I put "really works" in quotes because the definition of how to get to the bottom of how something "really works" is up for debate itself. The original context

I put "really works" in quotes because the definition of how to get to the bottom of how something "really works" is up for debate itself. The original context for claiming something like path integrals can't be how the system "really works" because it is some combination of being too complex, lacking an intuitive mental model for how to conceptualize it, and invoking things that seem extraneous to the person making the claim (possible paths that aren't necessarily realized). I would agree that physicists have the same, or perhaps even more, curiosity regarding discovery as other fields (partly why they are drawn to understanding the nature of the existence/universe itself) - but there is certainly an error with this narrow definition of "this can't be how it really works because X" is simply wrong - we choose the simplest explanation which meets the scientific criteria for the time, and up until something new is discovered - that is de facto how the system "really works". Ultimately people have this assumption from classical mechanics that everything can neatly fit into intuitive thought experiments to understand the nature of reality, but quantum mechanics has not followed the same human-centric intuitive modeling. Does it mean we haven't figured out how the system "really works"? Ultimately, it's a philosophical question, not question directly related to physics which is showing the way through predictable repeatable science.