Why String Theory as a Physics theory is a failure.

[jeremyjr]

The lack of contact with reality is an almost sure recipe for failure for any theory that pretends to describe reality and today we have a perfect example of that failure in the scientific world in String Theory.

A theory that Mathematically is very rich and had produced very deep results in various branch of higher Mathematics, but as a Physics theory of reality had been a failure.

 

And the reason for that failure is clear: When compared with two great Physics theories of Quantum Mechanics and Relativity Theory we can see that the genesis of Quantum Mechanics was the synthesis of multiple and consistent observational/experimental data and in Relativity Theory was an outstanding analysis of our basic understanding of space and time supported too by multiple observational results.

 

But String Theory genesis was a theoretical "accident" that did not have any conection with reality and from there many "maneuvers" have been done to keep the theory alive, but essentially no physics results of any relevance had been produced from String Theory that can not be obtained in simpler ways from more "standards" ideas. And after so many years with almost nothing to show that is the very definition of failure.

[ajb]

... but essentially no physics results of any relevance had been produced from String Theory that can not be obtained in simpler ways from more "standards" ideas.

Can you give us examples here?

 

You have put quite a negative spin on this, but then the people in string theory put a positive spin on their work.

 

String theory seems to be the only candidate for a unification scheme that we know of today. It gives us a theory of quantum gravity and is 'large enough' to include all the particles of the standard model. Nothing else really comes close.

 

My interest in string theory, which is not so great, is in the mathematical aspects. String theory has provided some amazing links with mathematics, I would say especially low dimensional topology, geometry and related topics.

[jeremyjr]

And this is not even "new", a simple search on Google will give some results from "serious" sources:

 

"Forty Years of String Theory | Not Even Wrong":

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=5358

 

"String Theory Now on Life Support":

http://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2012/11/string-theory-in-deep-trouble.html

 

String theory is the perfect example that shows that Mathematics alone is not enough to describe reality, that by the way answer a similar question as one topic in this section of this forum.

Detachment from reality is a systemic problem in today "science" or academia, the String theory case is just the tip of the iceberg.

[Phi for All]

String theory is the perfect example that shows that Mathematics alone is not enough to describe reality, that by the way answer a similar question as one topic in this section of this forum.

Detachment from reality is a systemic problem in today "science" or academia, the String theory case is just the tip of the iceberg.

 

Since you are generally negative towards mainstream science, it's not surprising you would take this perspective. Many others think String Theory shows the remarkable, self-correcting power of the scientific method.

 

And if the theory ever finds experimental support, I think you'll find the mathematics will describe reality pretty well. Ironically, I find your perspective to be the one detached from reality. You seem to think that if science is wrong about some things, it must be wrong about everything.

[jeremyjr]

 

Since you are generally negative towards mainstream science, it's not surprising you would take this perspective. Many others think String Theory shows the remarkable, self-correcting power of the scientific method.

 

And if the theory ever finds experimental support, I think you'll find the mathematics will describe reality pretty well. Ironically, I find your perspective to be the one detached from reality. You seem to think that if science is wrong about some things, it must be wrong about everything.

Since you are generally negative towards mainstream science, it's not surprising you would take this perspective. Many others think String Theory shows the remarkable, self-correcting power of the scientific method.

 

And if the theory ever finds experimental support, I think you'll find the mathematics will describe reality pretty well. Ironically, I find your perspective to be the one detached from reality. You seem to think that if science is wrong about some things, it must be wrong about everything.

You last paragraph is again one of your cover all generalizations, I did mention that String Theory is very rich as a Mathematics theory and Mathematics for your information is part of Mainstream Science, but I really believe that what you understand by science, that do not coinciide with mine, have systemic problems and String Theory is just one example of that.

The fact that String theory is very rich from a mathematical point of view do not make it a successful physics theory and I recommend the two mentioned articles that provide further arguments in that sense.

You think that as moderator in this forum you have "authority" in all topics but that is just an illusion as many of your other illusions about what is the scientific method, and please stay on topic and stop the personal attacks.

Edited April 14, 2015 by jeremyjr

[Phi for All]

You think that as moderator in this forum you have "authority" in all topics but that is just an illusion as many of your other illusions about what is the scientific method, and please stay on topic and stop the personal attacks.

 

Well, I don't moderate threads I'm involved with as a member, so my authority is equal to yours in that regard. My post was on topic, and my comments were directed at your perspective, not you personally. So, misconceptions cleared up, hopefully.

 

Perhaps I'm alone in thinking that your comments about String Theory aren't directed at science in general. It certainly seems that way to me.

[pavelcherepan]

I don't exactly agree with jeremyjr but I can see where he's coming from. Mathematical self-consistency is good, but not really enough to qualify as a proper natural science theory. In fact, if a theory is self-consistent mathematically but doesn't make testable real world predictions it can't be falsified. Unfortunately, I don't know enough of string theory (maths in it is way beyond my league), I know that it's pretty good at explaining known phenomena within its framework but does it make testable predictions and have those been tested?

 

EDIT: Searching the internets I haven't been able to locate any information on any successful tests of string theory mostly because any such tests would require energy levels many orders of magnitude higher than is currently achievable. So all in all, however elegant and fascinating the mathematical framework is and despite the fact that many scientists consider it to be the only current option for a "theory of everything", string theory (superstring, M-Theory) remains mostly a mathematical curiosity with beautiful equations but no real results to show for it.

Edited April 15, 2015 by pavelcherepan

[ajb]

...but essentially no physics results of any relevance had been produced from String Theory that can not be obtained in simpler ways from more "standards" ideas.

So we all have a better idea of where you are coming from, can you give examples of this.

 

Some of the most important results seem to stem from mathematically trying to understand what quantum field theory 'is'. String theory has also led to techniques that can be applied to point-particle QFTs; for example Witten's understanding of MHV amplitudes using twistor string theory. That said, most of the really interesting results really are in linking strings/fields to geometric and topological structures.

[jeremyjr]

Well, I don't moderate threads I'm involved with as a member, so my authority is equal to yours in that regard. My post was on topic, and my comments were directed at your perspective, not you personally. So, misconceptions cleared up, hopefully.

 

Perhaps I'm alone in thinking that your comments about String Theory aren't directed at science in general. It certainly seems that way to me.

And actually your perspective is the one that shows a very weak "scientific spirit": you "believe" that a theory like String Theory that do not have any testable predictions is a "valid" physics theory of reality, that is the very definition of taking something on "faith", again being mathematically rich do not make it a successful physics theory, the fact that this theory is/was the one with more theoretical physicists working on it only makes it "fashionable" nothing more, and the argument "no all these physicists could be wrong" is really very weak, history of science shows multiple examples where the majority opinion was wrong and actually that is almost always the case.

So you take the validity of String theory as a model of reality on faith, but as in other cases that you are referring indirectly in your post when presented with observational results that you can duplicate you refuse to accept these results, is that really a scientific approach? And the same approach is taken by many, this approach lead to a detachment from reality and that is really part of the systemic problem in "science" today. I am very much for a scientific approach but one that keep us in real contact with reality, not approaches that keep a platonic dream running for more than 40 years with nothing to show and then very basic extraordinary facts are ignored just because they contradict mainstream ideas.

 

And regarding the frequently used argument that String theory is a "tool" for the many mathematical results that had produced, that is really something "expected", any mathematical model when developed intensively will produce many new results that will interconnect with many other branches of mathematics and examples of that interconnections abound, Number theory being maybe one of the simplest examplest with interconnections with many other branches of Mathematics. So that argument used frequently to show the "strength" of String theory is really very weak.

Edited April 15, 2015 by jeremyjr

[ajb]

... that is really something "expected", any mathematical model when developed intensively will produce many new results that will interconnect with many other branches of mathematics and examples of that interconnections abound..

I don't really agree with this, but okay.

 

Anyway, what did you want to discuss? So far you have just informed us of your lack on interest in string theory. (Which reminds me, I have a couple of string theory seminars to attend this week )

[jeremyjr]

Everything that I will ever post in this forum is driven by what I observe almost in a daily basis, and that is the reality of anomalies.

With posts like this I am trying to explain why mainstream science had been unable to deal with that reality and the String theory case is just one example of the prevailing detachment from reality in academia and scientific circles.

Some people are just happy to devate platonic models of reality with zero testable predictions but they refuse to even try to verify the reality of something extraordinary that is being observed almost daily worldwide and I personally observe now almost in a daily basis. In my eyes that shows a deep systemic problem.

Edited April 15, 2015 by jeremyjr

[EdEarl]

The time between theoretical work and observation seems to be increasing.

 

Einstein wrote about general relativity in 1915, but it was 1919 before light was observed bending around the Sun, which was first observation of effects predicted by relativity.

 

Higgs and other theorists wrote about a boson about forty years before it was discovered.

 

The hypothesis called String Theory is not a bad hypothesis, it may be incorrect, it may be unprovable, but we have no alternative except to wait to see if it can be proven or not. Perhaps one day another unifying hypothesis will be developed to rival String Theory, we must wait for it, too. Patience is difficult.

[swansont]

The time between theoretical work and observation seems to be increasing.

 

Einstein wrote about general relativity in 1915, but it was 1919 before light was observed bending around the Sun, which was first observation of effects predicted by relativity.

 

Higgs and other theorists wrote about a boson about forty years before it was discovered.

 

The hypothesis called String Theory is not a bad hypothesis, it may be incorrect, it may be unprovable, but we have no alternative except to wait to see if it can be proven or not. Perhaps one day another unifying hypothesis will be developed to rival String Theory, we must wait for it, too. Patience is difficult.

More examples exist as well. Bose-Einstein condensates had to wait 70 years or so. Lasers/masers weren't developed for several decades after the theory was developed. Several tests of other aspects of GR took decades as well.

 

Gaps between theory development and testing is not sufficient to declare failure.

[Phi for All]

Perhaps I'm alone in thinking that your comments about String Theory aren't directed at science in general. It certainly seems that way to me.

So you take the validity of String theory as a model of reality on faith, but as in other cases that you are referring indirectly in your post when presented with observational results that you can duplicate you refuse to accept these results, is that really a scientific approach? And the same approach is taken by many, this approach lead to a detachment from reality and that is really part of the systemic problem in "science" today.

 

See, it's statements like this that make me think you're extrapolating String Theory's lack of experimental success to science in general. Others have noticed as well, and are asking you to do more than make hand-wavy assertions, perhaps provide some supportive evidence for your anti-mainstream stance.

 

And actually your perspective is the one that shows a very weak "scientific spirit": you "believe" that a theory like String Theory that do not have any testable predictions is a "valid" physics theory of reality, that is the very definition of taking something on "faith", again being mathematically rich do not make it a successful physics theory, the fact that this theory is/was the one with more theoretical physicists working on it only makes it "fashionable" nothing more, and the argument "no all these physicists could be wrong" is really very weak, history of science shows multiple examples where the majority opinion was wrong and actually that is almost always the case.

 

Oh please, not that tired old piece-of-crap argument about science as a religion! I think you missed the part where I never claimed to be a String Theory proponent. It's a really elegant theory, imo, but I don't have the math skills to confirm it personally. So I rely on those who do speak math, and they all tell me that it's the best part of this theory. But ultimately, right now we can't test the rest of it, and that alone makes the theory suspect on a foundational level.

 

String Theory is completely valid as a theory, and recognizes the standard model. It's one of the closest we have now to a unified field theory. Like all theories, it's just waiting to get better. Or be overthrown by something better. Like others, I'm just trying to show that it's far too premature to call it a failure and abandon it. And it absolutely doesn't prove any of the other crap you've attached to it, especially your last line above. I'd sure like to see you support the statement that the majority opinion in science is almost always wrong.

 

In my opinion, stances like these are suspicious in that they absolve you from a great deal of hard study and learning. Approaching science from an intuitive position is what is almost always wrong.

[ajb]

The hypothesis called String Theory is not a bad hypothesis...

I view string theory as a mathematical framework for which it maybe possible to build a realistic unification scheme. As it stands right now, no-one is sure if it really can be used that way. In particular it is just not know if amongst the huge number of solutions that one of those is our Universe. The hypothesis is that our Universe is one of these solutions.

 

What string theory has done for sure is give us a non-trivial generalisation of point-particle like quantum theories that seems consistent and insists that gravity be included. Just on a mathematical basis of trying to understand what a QFT is string theory pushes our understanding. The problem is that the initial seed of replacing points with strings has now exploded in such a way that the original simple idea is a bit lost.

[MigL]

While I agree that the gap between theoretical physics and experimental physics is widening ( our technology hasn't kept up with the energies needed to explore closer and closer to Planck scale ), string theory is a viable area of research. And even if ultimately proved to be a dead end, it will provide insight into other areas where the math may be applied.

Maybe 'theory' is the wrong word for it, as that implies testability, but does it really matter ?

 

Anyway, my gut still prefers LQG.

[ajb]

Anyway, my gut still prefers LQG.

That is far less ambitious and maybe a rival to string theory in the gravitational sector, but not so for everything else. You can add matter to LQG, but I think this is exactly that, adding matter and fields. String theory should contain all these ingredients from the start.

 

A big problem with LQG, and some people working on this are getting closer (according to one student I have spoken to), is the classical limit. It is not really known if the classical limit can be defined uniquely (generally there maybe more than one classical limit) and if that limit is general relativity maybe plus small corrections.

Edited April 16, 2015 by ajb

[jeremyjr]

Even Mathematics itself has its limits, creativity and intuition does not have this limitation, there is essentially no new paradigm in String Theory, it is basically the OLD expectation of unification and the recurrent use of the OLD recipe of quantization. No new physics really.

History of science also teach us that when many generations try to solve a problem following more or less tha same path and fail, that could be an indication of something deeper being missed, the genesis of non Euclidean geometries come to mind, also the Goedel's incompleteness theorems come to mind.

If even any sufficient complex mathematical model is intrinsically incomplete, because always we can find statements expressed inside that model that are improbable withing the model, then the same will not be true for the more complex of all possible models: reality?

[ajb]

jeremyjr, your opinions are duly noted, but is there anything in particular you wanted to discuss?

[jeremyjr]

It is well known that "complex systems" may have "emergent" properties, properties that are associated to the system and can not be "explained/deducted" from the "simpler" properties of the given system elementary components, that is really like a new property/statement in an axiomatic system that is independent from the axioms in the system, like the "parallel axiom" in Euclidean geometry.

 

One example of these emergent properties in complex system is the self organization tendency of complex carbon based chemical compounds/soups, likely the primordial property that is behind the genesis of life, similar self organization tendency had been found in complex plasma.

 

Then if in these subsystems of the Universe emergent properties are present it is not a great leap to assume that the Universe will have too "emergent" properties that can not be derived from its elementary constituents, even with a complete understanding of these elementary constituents, which is far from being the case.

[Strange]

Then if in these subsystems of the Universe emergent properties are present it is not a great leap to assume that the Universe will have too "emergent" properties that can not be derived from its elementary constituents, even with a complete understanding of these elementary constituents, which is far from being the case.

 

There are many such theories being explored at the moment. For example, with ideas like loop quantum gravity and causal dynamical triangulation suggest that space and time are just emergent properties of something more fundamental. And Erik Verlinde proposes that gravity is an emergent property of normal thermodynamic processes.

[jeremyjr]

There are many such theories being explored at the moment. For example, with ideas like loop quantum gravity and causal dynamical triangulation suggest that space and time are just emergent properties of something more fundamental. And Erik Verlinde proposes that gravity is an emergent property of normal thermodynamic processes.

Thanks for the references, but maybe we are not talking exactly of the same concept, in the examples that you mentioned the "emergent" property is "explained/deducted" from the properties of the system elementary constituents, the "emergent" properties that I am talking about are "unexpected" properties of the system, and unexpected means in this case no explainable by the known properties of its constituents.

 

Actually we do not need to take the whole Universe to talk about emergent properties, maybe "big" parts of it may have too emergent properties, like galaxies for example, that will place in a completely different light many things.

Edited April 20, 2015 by jeremyjr

[Strange]

Thanks for the references, actually we do not need to take the whole Universe to talk about emergent properties, maybe "big" parts of it may have too emergent properties, like galaxies for example, that will place in a completely different light many things.

 

Maybe. (Although just saying "things may have emergent properties" may be a bit too vague to be useful; or even interesting as a discussion point.)

 

Actually, the spiral arms of galaxies are emergent structures.

[jeremyjr]

Maybe. (Although just saying "things may have emergent properties" may be a bit too vague to be useful; or even interesting as a discussion point.)

 

Actually, the spiral arms of galaxies are emergent structures.

I thought that the edit in previous post was not going to affect the discussion, and I added a paragraph mentioning galaxies and mentioning that the emergent properties that you mentioned are not exactly the same that I am talking about.

[Strange]

Thanks for the references, but maybe we are not talking exactly of the same concept, in the examples that you mentioned the "emergent" property is "explained/deducted" from the properties of the system elementary constituents, the "emergent" properties that I am talking about are "unexpected" properties of the system, and unexpected means in this case no explainable by the known properties of its constituents.

 

That is exactly what I understand "emergent properties" to mean.

 

Well, apart from the "not explainable" bit; if they were not explainable in terms of the more fundamental properties then that would mean there was no connection and therefore they were not emergent.