revolution in cosmology The physics conference is only one week away now.
This morning I was quite worried because I discovered that I had an advanced calc test on Friday, October 6. I thought the test was going to be at night, but it turns out that it will be during the day (which is rare for RPI). So I won't have to reschedule my test... not that I could, because I have two OTHER big tests next week. There's no way I would miss out on this conference.
Strangely enough, I don't know anyone else from RPI who's going to this. None of my undergrad friends even knew about it. I think the educational-level distribution will look very similar to a delta function: virtually no undergrads, and almost all eminent PhDs. The integral over all people will equal 1, anyway (at least I hope). Seriously, though, I hope there will be other undergrads or grad students there... after all, who knows when another physics conference of this magnitude will occur? (Mensa's colloquium next year is all about humor, in case anyone's wondering: http://colloq07.us.mensa.org//AM/Template.cfm?Section=Home3 ). I would only go if they told jokes like the ones here: (http://www.math.ualberta.ca/~runde/jokes.html ).
The authors of "Not Even Wrong" and "The Reference Frame" haven't mentioned anything about the conference yet, but it would be REALLY interesting if they went. It would be a lot more than just a revolution in cosmology...  ¶ 8:52 PM 0 comments

  next week... I read island's latest post, and I thought the opening paragraph (quoted from http://observer.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1873989,00.html ) really DID take two or three times to read. Island's post mentions that extraterrestrial communications are indeed testable, although such communications have not YET reached earth. Certainly the discovery of extraterrestrial life would greatly enhance the anthropic principle. Some physicists, such as John Wheeler (at least according to http://us.imdb.com/name/nm0923868/bio ) think that sentient life only exists on earth. We don't know that, but we can test it; SETI has been trying to disprove that for quite some time. I wonder how many physicists favor a human-centered anthropic principle, or an anthropic principle for the existence of any life form.
Next week... is Mensa's "Revolution in Cosmology", held in Colonie, NY. I was glad I booked it four months in advance; it became full rather quickly. A LOT of big names will be there: http://colloq06.us.mensa.org/AM/Template.cfm?Section=Program1
And those are just the speakers. I think a lot of Nobelists, pro-string physicists, pro-LQG physicists (and hopefully other undergrads like myself) will show up. I may even meet my future thesis advisor (I intend to enter grad school in the fall of 2008). I'm extremely excited about this, and I will blog from the conference so everyone is posted.  ¶ 8:26 PM 3 comments

  just sickening Yet another hideous article emerged today in Wired:
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,71828-0.html?tw=wn_index_1
Just when you thought science articles couldn't get any dumber, along comes this one. (Searching for more articles by this author will bring up several stories about the imminent dangers of global warming, so you can probably tell what sort of science journalist he is.)
Anyway, what makes this excuse of an article so extreme is its unconventionality. It actually states that alternatives to string theory are AS PROMISING as string theory itself. I don't think even the most adamant critics of string theory would say anything THAT outlandish. Before anyone says that the quality of being "promising" is in the eye of the beholder, let me offer a less-fatalistic opinion.
I think that some parts of LQG will turn out to be right. I don't think it's as promising as string theory... for too many reasons to list here. I think that twistor (that's right, twistor, not "twister") theory is a great breakthrough in mathematics; as any reader of "The Emperor's New Mind" should recall, twistors are really bizarre constructions. I imagine that some physicists don't think twistors are too useful in the PHYSICAL sense, but that's what a lot of them thought about fractals. Now, of course, we know that fractals are useful in some areas of physics. Since Penrose doesn't yet have a unified theory of twistors, how can the twistor approach be as promising as other approaches to string theory (at the present time)?
The article gets into CDT and non-commutative geometry, which are too complicated to cram into a few paragraphs each (of course, the author doesn't care)... but then, in a fatalistic flourish, it mentions that there may be NO final theory. Well, if we're to accept that argument, we might as well quit physics now and commit mass suicide. What a ridiculous article!
I'm really sick and tired of these anti-string articles; most people have already heard about criticisms of string theory, anyway. We don't need these kinds of articles anymore. If people want to criticize it, they should post on "Not Even Wrong" and see if they can write something that 5,674,234,459 other people haven't already written a variation of.  ¶ 7:56 PM 0 comments

  insert expletive here I found a link (from Not Even Wrong) to this HIDEOUS article:
http://www.newyorker.com/critics/atlarge/articles/061002crat_atlarge
This article is beyond hideous. "Not a single new testable prediction has been made" [from string theory]? "This theory will come in such a bewildering number of versions that it will be of no practical use: a Theory of Nothing"?
Okay, tell us something that the idiots HAVEN'T (erroneously) told us already!
First of all, does a theory HAVE to make testable predictions? Absolutely not. Don't look surprised; there are quite a few physicists who are developing theories of wormholes, or white holes, or other cosmological oddities. Can we test the existence of wormholes? Can we prove that there are white holes? Not currently. Yet that doesn't mean that the work of cosmologists is garbage. Just because we can't prove their existence doesn't mean they're not there, or that those theories aren't plausible.
Think of the physicists who work with theories of time travel. Or who theorize the existence of tachyons (faster-than-light particles) or preons (particles inside electrons). Now for a more mainstream question: What about the Higgs boson? We may find it when the LHC becomes operational, but... we may not. If we don't find it, does that mean that Peter Higgs wasted his time? No. It means that we just haven't found it yet.
All this nonsense about untestability is EXTREMELY annoying. The untestability stigma has been put on all sorts of theories now. Multiverses, M-theory... some people would argue the anthropic principle. I do not for a minute think that the argument of untestability should be thrown around by scientifically-illiterate people. I don't think that string theory is the downfall of modern physics. I don't think that LQG, Dr. Woit, or even the Bogdanoffs are the downfalls of modern physics, either. The "trouble with physics" is that morons are criticizing it. These are morons who refuse to think, who just want to ignite controversy.
A lot of people want to discredit or berate the intelligent. They do this out of jealousy. I'm not saying that all the bad science journalists are jealous, or that jealousy is obvious in their articles. But it's very likely. If you're jealous of someone, don't you want to bring them down? Why are smart people more likely to get bullied than others? Jealousy. Bullies don't like to feel inferior.
The scientifically illiterate are quite similar. They have physics envy, and they're doing everything in their power to attack whatever they feel they can attack... and get away with. I feel bad for the good science journalists who have to put up with these morons.
Of course, the authors of "Manifold Destiny" didn't get away with it :) (But that's more of a math article.)  ¶ 11:08 PM 6 comments

  on the interpretation of quantum physics Everyone (well, almost everyone) at RPI is afraid of quantum physics. I think they've heard about how difficult it is (or how difficult it sounds) and they always give me strange looks when I tell them I'm taking it. The course IS a lot of work, but it's very rewarding. I think a lot of people are afraid of advanced physics because they don't see it as rewarding, just as a ton of work. Of course, most of RPI's courses require a lot of work, but not as much abstraction as quantum physics.
I've heard so many times (from the uninitiated) that the Uncertainty Principle necessarily signifies that measurement of one quantity greatly changes another quantity's value. This is vague, imprecise, and not at all satisfying. (It's only partly right.) There are so many interpretations of quantum mechanics (good, bad, ugly, and outright misguided) that aren't satisfying. Crackpots love weird interpretations; some in fact think that if they make up their own interpretations, they're qualified to write bad science articles!
There are even some physicists who interpret quantum mechanics in bizarre ways. Some of them want to alter it in order to make it less mathematical. Smolin is very philosophical in his approach to quantum gravity; he thinks that physics should rely less on mathematics. I don't think that's possible, but it's an interesting idea nonetheless. Wolfram's book "A New Kind of Science" also advocates a less mathematical approach to "complexity theory"... which is bizarre because he created MATHematica and MATHworld!
More recently, some physicists have commented on the anthropic principle without really understanding it. Island's blog talks about that in great detail; his last several posts have defended the entropic interpretation, which many physicists don't understand. If you want more info on the entropic interpretation, I suggest you look there.  ¶ 3:50 PM 0 comments

  physics blogging I don't know who originally developed the theoretical construct of a physics blog, but this construct seems to parallel string theory a lot. My apologies to "Not Even Wrong" and other dissenting blogs.
Just as string theory is an attempt to resolve the incompatibilities between quantum theory and general relativity, physics blogs could be attempts to resolve the incompatibilities between LQG people and string people. "Could be." Of course, that isn't really happening, although I hope this blog will do that.
I wonder how many physics bloggers are actually- personally- in contact with each other (by that I mean they don't just know each other through the blogging culture). I'd like to know if non-string (not necessarily contra-string) bloggers and pro-string bloggers have real discussions in real time.
I don't think too many of them do. I don't think too many people know the real identities of Angry Physics (http://angryphysics.blogspot.com/)or Absinthe (http://radio.weblogs.com/0151290/), either. If we don't know their identities, we can't really judge them, can we?
Unfortunately, I think that physics blogging (as a whole) is discouraging a lot of people from becoming physicists. (I say "as a whole" to avoid hypocrisy.) If so many people portray the physics culture as a bleak, impersonal culture... is that going to inspire people? Is that an honest portrayal? I say a resounding "no" to both questions.  ¶ 10:21 PM 1 comments

  science vs. inaccurate coverage of science [I wrote this as an editorial for a class called "Electronic Arts Theory", sometimes known as "Media Watch." It could've been an editorial on any topic, but I chose one that was related to my major]:

The majority of contemporary scientific ideas are very difficult to truly understand. This is why- in many fields- one must earn a PhD and conduct years of research in order to really understand the latest developments in that field.
Yet most science writers do not have these credentials; they write about science because there is a popular demand for stories about astronomy, evolution, criticisms of evolution, and many other topics. Unfortunately, many of these stories have little to do with science itself. In fact, some of them are nothing more than diatribes. With the increasing popularity of physics blogs, the subject of string theory- the most popular candidate for a grand unified theory of physics- has also become a target of some science journalists.
An article in the August 21st issue of Time Magazine, “The Unraveling of String Theory” (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1226142-1,00.html), is extraordinarily biased. It mentions that “Any university that doesn't have at least one string theorist on the payroll is considered a scientific backwater”, even though most universities do not have active researchers in string theory. RPI, for example, is far from being a scientific backwater. The article states little about string theory itself; it merely asserts that the theory is enormously flawed and too complex to be effective.
A more hostile article appeared in the September 14th edition of the online magazine Slate. “The Trouble with String Theory” (http://www.slate.com/id/2149598/) is an attack not only on string theory, but on all of physics. Its extremely informal style and anti-intellectual stance sensationalized the controversies in physics and most likely appealed to those who dislike science, but it was very hotly received by physicists. Both string theorists, such as Harvard physicist Lubos Motl, and critics of string theory, such as Columbia physicist Peter Woit, agreed that it was a poorly-written and misleading article. Dr. Woit wrote in his blog, “I started to remember who [Gregg] Easterbrook is, and how stupid some of his previous writings on physics were.” (http://www.math.columbia.edu/%7Ewoit/wordpress/?p=61) Easterbrook had even become involved in a scandal when he wrote in The New Republic that the majority of executives in Hollywood who promoted excessive violence in films were Jewish. (http://www.tnr.com/easterbrook.mhtml?week=2003-10-07)
Dr. Woit’s blog, “Not Even Wrong”, provides links to many articles and reviews either in favor of or against string theory. It is generally critical of string theory, but it acknowledges that journalistic coverage of physics can be quite embarrassing. His September 15th entry mentions that, “One sometimes depressing aspect of being on this side of the string theory controversy is seeing who some of one’s allies are.” (http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=459) It also states that some journalists specifically criticize him for using “technical jargon.” (Ibid) Yet such jargon must be used to give more than a superficial explanation of why string theory is or is not a truly scientific, or worthwhile, idea to pursue. While scientific articles would be accessible to more people if they were more qualitative, they would all be very similar and would not explain scientific principles well. Thus, the reader would most likely feel unsatisfied and would not have gained much knowledge.
One physicist decided to write a deliberately fake paper that was filled with equations and physics jargon, and submitted it to the humanities journal Social Text. Alan Sokal, a physics professor at NYU, wrote “Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity” (http://physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/transgress_v2/transgress_v2_singlefile.html), which looked serious due to the number of technical words it used. Social Text had no reviewers, so it was published without immediate opposition. Once it was exposed- by physicists- that this paper was a hoax, Sokal stated, “I confess to amusement that one Social Text editor still doesn't believe my piece was a parody.” (http://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/reply.html) Surprisingly, the media overlooked this incident until two physicists, Igor and Grichka Bogdanov, published several papers in scientific journals that were just as nonsensical. The media took notice of the Bogdanovs immediately; The Chronicle of Higher Education reported that their papers “exposed potentially wide cracks in how theoretical physicists judge one another's work.” (http://chronicle.com/free/2002/11/2002110501n.htm) Standards in peer review were thus exposed, and many physicists felt that following these incidents, it would be difficult to determine the legitimacy of any scientific paper.
The media generally focuses on scientific controversies, but it does not explain why theories or incidents are controversial very well. Since many science journalists lack scientific knowledge themselves, they often convey biases rather than honest, objective coverage of contemporary issues.  ¶ 7:14 PM 0 comments

  a consensus? I was quite amazed by the latest posting in "Not Even Wrong."
For the first time in quite a while, both ends of the theoretical physics spectrum agree on something: Gregg Easterbrook is an ignoramus and a moron.
And it shows. http://www.slate.com/id/2149598/
This isn't the first time he's come out against physics, either. See excerpts from one of his previous articles here: http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/2004_archives/001258.html
The amazing thing is that these articles don't just attack string theory; they attack ALL OF PHYSICS. He greatly enjoys the word "mumbo-jumbo" and uses it so many times that you can tell his originality is severely lacking. Perhaps the worst thing about these articles is that he attacks physics because HE DOESN'T UNDERSTAND IT. None of it makes any sense to him. How did he ever become a science writer, anyway?
Theories of black holes are untestable, he implies, therefore they must be flawed. He doesn't like how physical theories are counterintuitive. Well, guess what... even beginning physics is counterintuitive. Intuition would tell you that something exerts a force on something else, but that something else doesn't push back. Intuition is very wrong in this case. Never mind action at a distance, particle-antiparticle annihilations, etc., etc.
It's very sad that so many science writers know so little. But ignorance can be overcome more easily than overt hatred.
"Electric Universe: The Shocking True Story of Electricity" is a book that really shows the dark side of science journalism. David Bodanis evidently doesn't know much about electricity; the most complex illustrations of electricity deal with electrons moving rapidly through wires, or electrons being portrayed as bits that get ripped off solid, ball bearing-like atoms. These are very poor illustrations; massive streams of electrons don't shoot through wires, anyway (they move from atom to atom, and the drift speed of an electron is much smaller than the speed of light). And the concept of electrons getting plucked off hard atoms isn't even the right HISTORICAL concept of electricity, anyway. In most of the book, Bodanis tries to make the scientists who studied electricity look like total jerks. Some of them weren't exactly the most agreeable people, but when you read that Thomas Edison was "a creep and a liar", you know that you're reading a very biased, out-of-mainstream-opinion book.
Off-topic: There are many, many repetitions in "Electric Universe" of a line that goes something like this: "Without electricity, there would be no telephones, no radios, no televisions, no Internet, no CD's or DVD players, no phonographs, no light bulbs, no computers. Why, without electricity, life, the earth, or even this book would not exist." WOW.
I gave "Electric Universe" as an example because it's one of the worst examples of shoddy scientific journalism. I'm afraid that we'll see a lot more of this garbage in the next few years.  ¶ 7:16 PM 1 comments

  Symmetry (or lack thereof) The well-known physicist and popularizer of mathematics, Dr. Mario Livio, just gave a lecture at RPI about the ideas in his latest book: The Equation that Couldn't Be Solved. I was quite surprised by how many people showed up, considering he isn't quite as famous as many of the other annual lecturers at RPI. His book isn't really about an equation at all, but about symmetry itself.
Of course, a lecture on symmetry could present a lot of intuitive and obvious ideas, and this one was no exception. But what isn't obvious (to many non-scientists) is how important symmetry BREAKING is. There are many forms of symmetry breaking in nature, but he didn't delve into those, because this was a lecture intended for general audiences.
The latest post on "Not Even Wrong" mentions a physics opera. What could be more amazing than a physics opera, with a cast of Nobel Prize-winners? (Many people believe that science should not be integrated into the arts, but such people are extroardinarily mistaken. In high school, I wrote a mathematical opera called "Angle of Innocence", which had characters named after various mathematical ideas. I wrote the libretto and about half of the actual score, but I never finished it.)
The concepts of science can greatly benefit and enrich the arts. Symmetry is a classic example of a concept with mathematical, scientific, and artistic appeal. I predict that in a few years, someone will write an opera or an epic poem based on string theory, the anthropic principle, or some other contemporary scientific idea.
That is what I hope for, anyway. It's quite difficult, though, to teach advanced scientific concepts to many liberal arts students. "Physics for Poets" courses come to mind. Villanova has a course (actually two courses, with labs) called "Great Ideas in Physics" that doesn't use math beyond ALGEBRA. And (make sure you don't fall off your chair) there is even a course at Berkeley called "Physics for Future Presidents": http://lsdiscovery.berkeley.edu/2006spring/c70v.html
The description of PfFP includes the somewhat disturbing sentence, "The beauty of physics may lie in the math, but future presidents don't have time for that." Why shouldn't they have time for that? Of course, they don't need to know tensor calculus, although that certainly helps :) But why shouldn't they really get a sense of what they're doing, which can only be achieved through a certain degree of mathematical sophistication? Wouldn't everyone benefit enormously if future presidents knew something about physics, anyway?
I hope someone can answer those questions seriously.  ¶ 8:05 PM 3 comments

  Intelligence? Today, of course, is the fifth anniversary of 9/11. In today's post on "The Reference Frame" there is a link to a post (right after the London bombings), that is absolutely incredible: http://motls.blogspot.com/2005/07/bombings.html
Dr. Motl's statement at the end is extroardinarily profound and inspiring: "The terrorists and their ideas and ideals simply cannot be dominating over the world of the 3rd millenium." I hope that's true. I hope more people will realize that they don't have to live in fear, because living in fear is submitting to terrorism.
Threats to human safety can come from anywhere, but how many people realize that? Why are most people more afraid of flying than driving, for example? Why is the level of security higher at certain low-traffic airports than at many high-traffic airports? For example, I've noticed that some Canadian airports (particularly Quebec City), use much more sensitive metal detectors than, say, Newark or JFK.
Another example: Last year, Kip Thorne of Caltech lectured at my college about black holes and experiments to test general relativity (such as the LIGO project). He used a bowling ball as a (rather unusual) prop to illustrate a black hole. The security at LAX almost didn't allow him to bring A BOWLING BALL on the plane!
Before the conference, I got invited to sit in on a conference that the other RPI physics professors had with him. He's an extremely modest scientist (he introduced himself to me by his first name), so it's hard to imagine airport security giving someone like him a hard time... unless you go back to reality and understand that anyone can get stopped for any reason.
I hope everyone realizes that although "the front line is everywhere", we as humans have better things to do than live in fear. We have to seek truth. And then we will understand that our problems are not unique, that difficult times have happened before. We know a lot more about the natural world now than we did several thousand years ago, when thunderstorms, earthquakes, etc. were thought of as the wrath of Jupiter or Poseidon. Yet although we know more, we still have to know why our theories work so well. Few scientists, even the most famous ones- if you've read my previous postings- really understand their theories. There are many ways to use science for purposes other than science. Supporters of creationism abuse the anthropic principle, but so do a lot of evolution supporters.

Endnote: The Mensa cosmology colloquium is now totally full. It's a good thing I booked it about four months in advance :)  ¶ 5:01 PM 0 comments

  taking the implications honestly Island mentioned yesterday that scientists don't take the implications of their work honestly, which is a very interesting comment on the status of science. Looking at the opinions of physicists (and people who misunderstand physics), it appears that people are very defensive of their theories (or lack thereof), and thus cannot- due to their bias- notice all of the implications resulting from those theories.
Probably the clearest way to illustrate this idea is to talk about the interpretations of quantum mechanics. The Elegant Universe states, "Many find it fatuous and downright repugnant to claim that the wonders of life and the universe are mere reflections of microscopic particles engaged in a pointless dance fully choreographed by the laws of physics." (Chapter 1, page 16 of the 2003 edition) If one is to favor a reductionist approach to quantum mechanics, one must accept that everything we experience is nothing more than what happens on the quantum level. (More precisely, there are several different types of reductionism; this interpretation mostly resembles the ontological variety.)
How is one to interpret quantum mechanics, string theory, etc.? We don't know. Many people are put off by reductionism for obvious reasons, so they won't think that way. We need a unified interpretation of science, and we need one now.  ¶ 1:33 PM 9 comments

  More theories I learned earlier today (read the comments on yesterday's post) about the entropic interpretation of the anthropic principle. The entropic interpretation is very fascinating in its own right, from the little I've read about it so far. It appears that there are different ways to interpret the interpretation, which makes the entropic idea more complicated than the regular anthropic principle. You can read more about island's interpretation at evolutionarydesign.blogspot.com
Island says that "a true anthropic constraint on the forces of the universe will necessarily include the human evolutionary process." This is a powerful idea, and if it is correct, it will tremendously elevate the status of human evolution. By "elevate the status" I mean "make the theory of evolution more convincing for those who do not accept it."
The theory of evolution came under fire (and still is under fire) because many people believe that humans- not apes, other land mammals, algae, etc.- are made in the image of God, and therefore humans are not descended from more primitive life forms. Well, that's one reason. But probably the main reason is that intelligent design is a much easier idea. If you believe that God created the universe and all life forms in six days, then that's a much more concise thing to remember. You don't have to worry about studies of Galapagos finches or biochemical reactions or the skeletons of Australopithecus afarensis, never mind particle physics, relativity, and extrapolations of cosmological models to the early seconds of the universe. (Although religion, as long as it does not take intelligent design seriously, does not have to conflict with science. For example, the Vatican has many observatories, as well as a lot of astronomers and planetary scientists who are not afraid to do their job.) :)
Science takes into account all of those things. The entropic interpretation is a framework on which they can be unified. For one thing, it's a far more scientific anthropic interpretation than, say, Tipler's Omega Point theory. (Although I like the Omega Point theory a lot, I highly doubt that artificial intelligence will ever become THAT powerful.)  ¶ 3:18 PM 3 comments

  is this true? The Centre for Research on Globalization, an organization in Quebec, featured a rather interesting article two days ago:
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20060904&articleId=3140
By "interesting" I mean "not meant to be taken seriously." This article- written by a physicist- claims that 80% of physicists work for the military.
Okay, so... where did that number come from? And why is this- if it were actually true- such a big deal?
Physicists are sometimes stereotyped as being militantly apathetic people, but this article suggests otherwise... except for the militant part :) While some physicists have no interest in politics or the military, this article completely shatters that stereotype. Physics evidently is far from some ivory-tower activity that no one will ever actually use; the ivory-tower image comes from ignorant people who criticize science because they can't grasp even the basic concepts. Many of those people post comments on "Not Even Wrong."
The article does far more than denigrate the military, though. It states that physicists are DUMB.
That's right, dumb. "How many unified field theorists does it take to screw in a light bulb?" jokes come to mind.
Everyone knows (or maybe they don't) that physicists are not dumb. Some of them are misguided, but none of them are dumb. Some of them came up with bizarre dissertations (e.g. the Bogdanov brothers), but none of them are dumb. Some of them have tried to make their data more convincing than it should be, but none of them are dumb. What other people have such a grasp of underlying phenomena in the physical world? What other people burden themselves with advanced calculus, PDE's, integral equations, computational methods of solving problems, AND physics?
The fact that the article was written by a physicist is what should trouble everyone. Or not. Complexity is physics, and physics is complexity. Physics is not stamp collecting. Introductory-level physics is made accessible to other people so they won't run away in horror. That is why I've heard several people claim that chemistry, biology, engineering, etc. are harder than physics. Such statements are blatant lies. While chemistry, biology, engineering, and other related disciplines are hard, they are just applications.
That does not mean that everything other than physics is worthless; it just means that every other discipline can be traced (albeit in a convoluted way) to the underlying principles of physics. If you support the Anthropic Principle, the universe has just the correct parameters that enable us to survive. If we weren't alive, we wouldn't be able to study why the universe is the way it is, etc., etc. That's just one connection to philosophy, and biology. As well as all of the humanities disciplines, because without our existence, the humanities would have no meaning. Axioms, lemmas (or lemmata), theorems, etc. in mathematics wouldn't have been developed, but... mathematics is special. It is special because academics are divided as to its underlying origins. To some, math is embedded in nature, as something physically realizable. To others, it is a human construction. As Leopold Kronecker stated, "God created the natural numbers; everything else is the work of man." Of course, this further suggests that God exists, and any such discussion is far more debatable (other than in a group consisting entirely of either very religious or atheistic people) than the Grand Unified Theory (at least at the present time).
Anyway, are physicists dumb and unable to perceive complexity? I hope you can deduce the answer from my above arguments.  ¶ 8:54 PM 3 comments

  Interesting Yesterday's post at the "Reference Frame" takes notice of the fact that string theory, and criticisms of it, are the most unusual topics for blog discussions. Physics is an unusual topic because very few people really understand it. Many of the people who post on "Not Even Wrong" and the "Reference Frame" like to THINK they know a lot about physics, when in fact they probably haven't even had a high school physics education.
The problem with "Not Even Wrong" is that too many know-it-alls (who really know nothing) decide to offer their ignorant opinions in comments. The problem is not Dr. Woit's criticism; he is entitled to his opinions, even they aren't the opinions of the majority.
The "Reference Frame" has the same problem of being overrun by crackpots. Although Dr. Motl's beliefs are controversial, they don't seem wrong (or "not even wrong") :) Just because they don't seem wrong doesn't mean they necessarily are right. Not every idea in contemporary string theory is right, either, although string theory certainly has a lot more potential than its alternatives.
This potential is mostly exemplified by its strength in numbers. If loop quantum gravity were mainstream and string theory were considered a "fringe" idea, LQG would have more potential. This is not the case, though.
Nevertheless, I have often found it amazing that string theory is more popular than LQG. String theory requires extra dimensions and bizarre mathematical constructs, and it seems incredibly counter-intuitive (unless you're a string theorist.) Why would so many people take on a task that is extroardinarily difficult and counter-intuitive?
The fact that so many people do this IS indeed mysterious, if you consider the difficulty of the material alone. I find it very hard to believe that string theory will be an empty effort, considering its popularity.
During the late 19th century, classical mechanics was the most popular framework for explaining the universe. It was far from being "not even wrong", even though it was very incomplete. Anyone who worked on theories of phlogiston, for example, couldn't be taken seriously, because- well- there is no such thing as phlogiston!
Quantum mechanics refined classical mechanics, but it didn't entirely supplant it. (The two disciplines are related through the Correspondence Principle.) Some famous physicists, including Einstein himself, didn't like it. They thought it was ugly and counter-intuitive. But Einstein had actually won the Nobel Prize in 1921 for the photoelectric effect, which... guess what... is a quantum phenomenon!
The critics of string theory think exactly the same way. They think it's ugly and counter-intuitive. These physicists are very intelligent, and, like Einstein, many of them have worked on the theory that they criticize :) So why would they be against it?
I have to draw a conclusion from this, one that has several meanings:

STRING THEORY IS THE NEW QUANTUM MECHANICS.  ¶ 8:37 PM 0 comments

  Navigating Physics There are two extraordinarily popular blogs that have made a tremendous impact on theoretical physics. They are known as "Not Even Wrong" and "Lubos Motl's Reference Frame."
"Not Even Wrong" argues that string theory- a theory that requires extra dimensions and regards elementary particles as strings- is a theory of anything rather than a theory of everything. Because it cannot be experimentally verified, it may be a trap for theoretical physicists... at least according to Dr. Peter Woit, a professor in Columbia University's math department.
"Lubos Motl's Reference Frame" takes the opposite point of view and states that string theory is- by far- the best candidate for a Grand Unified Theory. (A Grand Unified Theory is one that will unite general relativity and quantum mechanics, and thus all four forces of nature.) While experimental verification of the theory is unlikely, string theory is a very popular development, far more popular than its alternatives.
To someone not well-versed in physics, the concepts discussed in these blogs look like gibberish. This is exactly why so many crackpots post off-topic comments on "Not Even Wrong" and the "Reference Frame." These comments are extremely dangerous because they are nothing more than empty attacks. Most of them are made by people who know nothing about science and who just want to see great physicists get angry.
Unfortunately, a lot of these comments do nothing more than criticize Lubos Motl, who is a professor of physics at Harvard. They usually do not criticize him for developing string theory (rather than loop quantum gravity or other alternative theories); they criticize him for his political views.
For example, Dr. Motl believes that most women have little interest in math and science. Well, that's true. Of course, the same could be said of most men. (How many people- of either gender- were in your high school calculus class?) I know a lot of men who can barely add, let alone take a triple integral to find the volume of a sphere. Why is this belief so controversial, even though it's true?
Why is string theory so controversial, if so many famous physicists are trying to develop it?
There are no definite answers as of yet. This blogger is determined to find them.
It might turn out that string theory won't be the final theory. But it will certainly take many, many years for alternative theories to make as much progress (or gather as many followers) as string theory has. Both string theory and loop quantum gravity have created new mathematical ideas that will undoubtedly prove useful to other physicists and mathematicians, so everyone is benefiting.
Mensa is holding a cosmology colloquium from October 6-8. You can find it here: www.colloquium.us.mensa.org
I have already signed up to go to it. This colloquium will allow physicists (and physics students like myself) to see everything that is going on. Both loop quantum gravity and string theory will be represented, so no one will go away unsatisfied.

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