{"id":21997,"date":"2023-01-28T10:52:45","date_gmt":"2023-01-28T15:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?p=21997"},"modified":"2023-01-28T11:00:30","modified_gmt":"2023-01-28T16:00:30","slug":"way-too-smart-for-their-own-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I feel it\u2019s time for another physics rant.<\/p>\n

Somebody named Paul Sutter wrote an article in Ars Technica called \u201c Requiem for a string: Charting the rise and fall of a theory of everything.\u00a0 String theory was supposed to explain all of physics. What went wrong?<\/a>\u201d<\/p>\n

I have some excerpts from the article that indicate the thrust of the problem with string theory.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike most revolutions, string theory had humble origins. It started in the 1960s as an attempt to understand the workings of the strong nuclear force, which had only recently been discovered.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cA group of physicists took a mathematical technique developed (and later abandoned) by quantum godfather Werner Heisenberg and expanded it. In that expansion, they found the first strings\u2014mathematical structures that repeated themselves in spacetime. Unfortunately, this proto-string theory made incorrect predictions about the nature of the strong force and also had a variety of troublesome artifacts (like the existence of tachyons, particles that only traveled faster than light). Once another theory was developed to explain the strong force\u2014the one we use today, based on quarks and gluons\u2014string theory faded from the scene.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, look at this.\u00a0 They borrow a technique from someone who was extremely smart.\u00a0 But it was a technique that was discarded because it doesn\u2019t work.\u00a0 They ignore the fact that it produces crazy answers and they try to nurse it along by expanding it into more dimensions and other complications.\u00a0 Shades of Ptolemy\u2019s epicycles!<\/p>\n

\u201cUnlike its quantum cousins, when it comes to string theory, we have no fundamental theory\u2014we have only a set of approximation and perturbation methods. We\u2019re not exactly sure if our approximations are good ones or if we\u2019re way off the mark. We have perturbation techniques, but we\u2019re not sure what we\u2019re perturbing from. In other words, there\u2019s no such thing as string theory, just approximations of what we hope string theory could be.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Wow.\u00a0 It\u2019s useless and wrong and yet it lives on decade after decade.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be clear, our inability to understand string theory isn\u2019t limited by experiment. Even if we could build a super-duper-collider experiment that achieved the energies necessary to unlock quantum gravity, we still wouldn\u2019t be able to test string theory because we have no string theory. We have no mathematical model that can make reliable predictions, only approximations that we hope accurately represent the true physics. We can test those approximations, I guess, but it won\u2019t help us determine the inner workings of the true model.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

They\u2019re paying these people!\u00a0 No one\u2019s forcing them to pay them but they keep on paying them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe beams of the LHC began their first test operations in 2008 with two main science goals in mind: finding the elusive Higgs boson and finding evidence of supersymmetry.\u00a0 Four years later, the Higgs was found. Supersymmetry was not. It\u2019s now 15 years later, and there are still no signs of supersymmetry.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Can we get our money back?<\/p>\n

\u201cThe dearth of evidence has slaughtered so many members of the supersymmetric family that the whole idea is on very shaky ground, with physicists beginning to have conferences with titles like \u201cBeyond Supersymmetry\u201d and \u201cOh My God, I Think I Wasted My Career.\u201d\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

You sure have!\u00a0 And our billions in funding for this clap-trap!<\/p>\n

\u201cMost string theorists of the modern era don\u2019t work on string theory directly but instead mostly on the AdS\/CFT correspondence and its implications, hoping that continuing to probe that mathematical relationship will unlock some hidden insight into the workings of a theory of everything.\u00a0 I wish them luck.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t!<\/p>\n

We really need to restrict the funds available to really smart people such that only the one really smartest guy in the field is allowed to waste his whole life doing this kind of mental masturbation.\u00a0 This is not physics.\u00a0 It has the same relation to physics as rhythmic gymnastics has to power-lifting.\u00a0 I mean should I get tenure for coming up with the new variant called string cheese theory?\u00a0 Does my background in mozzarella qualify me to expound my theory that the universe is really a large amorphous blob of Italian dairy product?\u00a0 I think not!<\/p>\n

The rest of them should be forced to do this crap in their spare time if they want to when no one can see them and during working hours force them to do something that pays the electric bill.\u00a0 Maybe they can get an engineering degree on the side and design quantum screw drivers or something.<\/p>\n

Look at this quote again:<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/strong>To be clear, our inability to understand string theory isn\u2019t limited by experiment. Even if we could build a super-duper-collider experiment that achieved the energies necessary to unlock quantum gravity, we still wouldn\u2019t be able to test string theory because we have no string theory.<\/u> <\/strong>We have no mathematical model that can make reliable predictions, only approximations that we hope accurately represent the true physics. We can test those approximations, I guess, but it won\u2019t help us determine the inner workings of the true model.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

These guys have been futzin\u2019 around with this thing for fifty years and they still haven\u2019t got a theory to justify their paychecks.\u00a0 In China they would have been taken out behind the building and shot and their families would be forced to pay for the bullets they were shot with.\u00a0 Here they should have been tarred and feathered and ridden out of Princeton on a rail.<\/p>\n

Camera Girl has often told me off for being, in her words, \u201cscholastic-asstic.\u201d\u00a0 By this she means too smart for my own good or more precisely an educated dope.\u00a0 And often she is exactly right.\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t dare tell her about this outrage to common sense because she would hit me for trying to waste her time listening to this nonsense.\u00a0 She would equate it with ecclesiastical scholars \u00a0attempting to calculate the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.\u00a0 That is if she had ever heard of that concept before, which I\u2019m fairly certain she has not.<\/p>\n

So instead, I\u2019m bringing this here for the larger audience to hear.\u00a0 Albert Einstein figured out relativity while working as a patent clerk.\u00a0 That should be the model.\u00a0 When someone figures out anti-gravity or faster than light pizza delivery then we can talk about a cushy office in the physics department at Cal Tech and maybe tenure.\u00a0 But if they\u2019re going to spend forty years of academic salary and perks for this drivel, we need to break out the Chinese model.\u00a0 Who knows, maybe we can throw in the cost of the bullets for free.\u00a0 After all we are reasonable people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I feel it\u2019s time for another physics rant. Somebody named Paul Sutter wrote an article in Ars Technica called \u201c Requiem for a string: Charting<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[712,3545],"tags":[713,2442,165,3467],"class_list":["post-21997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fake-science","category-science","tag-fake-science","tag-physics","tag-science","tag-string-theory"],"yoast_head":"\nWay Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I feel it\u2019s time for another physics rant. Somebody named Paul Sutter wrote an article in Ars Technica called \u201c Requiem for a string: Charting\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Orion's Cold Fire\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Arrokoth.png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"photog\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@orionscoldfire\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@orionscoldfire\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"photog\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"photog\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d11e80f83f3825ce9fe38a5303eb64d3\"},\"headline\":\"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\"},\"wordCount\":1138,\"commentCount\":4,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Fake Science\",\"physics\",\"science\",\"string theory\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Fake Science\",\"Science\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\",\"name\":\"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/\",\"name\":\"Orion's Cold Fire\",\"description\":\"All the Secrets of the Universe and Some Really Important Stuff Too!\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Orion's Cold Fire\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/DSC06141.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/DSC06141.jpg\",\"width\":4022,\"height\":1419,\"caption\":\"Orion's Cold Fire\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/orionscoldfire\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d11e80f83f3825ce9fe38a5303eb64d3\",\"name\":\"photog\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/photog-image.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/photog-image.jpg\",\"caption\":\"photog\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/author\/photog\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire","og_description":"I feel it\u2019s time for another physics rant. Somebody named Paul Sutter wrote an article in Ars Technica called \u201c Requiem for a string: Charting","og_url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/","og_site_name":"Orion's Cold Fire","article_published_time":"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/Arrokoth.png"}],"author":"photog","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@orionscoldfire","twitter_site":"@orionscoldfire","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"photog","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/"},"author":{"name":"photog","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d11e80f83f3825ce9fe38a5303eb64d3"},"headline":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good","datePublished":"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00","dateModified":"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/"},"wordCount":1138,"commentCount":4,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization"},"keywords":["Fake Science","physics","science","string theory"],"articleSection":["Fake Science","Science"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/","url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/","name":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good - Orion's Cold Fire","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#website"},"datePublished":"2023-01-28T15:52:45+00:00","dateModified":"2023-01-28T16:00:30+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/28\/way-too-smart-for-their-own-good\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Way Too Smart for Their Own Good"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/","name":"Orion's Cold Fire","description":"All the Secrets of the Universe and Some Really Important Stuff Too!","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#organization","name":"Orion's Cold Fire","url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/DSC06141.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/DSC06141.jpg","width":4022,"height":1419,"caption":"Orion's Cold Fire"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/twitter.com\/orionscoldfire"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/d11e80f83f3825ce9fe38a5303eb64d3","name":"photog","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/photog-image.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/photog-image.jpg","caption":"photog"},"url":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/author\/photog\/"}]}},"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21997"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22002,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21997\/revisions\/22002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/orionscoldfire.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}