- #1
Juan R.
- 416
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Demodocus said:Jaun: String theory is a waste of time.
I dissagree. I don't know if string theory is correct or not, and I really don't care. But, even if it is completely wrong, basically no theory is a waste of time, as long as it is well developed and researched. A lot of times, the journey is more important than the goal, I think. All these extremely intelligent people are sitting around pondering string theory. Now imagine if one realized that it was complete BS. If they did, they would have a reason why, and therefore they have created a new theory. So, it isn't a waste of time, even if it is completely wrong, because it prompts debate and refining of the theory. Just think--pretty much all of Aristotles theories were completely wrong, but people heard about his theorys, and thought that it couldn't be right, and created theories of their own, which were better and more refined. Generally in physics, you have to be wrong before you can be right.
--Demodocus
But hey, what do I know?
"But, even if it is completely wrong, basically no theory is a waste of time, as long as it is well developed and researched."
The problem is that it is not well developed and researched. As said by Nobel laureate P. Anderson this year, string theory is a futile exercise as physics.
"A lot of times, the journey is more important than the goal, I think."
Well, perhaps, but anybody agree that Einstein unified field theory was a waste of time. He simply ignored experimental data on favour of a "beatiful" idea and he failed. As often ask Nobel laureate Glasgow, why Einstein few years enedeavor is seen like a failure but 30 years-1000 physicists research in string theory do not?
"All these extremely intelligent people are sitting around pondering string theory."
Yes this is another of myths of string theory propaganda. "String theorists are very smart, rest of people is stupid." Still, and this is a really interesting point, no one string theorists have solved or provided solution to some of most difficult open problems of physics, and some of proposed solutions by them are simply stupid. For example, Brian Greene ideas on quantum-classical correspondence were ridiculized last year by Dyson (Nobel laureate).
I think that your emphasis on theories that are still in a initial stage or still nobody know if are both correct or wrong. However, people is critizing string theory because is wrong.