Sunday Times on string (review of Not Even Wrong)

[Martin]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2102-2214707,00.html

 

===sample===

 

...But is string theory true? Peter Woit, a mathematician at Columbia University, has challenged the entire string-theory discipline by proclaiming that its topic is not a genuine theory at all and that many of its exponents do not understand the complex mathematics it employs. String theory, he avers, has become a form of science fiction. Hence his book’s title, Not Even Wrong: an epithet created by Wolfgang Pauli, an irascible early 20th-century German physicist. Pauli had three escalating levels of insult for colleagues he deemed to be talking nonsense: “Wrong!”, “Completely wrong!” and finally “Not even wrong!”. By which he meant that a proposal was so completely outside the scientific ballpark as not to merit the least consideration.

 

Woit’s book, highly readable, accessible and powerfully persuasive, is designed to give a short history of recent particle and theoretical physics. Ultimately he seeks not only to rattle but to dismantle the cage of the string theorists...

===endquote===

[Martin]

To give the context of John Cornwell's review:

 

===quote===

The Sunday Times June 11, 2006

 

Science

 

The dean of debunking

REVIEWED BY JOHN CORNWELL

In challenging string theory, Peter Woit is taking on the self-interest of the entire scientific establishment

 

NOT EVEN WRONG: The Failure of String Theory and the Continuing Challenge to Unify the Laws of Physics

by Peter Woit

Cape £18.99 pp290

 

What is the basic, unifying stuff of our universe? One philosopher in ancient Greece thought that everything was reducible to water; another plumped for air. Later, a philosopher called Democritus taught that the world is ultimately made up of tiny, eternal particles of varying weight known as “atoms”, which form and reform as nature undergoes its constant round of change, death and rebirth. Today, 2,500 years on, and after several great revolutions in modern physics, a large and expanding community of scientists believes that the basic stuff of our universe is “strings”. Hence “string theory”.

 

These are no ordinary strings. The physicists envisage tiny, vibrating, folding and elongating coils of energy, each 100 billion billion times smaller than the protons at the nucleus of an atom; so small,indeed, that they can be understood only in terms of extremely sophisticated mathematics impenetrable to all but an elite of specialists.

 

String theory, which nowadays dominates the research programmes and main funding of theoretical physics in many western universities (at a recent conference in Cambridge some 440 of them gathered to discuss their subject), was not so much discovered as invented in order to solve a vexing explanatory deficit. In the early 1970s, physicists announced the so-called “standard model” — a theory that seeks agreement between the contrasting realms of super-huge objects, such as stars and planets, (known as relativity) and the super-small realms of the subatomic (known as quantum). The standard model, however, failed to explain gravity. Enter string theory to rectify the problem. In its simplest terms, this complex set of notions claims 10 or 11 space dimensions (as opposed to the three of everyday human perception), and assumes a “landscape” of myriad elementary bundles of energy (strings) that interface not only with the universe we inhabit but a multiplicity of unseen and unknowable parallel universes.

 

But is string theory true? Peter Woit, a mathematician at Columbia University, has challenged the entire string-theory discipline by proclaiming that its topic is not a genuine theory at all and that many of its exponents do not understand the complex mathematics it employs. String theory, he avers, has become a form of science fiction. Hence his book’s title, Not Even Wrong: an epithet created by Wolfgang Pauli, an irascible early 20th-century German physicist. Pauli had three escalating levels of insult for colleagues he deemed to be talking nonsense: “Wrong!”, “Completely wrong!” and finally “Not even wrong!”. By which he meant that a proposal was so completely outside the scientific ballpark as not to merit the least consideration.

 

Woit’s book, highly readable, accessible and powerfully persuasive, is designed to give a short history of recent particle and theoretical physics. Ultimately he seeks not only to rattle but to dismantle the cage of the string theorists. What gives the book its searingly provocative edge, moreover, is the fact that Woit isn’t even a tenured professor, but a mere mathematics instructor specialising in computer systems. Yet he has formidable allies such as David Gross (the Nobel Llaureate theoretical physicist), Roger Penrose (the world-class mathematician) and Lee Smolin (the leading cosmologist), plus an accumulating constituency of other big-name supporters. Woit has taken on a group of the smartest minds in the world and told them that their intellectually imperial pretensions are naked. He has boldly published what many have thought but never dared to express so cogently, or at such length.

 

He grants that an explanation for gravity is usefully embedded in string theory, but he challenges its authenticity as proper science. In his view, string theory offers no foreseeable prospect of making predictions, a crucial criterion for any theory worthy of the name. Matching the theory with the way we see the world, he argues, depends on believing in sixseveral tiny unobserved spatial dimensions wrapped around each other. Hence there is an infinite number of possible choices as to how one would make predictions, and nobody knows how to determine which choice is correct. The objection invokes the late Karl Popper’s widely accepted definition of science. An explanation is scientific, according to Popper, only if it can be used to make predictions of a kind that can be falsified: in other words, can be checked to be right or wrong.

 

Woit’s second main objection is that string theory offers no possibility of producing experimental evidence. Even the proposed prodigiously expensive class of accelerators known as Superconducting Super Colliders (SSCs), he claims, would have failed to provide the merest clue as to whether the theory had merit. In the event, the SSCs fell victim to the hubris of physics. An infamous example is the one at Waxahachie, Texas. Budgeted at $11 billion, and designed to be 87km, it was cancelled by Congress in 1993 when $2 billion had been spent and 22km of tunnel constructed.

 

Woit’s most compelling accusation, however, is that the domination of string theory in universities has stifled progress in alternative research programmes within theoretical physics. As long as the leadership of the physics community refuses to accept that string theory is a “failed project”, he writes, “there is little likelihood of new ideas finding fertile ground in which to grow”.

 

Finally, and most devastatingly, he follows the lead of the science writer John Horgan, who suggested in his controversial book, The End of Science (1996), that, having reached their limit, some areas of science are in danger of becoming what he terms “ironic science”. In a passage of ultimate insult, Woit unpacks this notion further, suggesting that theoretical physics has become like the deconstructionist realms of literary criticism in the 1970s, which disappeared up its own fundament, “incapable of ever converging on the truth”.

 

Now that Woit has thrown a wild cat among the theoreticians, we can be sure that the ruffled string-theory advocates will be preparing a rebuttal. Woit, the humble maths instructor, has nothing to lose in terms of academic standing, but physics might have much to gain from his boldness. While his book tends to be negative, it may well shake up a community of scientists that has evidently become complacent if not entirely ossified in its thinking. If he can encourage string theorists to acknowledge the true difficulties of their discipline, and encourage young researchers to try neglected but promising alternatives, he will have succeeded in an important task.

 

===end quote===

 

The Sunday Times has the book available for sale, priced at £16.99 (inc p&p) on 0870 165 8585.

 

In my estimation there are some TECHNICAL ERRORS in John Cornwell's account. I never heard that Wolfgang Pauli had 3 grades of badness (wrong, completely wrong, not even wrong) and i thought that not even wrong simply meant not experimentally testable---unempirical. I could be wrong. But I do not think that Cornwell's technical errors, if he makes them, materially affect his story.

 

Cornwell is an HISTORIAN specializing in 20th century, and certainly not a physicist. But as a scholar he is aware of the academic scene, the fashions and politics in research, and the damage which may result when one particular research clique or SCHOOL takes over a field. So, appropriately or not---rightly or wrongly---he applies his own experience to grasp what is going on in physics and the circumstances surrounding Peter Woit's book.

[swansont]

Hence his book’s title, Not Even Wrong: an epithet created by Wolfgang Pauli, an irascible early 20th-century German physicist.

 

 

An aside: I TA'd for a prof who once told me "Wolfgang Pauli was my electrodynamic professor. He was a real bastard." (It sounded even better in a German/Austrian accent.)

[timo]

An aside: I TA'd for a prof who once told me "Wolfgang Pauli was my electrodynamic professor. He was a real bastard."

That´s probably because he tried to exclude everyone who had similar interests .

[Martin]

".. He was a real bastard." (It sounded even better in a German/Austrian accent.)

 

Love it. I can hear the broad A

 

a real bahhhhh-stahrd

 

YES!

[5614]

I actually have the original article on the floor behind me. I thought it was very interesting.

 

"but he challenges its authenticity as proper science. In his view, string theory offers no foreseeable prospect of making predictions, a crucial criterion for any theory worthy of the name"

 

"string theory offers no possibility of producing experimental evidence"

 

I think it would be a good read, but not one that I will ever get around to doing.

[Martin]

the next book in this wave of anti-string books due out 3 months from now, in September.

 

meanwhile Peter Woit's book is outselling the recent book by string theorist Leonard Susskind by about 50 to 1.

 

Susskind is an outstanding writer, excellent with descriptions for the layperson, brilliant mind, and one of the founding fathers of string. His book has a catchy title too. but it doesnt seem to be his year.

 

Last time I looked at the sales ranking, Peter Woit was #408 and Leonard Susskind was #30,419------sort of 50 to 1. It changes though, you can check with these links. It might be a real brief phenomenon related to the reviews.

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0224076051/ref=pd_ecc_rvi_3/202-2431188-4987064

Not Even Wrong: The Failure of String Theory and the Continuing Challenge to Unify the Laws of Physics (June 2006)

 

 

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0316155799/sr=1-2/qid=1150305898/ref=sr_1_2/202-2431188-4987064?%5Fencoding=UTF8&s=books&v=glance

The Cosmic Landscape: String Theory and the Illusion of Intelligent Design(December 2005)

 

 

Anyone have a suggestion of some other wide-audience physics book that is still in hardcover and has appeared recently enough to provide a comparison gauge?

Lisa Randall's book is still in hardcover but came out June 2005, not so recent, so I think it would not be a fair comparison (sales probably peaked earlier)

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0713996994/sr=1-6/qid=1150306378/ref=sr_1_6/202-2431188-4987064?%5Fencoding=UTF8&s=books&v=glance

 

Thomas Larsson's had a comment about this at Peter Woit's blog

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0713996994/sr=1-6/qid=1150306378/ref=sr_1_6/202-2431188-4987064?%5Fencoding=UTF8&s=books&v=glance

[SkepticLance]

The biggest problem with string theory is that it has led to no testable predictions. In science, any hypothesis must be testable empirically with the opportunity to falsify it. Anything else is religion.

 

This does not mean string theory is wrong. it may be right, or mainly right. However, until it is empirically tested, it remains of little value.

[Royston]

This does not mean string theory is wrong. it may be right, or mainly right. However, until it is empirically tested[/b'], it remains of little value.

 

Apart from the complexity of the maths involved, the problem I have with string theory is the amount of energy needed to find the little b*ggers...IIRC it's impossible. I'm not comfortable with something that will never be observed. Something just niggles me, that extra dimension are not needed, and simplicity seems to be the standard of any great theory...it also means the theory is accesible, for people who are not educated in physics.

 

Selfish as it may sound, I just hope that string theory doesn't make a prediction, not to undermine the incredibe amount of work that's gone into it, but my study is heading in the direction of quantum explanations for gravity...so personally, the less interest in this field the better.

[Locrian]

Heh I remember back in 2001 (or so?) reading Woit's article in American Scientist. I was still an undergrad at the time, but his arguments resonated deeply with me. Its been fun being the contrarian all this time, but now it looks like my skepticism may be - if not a majority - at least a bit mainstream.

 

Will that take all the fun out of it? Only time will tell. Laughlin stirs people up better anyhow

[SmallIsPower]

The biggest problem with string theory is that it has led to no testable predictions. In science' date=' any hypothesis must be testable empirically with the opportunity to falsify it. Anything else is religion.

 

This does not mean string theory is wrong. it may be right, or mainly right. However, until it is empirically tested, it remains of little value.[/quote']

 

Yes, but the fact that gravity is embedded in string theory without it looking like it was artificially added does add a bit of coroboration to it.

 

Relativity was of little value, too for 90 years, until it was needed for GPS satelites. Freeman Dyson has been critical of how long it takes theoretical physics to become useful, too.

[Locrian]

Actually, broad areas of theoretical physics end up useful very quickly. Think quantum optics, transistor, GMR, etc. String theory, on the other hand, doesn't have a problem with usefulness yet. It has a problem with being more than fantasy. Mathematics is a beautiful thing, but its not physics until there is experimentation.

 

Once string theory is burned by the holy brand of phenomenology, it may twist and shape itself to something that is physics. At that time it will face the usefulness problem. To get an idea of how useful it might be, look to all the important social and scientific changes due to work in particle physics over the past twenty years.

[Martin]

... it may twist and shape itself to something that is physics. ...

 

it's a good thought.

BTW here is an example of a guy doing something like strings and branes but without necessarily having extra dimensions-----the stuff is tentative and barely gotten started but it involves new mathematics:

 

Baez video lecture at Perimeter institute

 

available both as PDF and as video, for the video go here

http://streamer.perimeterinstitute.ca:81/mediasite/viewer/FrontEnd/Front.aspx?&shouldResize=False

 

select SEMINAR SERIES near the top of the sidebar menu on the left

 

in Seminar Series menu click on the 31 May 2006 talk given by John Baez for streaming video plus slides (needs a fairly fast connection)

 

or with any kind of connection check out this related page

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/

 

in particular this page has the lecturenotes for the 31 May talk in PDF

you go here

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/quantum_spacetime/

and the first link you see is to the PDF of the "transparencies" for

Higher-Dimensional Algebra: A Language for Quantum Spacetime

 

it may sound offputting but it is an example of a spinoff from string that unites with some other QG approaches, and gets some new math, and might pan out

 

I like the image of something burned by contact with reality twisting into new unexpected shapes-----not just human creativity, nature helping some too

[Locrian]

Wow. You know, I've been to Baez site now and then, but the pdf on his "quantum_spactime" page really impressed upon me how good a communicator he is.

 

Not that I can claim to really understand the details in any meaningful way...

 

Thanks for the links Martin