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> string theory this and god particle that, and it's really not very satisfying or illuminating I think what would be interesting would be a study of why resea

> string theory this and god particle that, and it's really not very satisfying or illuminating I think what would be interesting would be a study of why researchers are drawn to string theory. I remember reading about it in OMNI magazine as a teen back in the 80's. During my studies at university, I learned about many proposals in physics that failed after people spend decades trying to hammer into reality (like the electrical ether, or planetary motion), only to have a genius show up and resolve the dilemmas with a completely different proposal. Going on its 5th decade, string theory feels like one of these ancient red herrings, but maybe it just needs a few more centuries?

planck01 4y ago
It's because everyone wants to be the new Einstein and his special and general relativity theory were mathematically beautiful. Those theories prophesied new phenomena that were actually found to exist and are real and measurable. I don't think any subsequent new big theory like string theory accomplished that and Einstein-emulation seems a dead end. However theorist don't give up on the approach and quite a lot of them seem to argue that beauty without testability is good enough, while that is really really iffy.