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What I find most interesting about these articles showing up on Hacker News is how discussion of abstruse details irrelevant to the bulk of progress in physics

What I find most interesting about these articles showing up on Hacker News is how discussion of abstruse details irrelevant to the bulk of progress in physics or mathematics gets almost all the air time. Compare the number of articles on string theory and physics beyond the standard model to those on exotic materials, advances in turbulence, orbital mechanics, modern elasticity, solar system formation, or foundations of quantum mechanics. Is it that there is no tradition of popular writing that makes people think that they have any insight beyond the wall of knowledge necessary to understand these fields?

andrewmcwatters 8y ago
It's just the wrong audience altogether.
p1necone 8y ago
String theory is the buzziest of science buzzwords.
woodandsteel 8y ago
Seems to me one solution would be for you and others who think like you to regularly post links on HN to articles on these topics you believe are being unjustly neglected.
- Koshkin 8y ago
  ... and see them being completely ignored. (That was the whole point, I think.)
platz 8y ago
Where are the articles on Boyce–Codd normal form, Java bytecode, SOLID etc.. This is still a 'social' network.
- kristianp 8y ago
  I don't think I've heard of BCNF for a while, thanks for the mention. I doubt anyone uses more than 1NF. I've posted it here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19140206 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19140206
  - will_pseudonym 8y ago
    I remember having to learn how to normalize my data a lot when I was learning SQL, because the only tools available for use in my environment was a good ole' tool called Microsoft Access & VBA.
  - dpark 8y ago
    I would be concerned if an engineer I worked with put forward a DB design that wasn’t normalized to 3NF without a really good reason. Designs that are 1NF but not 3NF are generally either hyper-optimized (better have a really good reason) or just bad. It’s not hard to get a DB into 3NF.
whatshisface 8y ago
String theory and things similar to it evolved to be as intellectually interesting as possible. Normally you have a mixture of humdrum "experiment theory" and exciting abstractions, but without the humdrum experiments to motivate all the humdrum calculations only the most attractive parts get studied. As a result, string theory is 99% mind-blowing, while the rest of the items on the list are 1% mind-blowing and 99% "numerical simulation of heat transfer in a honeycomb lattice." Nobody would ever write a boring string theory paper because there is no possible motivation for doing so. This is not to say that string theorists are somehow neglecting a duty, just that there is almost certainly a vast mine of untapped results that are not presently being worked on because there is little motivation for them. One thousands years from now when humanity is building star-bridges out of beyond-standard-model particles, I guarantee that there will be a Journal of Taychon Engineering whose articles never make it on PBS.

andrewmcwatters 8y ago

It's just the wrong audience altogether.

p1necone 8y ago

String theory is the buzziest of science buzzwords.

woodandsteel 8y ago

Seems to me one solution would be for you and others who think like you to regularly post links on HN to articles on these topics you believe are being unjustly neglected.

Koshkin 8y ago
... and see them being completely ignored. (That was the whole point, I think.)

platz 8y ago

Where are the articles on Boyce–Codd normal form, Java bytecode, SOLID etc.. This is still a 'social' network.

kristianp 8y ago
I don't think I've heard of BCNF for a while, thanks for the mention. I doubt anyone uses more than 1NF. I've posted it here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19140206 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19140206
- will_pseudonym 8y ago
  I remember having to learn how to normalize my data a lot when I was learning SQL, because the only tools available for use in my environment was a good ole' tool called Microsoft Access & VBA.
- dpark 8y ago
  I would be concerned if an engineer I worked with put forward a DB design that wasn’t normalized to 3NF without a really good reason. Designs that are 1NF but not 3NF are generally either hyper-optimized (better have a really good reason) or just bad. It’s not hard to get a DB into 3NF.

whatshisface 8y ago

String theory and things similar to it evolved to be as intellectually interesting as possible. Normally you have a mixture of humdrum "experiment theory" and exciting abstractions, but without the humdrum experiments to motivate all the humdrum calculations only the most attractive parts get studied. As a result, string theory is 99% mind-blowing, while the rest of the items on the list are 1% mind-blowing and 99% "numerical simulation of heat transfer in a honeycomb lattice." Nobody would ever write a boring string theory paper because there is no possible motivation for doing so. This is not to say that string theorists are somehow neglecting a duty, just that there is almost certainly a vast mine of untapped results that are not presently being worked on because there is little motivation for them. One thousands years from now when humanity is building star-bridges out of beyond-standard-model particles, I guarantee that there will be a Journal of Taychon Engineering whose articles never make it on PBS.