2 ms·

Well, I certainly wouldn't want to be a fool. I might be of course, especially compared to the many people I know who are smarter than myself. I think though t

by Luc 16y ago

Well, I certainly wouldn't want to be a fool. I might be of course, especially compared to the many people I know who are smarter than myself. I think though that your argument is basically an 'appeal to ridicule' fallacy. You are making it sound like my statement is the philosophical equivalent of 'we can't be sure the sun will rise tomorrow'. It isn't, it is simple the statement that the current zoo of particles may well all be fundamental, with no 'simpler' theory underlying them. Secondly, I think your statement that 'every single major advance in physics' has been a simplification is debatable. Thirdly, extrapolating from that that every new advance will be found using the same heuristic is also debatable. If there really is to be a scientific breakthrough of the magnitude of a Newton, it seems likely (almost by definition) that it will be from an unexpected avenue of thought - seeing that the expected ones have been well researched and haven't been all that productive. I guess it makes sense to bet on a unifying theory if you are a career particle physicist. There's a Nobel prize in it. It doesn't make sense to bet on the opposite notion, since there are probably no breakthroughs that way.

jessriedel 16y ago
I do think your statement is the philosophical equivalent of 'we can't be sure the sun will rise tomorrow', except that it differs by degree. (The sun has risen thousands of times in my personal experience, and bazillions of times in the experience of humans, while only a handful of fundamental physics discoveries have been made.) In either case, it's a question of justifying the claim that "In situations of type A, X has always been true in the past. Therefore, in situations of type A in the future, X will be true". Likewise your simple statement that "the current zoo of particles may well all be fundamental, with no 'simpler' theory underlying them." is analogous to "the sun will collapse into a black hole tomorrow". Again, just a difference of degree. [I should stress here that the justification for empiricism is an age-old philosophical problem which isn't easy to understand, much less solve. However, I think that a proper understanding of the history of physics gives very convincing (though maybe not the-sun-will-rise convincing) evidence that simplicity and beauty will be found at the bottom of the particle zoo.] I don't understand what the true statement >If there really is to be a scientific breakthrough of the magnitude of a Newton, it seems likely (almost by definition) that it will be from an unexpected avenue of thought - seeing that the expected ones have been well researched and haven't been all that productive. has to do with our current discussion. Lastly, (basically) no career particle physicist think that any Nobel prizes will be awarded for a unifying theory in their lifetime. (See, for instance, http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=2998 http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=2998). Perhaps, if we're lucky, there will be a somewhat simplifying theory (which gets a Nobel prize) but that certainly couldn't come from the dominant research avenue, string theory.

by Luc 16y ago

jessriedel 16y ago

I do think your statement is the philosophical equivalent of 'we can't be sure the sun will rise tomorrow', except that it differs by degree. (The sun has risen thousands of times in my personal experience, and bazillions of times in the experience of humans, while only a handful of fundamental physics discoveries have been made.) In either case, it's a question of justifying the claim that "In situations of type A, X has always been true in the past. Therefore, in situations of type A in the future, X will be true". Likewise your simple statement that "the current zoo of particles may well all be fundamental, with no 'simpler' theory underlying them." is analogous to "the sun will collapse into a black hole tomorrow". Again, just a difference of degree. [I should stress here that the justification for empiricism is an age-old philosophical problem which isn't easy to understand, much less solve. However, I think that a proper understanding of the history of physics gives very convincing (though maybe not the-sun-will-rise convincing) evidence that simplicity and beauty will be found at the bottom of the particle zoo.] I don't understand what the true statement >If there really is to be a scientific breakthrough of the magnitude of a Newton, it seems likely (almost by definition) that it will be from an unexpected avenue of thought - seeing that the expected ones have been well researched and haven't been all that productive. has to do with our current discussion. Lastly, (basically) no career particle physicist think that any Nobel prizes will be awarded for a unifying theory in their lifetime. (See, for instance, http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=2998 http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=2998). Perhaps, if we're lucky, there will be a somewhat simplifying theory (which gets a Nobel prize) but that certainly couldn't come from the dominant research avenue, string theory.