The crisis in physics is not only about physics • Hacker News Board

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#21

Post by pxhb » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:18 PM UTC

Barrin92 wrote: post #13

knzhou wrote: post #8

As usual with Sabine, this article blatantly misrepresents how science is done and how actual scientists think, and serves mainly to portray herself as the only person in the field capable of rational thought. People in the comments here are picking up on this when it takes an unfair swipe at medicine, but it really applies to the whole article. I am not going to bother doing a line-by-line rebuttal, because I've alr…

> As usual with Sabine, this article blatantly misrepresents how science is done and how actual scientists think No offence but she is a trained physicist so she too is an 'actual scientist' by the very definition of the term. And she's completely right about the neglect of economic reasoning. The arguments against blowing 40 billion bucks on an accelerator that will likely not surface anything new is valid. Physicis…

> Almost any material hard metrics you look at like life expectancy, economic growth or whatever you could consider a sign of technological advancement, even tens of billions in investment seem to produce only marginal improvements. We are not living in the golden age of science.

As a knit pick, these metrics are all derivatives of science output, and not science itself. For example, detecting gravity waves does move the needle on any of these metrics, but it is still a great achievement for experimental physics.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#22

Post by dwaltrip » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:19 PM UTC

trixie_ wrote: post #18

It feels from the outside, academic research is performed by an individual or small group that culminates into a paper at the end. When attacking large problems in physics or biology this seems short sighted. A potentially better way would be to attack the problem in an organized manner with teams researching various aspects of the problem and building off of each other. Remove the whole 'paper writing/journal articl…

Yes, they do exist. See the CERN supercollider, LIGO, the DEMO fusion reactor, and many other projects.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#23

Post by ColanR » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:20 PM UTC

I wonder if what the author is observing is an effect of the industrialization of science. As she pointed out,

> Because the existing scientific system does not encourage learning. Physicists today can happily make career by writing papers about things no one has ever observed, and never will observe.

Maybe what's really going on is that almost every scientist out there is forced to chase grants and maintain a steady stream of publications. We have to give our scientists the ability to put long-term effort into projects that have a low likelyhood of payoff; otherwise research stagnates.

Also, it seems like the 'groupthink' she pointed out is a very real problem. Remember that weird EM drive associated with NASA? We all know that it's nearly impossible that it could be a valid phenomenon; but as a global scientific community, almost everyone dismissed it outright. We should all have jumped on it, to see if it could possibly be true, regardless of how outlandish. If we are unwilling to explore the boundaries of what we know, then we deserve to stagnate, and we will.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#24

Post by czbond » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:28 PM UTC

dannykwells wrote: post #2

This was great until the bit about medicine. Medicine has made huge, tremendous progress in the past 30 years. And there are still many serendipitous discoveries happening that lead to new drugs. I mean jesus for the first time ever, a company is going to put up a drug for approval to treat alzheimers. Let's not lump medicine in with physics, please. Medicine has always been skeptical of theories without data and, wh…

I disagree at the 'rank and file' level, which is different than Pharma. Pharma is mainly scientists and engineers paid for years to noodle a problem. Rank and file physicians are often Sensors (immediate world around them) and Feelers (tuned to people's feelings) - which are different than the personality traits required to push past status quo, take risks, and innovate.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#25

Post by OnlineGladiator » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

pxhb wrote: post #21

Barrin92 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As usual with Sabine, this article blatantly misrepresents how science is done and how actual scientists think No offence but she is a trained physicist so she too is an 'actual scientist' by the very definition of the term. And she's completely right about the neglect of economic reasoning. The arguments against blowing 40 billion bucks on an accelerator that will likely not surface anything new is valid. Physicis…

> Almost any material hard metrics you look at like life expectancy, economic growth or whatever you could consider a sign of technological advancement, even tens of billions in investment seem to produce only marginal improvements. We are not living in the golden age of science. As a knit pick, these metrics are all derivatives of science output, and not science itself. For example, detecting gravity waves does move…

I think his point is the science would be better served if it focused on solving problems for people, rather than exploring knowledge for the sake of it. But really I think that is the realm of engineering, and science is really just pursuing knowledge for the sake of it. It's impossible to know what will be useful - Richard Feynman thought it would be fun to analyze the flight characteristics of a flying plate. He later used the math he developed doing that to help him earn a Nobel prize.

https://www.asc.ohio-state.edu/kilcup.1/262/feynman.html

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#26

Post by Will_Parker » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

Robotbeat wrote: post #16

H8crilA wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that bothers me is that indeed it has been resolving inconsistencies that often lead to progress, as the author points out. What would you say to that? What are the still unresolved inconsistencies in physics? To me it feels more like that we just mostly ran out of the obvious inconsistencies to resolve.

Dark matter, dark energy, quantum gravity.

Consciousness :trollface:

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#27

Post by mfer » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:36 PM UTC

knzhou wrote: post #8

As usual with Sabine, this article blatantly misrepresents how science is done and how actual scientists think, and serves mainly to portray herself as the only person in the field capable of rational thought. People in the comments here are picking up on this when it takes an unfair swipe at medicine, but it really applies to the whole article. I am not going to bother doing a line-by-line rebuttal, because I've alr…

> actual scientists

and

> I am a working scientist, which means I have neither the time to keep up nor the audience.

For those that don't know about Sabine, who is criticized in the parent, you can read about her at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sabine_Hossenfelder

Short summary... she is a research fellow, theoretical physicist, and of course has a PhD in physics.

I fully expect scientists to disagree with each other. I even enjoy reading about their disagreements. But, to take shots at qualifications (even if in a passive aggressive manner) is rude. The tone of the parent attempts to dismiss her by making us feel she isn't a read scientist while in fact she's talking about her profession.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#28

Post by bumbledraven » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:37 PM UTC

knzhou wrote: post #8

As usual with Sabine, this article blatantly misrepresents how science is done and how actual scientists think, and serves mainly to portray herself as the only person in the field capable of rational thought. People in the comments here are picking up on this when it takes an unfair swipe at medicine, but it really applies to the whole article. I am not going to bother doing a line-by-line rebuttal, because I've alr…

You could at least link a few of your rebuttals so people can check your claims.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#29

Post by btrettel » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:37 PM UTC

ColanR wrote: post #23

I wonder if what the author is observing is an effect of the industrialization of science. As she pointed out, > Because the existing scientific system does not encourage learning. Physicists today can happily make career by writing papers about things no one has ever observed, and never will observe. Maybe what's really going on is that almost every scientist out there is forced to chase grants and maintain a steady…

The inability to make long-term investments is a major reason I don't intend to stay in academia after my PhD. Government and corporate labs don't seem better in my view either.

At present my plan is the following: Keep the amount of time spent making money to the minimum needed to support myself. Then I can invest my own time and money into research. I could make money from research via grants/contracts like normal academics, but that's not necessary in this scheme. I'm thinking about starting several SaaS businesses.

Re: The crisis in physics is not only about physics

#30

Post by jonbronson » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 7:37 PM UTC

"In the foundations of physics, we have not seen progress since the mid 1970s when the standard model of particle physics was completed."

This seems to discount the explosion of work in the foundations of theoretical physics. Most notably the many variations of String Theory. Just because the work has not yet produced experiments that can validate them do not mean they are not progress. It's some of the most exciting foundational work that's come for decades.