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Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

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Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#211

Post by dang »

lazide wrote: post #209
dang wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something. " " Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. " https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Hardly a shallow dismissal dang, as the replies show. It’s a very valid critique of where it has ended up, and goes right to the heart of the underlying problem. The challenge is if it’s intentional from the start, or merely ended up being intentional at the end eh? And the folks arguing that the underlying critique are false, as shown in the follow-ups, are wrong. If anything, it’s just getting downvotes because peo…

Sorry, but your GP comment consisted of nothing but putdowns—not just of an entire field but of the people working in it. That is a classic shallow dismissal in the sense that we use the term. Not a borderline call!

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#212

Post by lll-o-lll »

randomNumber7 wrote: post #136
btilly wrote: post #4

The fundamental reason for this is simple. Humans are prone to cognitive dissonance. Meaning, we do absurd things to avoid painful thoughts. And anything that questions our sense of identity, is a painful thought. So if my self-image is, "I've advanced our understanding of the fundamental nature of reality," then the idea that my contributions weren't useful becomes painful. So we avoid thinking it, challenge people…

To extend this, group dynamics can come into play too. I once worked at a startup that developed fancy new tec. The group dynamic there was that critical thinking absolutely did not exist. The reason was probably that they accepted only people in their circle, that had the same burning positive attitude towards the idea. This can become a self reinforcing circle, because critically thinking people will leave at some…

Off topic, but a bent towards irrational optimism is necessary for progress. Generally, positive bias is needed for good mental health.

Probability shows that your idea will almost certainly fail, but you can’t believe that and put in the necessary effort to make it succeed.

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#213

Post by Risord »

Risord wrote: post #187
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone claiming that string theory is part of "the standard model", when proposing their alternative theory, is probably a crank. Anyone deriving "E=mc²", and claiming that as evidence of their theory, is almost certainly a crank.

Sometimes I am wondering what if there is theory which have been on right track but it's (false?) falsified and already forgotten. Sure theory could be incomplete or incorrect on some ways but would that right part be noticed? For example I think it's too easy to imagine world where relativity or quantum theory would be socially falsified and/or left without any attention. Simple example experience I had when I was b…

Btw this potential false falsify also popped up newest Sabine's video: https://youtu.be/NHrL4fkyWKI?si=nCuagTnP3WJIDbSv

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#214

Post by versteegen »

throwawaymaths wrote: post #133
ants_everywhere wrote: post #40

My understanding of the situation (which may be wrong, in which case please let me know) is that physics is stuck at a local optimum. There are two obvious ways to get out (1) Surprising physical observations, or (2) Mathematical advances Way (1) is what kicked off quantum mechanics. Way (2) is what kicked off Newtonian mechanics. I see string theorists and loop quantum gravity people as working on (2). Their models…

Name a single physics phenomenon that was discovered purely with way 2. I can only think of one, the positron. Newtonian physics was not kicked off by math "advances". Approximately speaking it was the other way, Newton created the math to explain p^2 ~ r^3, which was a surprising observation. Even theory of relativity wasn't really a math advance, the math was already mostly worked out by mach, lorenz, and minkowski…

Bose-Einstein statistics, which originated purely from finding a derivation of an equation, without immediately understanding of the true physical meaning of the derivation.

And then Bose-Einstein condensates; a thought-experiment consequence of Bose-Einstein statistics.

Radio waves etc., from formulating Maxwell's equations.

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#215

Post by jiggawatts »

Risord wrote: post #187
wizzwizz4 wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone claiming that string theory is part of "the standard model", when proposing their alternative theory, is probably a crank. Anyone deriving "E=mc²", and claiming that as evidence of their theory, is almost certainly a crank.

Sometimes I am wondering what if there is theory which have been on right track but it's (false?) falsified and already forgotten. Sure theory could be incomplete or incorrect on some ways but would that right part be noticed? For example I think it's too easy to imagine world where relativity or quantum theory would be socially falsified and/or left without any attention. Simple example experience I had when I was b…

My theory is that physics went down a parallel path that leads to a dead end. The fork was too far back and nobody is willing to backtrack enough. A part of this is that almost all of modern physics takes mathematical shortcuts of dubious validity because “modern” physics was developed in the era of pencil and paper. With computer algebra systems and numerical methods new have available to us now a lot of old assumptions ought to be revisited.

Also some theories were ignored for political or even religious reasons. Or as you said, they couldn’t fix some basic issue at the time and just shelved the theory.

Some random examples:

The Many Worlds Interpretation is one of the least “popular” but the only sane and consistent theory of Quantum Mechanics.

One of Einstein’s last collaborations was Kaluza Klein theory which has many excellent features such as smoothly integrating EM and gravitational effects. The maths was too hard at the time so it languished.

Multiple time dimensions (a variant of MWI above) were all completely ignored because one paper “disproved” their feasibility. I read that paper and it only disproved a specific subset of theory space.

Etc…

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#216

Post by BoiledCabbage »

elashri wrote: post #210
BoiledCabbage wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sabine's argument has been frequently bad faith after the fact and currently. Just skimming some of her written work: I want to make sure to clarify your point before continuing. Are you saying that Sabine makes arguments in bad faith? Or are you saying that Sabine is saying that many physicists are making arguments in bad faith? I believe that you are stating the former - but I want to make sure of that before con…

I don't want to discuss whether sabine is making argument in bad faith or not. Or if she us just cherry picking claims from couple of researchers among thousands working/ed on LHC. But it is inaccurate to say the LHC is built to search for supersymmetry. The original motivation for LHC was Higgs search, we didn't have enough energy in Tevatron so people proposed LHC. There are other motivations like studying dark mat…

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

I think you might be inadvertently side-stepping my point. My argument was not about whether the LHC should have been built. It was about whether or not it was a valid justification put forward. I think the LHC should have been built. And while I can't say for sure, I'm pretty sure Sabine would as well. I think in that same video she calls out that it was built for the Higgs, so no discrepancy there.

But it still side steps the point - which is a false justification being provided by people who either should have or did know better - and that never being acknowledged or addressed.

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#217

Post by btilly »

reshlo wrote: post #145
btilly wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right that these were not the only people working on the set of problems that lead to QM. Lots of people were thinking about the same problems at the same period of time. And lots more added to it later. But what key concept underlying how we now think about QM doesn't go back to this list of people? OK, add Richard Feynman if you want to include the second breakthrough to QED. Ideas that look like conceptual…

> What key concept underlying how we now think about QM doesn’t go back to this list of people? Off the top of my head: quarks, and therefore the existence of the colour charge quantum number; and the Higgs field. All of the people in the list were also building on prior research by the likes of James Clerk Maxwell and Ludwig Boltzmann. Einstein himself said “I stand on the shoulders of Maxwell.” There are other obvi…

You are adding people by changing the discussion to one where the point no longer makes sense.

I'm focused on how many people were needed to make the conceptual breakthrough from classical thinking to quantum thinking. I'm very explicitly not considering how many people were needed to further develop the idea of QM from there. I'm also not considering various other conceptual breakthroughs. Just how did we go from, "here's a bunch of weird observations that don't make sense," to, "here's a way of thinking that lets us explain them."

The discovery of quarks, color charge quantum number, and Higgs field are part of the further research, and so aren't relevant.

Maxwell was firmly part of classical mechanics. He provided a key foundation, but was not part of the transition.

Boltzmann was key to the creation of statistical mechanics. While converting classical statistical mechanics to QM was a key part of the success of QM, this was not work that Boltzmann was engaged with.

Henri Poincaré did indeed spend a fruitful few months on QM in the last year of his life. Sure, add him to the list.

Hendrik Lorentz contributed to SR, not QM. Yes, he did lecture on SR in the 1920s, but he was lecturing on what Schrödinger has already discovered. He did not originate new ways of thinking to QM.

You have an extremely good point about Satyendra Nath Bose.

So most of the topics you added were not part of the key shift that I was talking about. Most of the researchers that you added did not directly contribute to that theoretical transition.

We need lots of people to create the foundation. Lots to build out the new framework. But very few are needed to develop the new way of thinking that scientists transition to.

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#218

Post by btilly »

m101 wrote: post #160
btilly wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This strongly depends on what you mean by "theory of knowledge". If you mean the practical importance of self-honesty, and a historical awareness of how easily we slip into self-delusion, then I agree. See, for instance, https://calteches.library.caltech.edu/51/2/CargoCult.htm for a very famous speech on exactly this topic. A lot of Feynman's writing touches on the same issue. If you mean the musings of philosophers…

I meant your second perspective. I'm in the Popper camp on your example. You may have good reasons as to why you say he's wrong, but isn't that the scientific method: showing things to be false. If it can't be shown to be false then how can it be scientific? It might be some other branch of thought. On the specific case of quantum mechanics - I want to see these forever promised quantum computers actually doing somet…

From my personal observation, those whose scientific understanding I admire mostly see little value in what the philosophers have produced. Those who I see admiring the philosophers seldom demonstrate much scientific understanding. Therefore my personal observations do not lead me to the belief that the philosophy helps scientific observation.

You are an illustration. You just argued that one of the most successful scientific theories over the last century should not be considered scientific because it is probabilistic in nature. In so doing you deny all of the evidence for it. Including the theory that allowed us to build the transistors that allow your computer to work.

Evolution these days depends on the theory of population genetics, which is again fundamentally probabilistic in nature. Are you now going to take the position that the theory of evolution is also not scientific?

If so, then your definition of science is so ludicrous that I'm comfortable in dismissing it with derision.

Re: Fundamental physics is dying? [video]

#220

Post by lazide »

dang wrote: post #211
lazide wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hardly a shallow dismissal dang, as the replies show. It’s a very valid critique of where it has ended up, and goes right to the heart of the underlying problem. The challenge is if it’s intentional from the start, or merely ended up being intentional at the end eh? And the folks arguing that the underlying critique are false, as shown in the follow-ups, are wrong. If anything, it’s just getting downvotes because peo…

Sorry, but your GP comment consisted of nothing but putdowns—not just of an entire field but of the people working in it. That is a classic shallow dismissal in the sense that we use the term. Not a borderline call!

I guess we have a different definition of put downs eh? Noted, thanks.
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