I completely concur with your point that people shouldn't throw out the existing experimental evidence. I think there is far to much "wishing for new physics" going on.
At the end of the day I want experimental research done, and more importantly I want science to embrace greater value in "reproduction" of existing research. The bias the current "publish or perish" system has developed towards the novelty of each item of research, hurts the foundations of knowledge. Painstaking hard work on the reproduction of an experiment is valuable. Yes there's a reduction in value for each successive reproduction, but the bulk of modern science sadly never gets any reproduction at all.
The EagleWorks team may only succeed in reproducing the past work on resonant cavities, but I see no shame or reason why they can't as scientists decide "we want to measure this $foo, because these exact permutations have not yet been tested". So we gain one more data point, we rule out one more thing, this is the essence of science and I just can't in good conscience be negative about it.
If we focus on only the waste of money and resources... Congress literally forces NASA to be much more wasteful as an entire organisation, in this environment, singling out EW feels like mandating smaller font sizes in order to save on paper costs. The biggest examples I can immediately think of are the entire SLS boondoggle, and the Constellation program complete with the crown jewel of NASA's waste in the last two decades, the A-3 test stand. I'm pretty happy with how I see EagleWorks operating budget wise compared to the rest of all of NASA.
At the end of the day I want experimental research done, and more importantly I want science to embrace greater value in "reproduction" of existing research. The bias the current "publish or perish" system has developed towards the novelty of each item of research, hurts the foundations of knowledge. Painstaking hard work on the reproduction of an experiment is valuable. Yes there's a reduction in value for each successive reproduction, but the bulk of modern science sadly never gets any reproduction at all.
The EagleWorks team may only succeed in reproducing the past work on resonant cavities, but I see no shame or reason why they can't as scientists decide "we want to measure this $foo, because these exact permutations have not yet been tested". So we gain one more data point, we rule out one more thing, this is the essence of science and I just can't in good conscience be negative about it.
If we focus on only the waste of money and resources... Congress literally forces NASA to be much more wasteful as an entire organisation, in this environment, singling out EW feels like mandating smaller font sizes in order to save on paper costs. The biggest examples I can immediately think of are the entire SLS boondoggle, and the Constellation program complete with the crown jewel of NASA's waste in the last two decades, the A-3 test stand. I'm pretty happy with how I see EagleWorks operating budget wise compared to the rest of all of NASA.