, if you use the "data". I could tell you facts about when I was a data engineer, but let's forget it.
Then the abuse of infographics never fails: nothing says science like a time series graph:
Above all, I want to point out the COMIC part of an article online today, which points out that Italians who continue to work after retirement are all in good health. After all, dying of a heart attack and working are not so suitable, but the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions does not touch the sharp mind of Gabanelli, who does not understand that her data can be read in two ways:
- those who work after retirement are healthy, so working helps to be healthy.
- only those who are healthy work after retirement, so being healthy helps to work.
Obviously, Gabanelli chooses the wrong reading.
But with infographics, it looks like science.
In general, I recommend reacting to science-sounding as we expats do when an "Italian" restaurant offers Lasagne al Pesto.
You go to the Japanese to eat Ramen.
Which is a Chinese recipe.