Peter Woit's Blog: Good Stuff, Not Too Hard on String Theory

[sol2]

From a laymen's perspective, the second revolution has already happened. Just to point out where this has lead too. M Theory

Imagine now then, developing perspective in regards to Warp Drive, from a brane scenario?

Most certainly there is a architectual apparatus that is mathematically driven, but like understanding gravitational waves, the graviton helps us to recognize the dimensional perspective of the bulk? Do we then dismiss this new perspective?

I am open to corrections

 

[marcus]

reconnecting with topic---Haelfix' focus on "main beef"

Before April 1 ( chuckling over the spoof in the blog) we were discussing
Woit's criticism of excess hype and unbalanced funding.
notevenwrong responded to this:

Haelfix raised the issue of what is your "main beef" and got me curious.
He suggested it was lopsided funding. I want to try to get the essential
points isolated and in focus, at least for me. I don't hear a complaint (which is I guess what a beef is) and maybe I hear more a warning and a demand for integrity. Have to reflect a bit.

I think you've got it right. My point of view is that the over-hyping of string theory has lead to a really unhealthy situation in particle theory, and the remedy for this is for people to start honestly evaluating the results of the last 20 years work on the subject. I think if they do that they'll conclude that the idea of unifying the standard model and gravity in a 10/11 dimensional supersymmetric string/M-theory simply doesn't work. Once they get used to that idea, maybe people will start thinking about other more promising things.

 

[selfAdjoint]

I've been rereading Kaku's Hyperspace (thought I ought to) and I was struck by the way he described the enthusiasm and hope of the physicists who developed 10 dimensional supergravity in the 1980s. They thought for a while they had IT, the theory of everything. But it turned out to be unrenormalizable. Just wrong.

Superstrings, and string physics generally, has never sent this signal. One of the first things proven in it was that it didn't require renormalization, because the worldsheets didn't intersect in points, as world lines of particles did. So the situation is not quite "not even wrong", because the failure of the "wrong" signal to appear is not due to the weakness of the theory but to its strength.

Because they never have had the theory itself tell them it was hopeless, string physicists have never given up hope. They have gone farther and farther, and how ever far it is, the math tells them it's OK to press on. I can't help but feel that some of the string physicists are wandering in the wilderness, but their stuff is still mathematically sound, so how can you tell? At least one of the posters on the new string board feels the huge landscape of vacua is amenable to calculation and not that big a threat. More power to him.

 

[marcus]

... At least one of the posters on the new string board feels the huge landscape of vacua is amenable to calculation and not that big a threat. More power to him.

sA it was a real delight that you tuned us into Woit's blog! I check it every 5 or 6 days or so. notevenwrong has commended the new board and commented just yesterday on what I imagine are the same posts you are referring to here. His comment is "pass the popcorn!"

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

--------exerpt from "Not Even Wrong" blog-----
April 07, 2004
KKLT Smackdown
I was dubious of the value of a new "sci.physics.strings" newsgroup when it was first proposed, but now must admit it seems to have been a great idea It started up a week or two ago, and quickly someone asked the seemingly innocuous question of how many different possible vacuum states were expected in string theory. This is a hugely controversial issue among string theorists, largely because recent evidence is that the number is definitely astronomically large, and this makes it very unlikely that current ideas about string theory can ever be used to predict anything about the real world.

A lot of the discussion revolves around the "KKLT" proposal for constructing a large number of these vacuum states. The acronym is the initials of the authors, three of whom are at Stanford: Shamit Kachru, Renata Kallosh and Andrei Linde. Also at Stanford is Lenny Susskind, who has been spending the last year or so going around giving talks on the "Landscape of String Theory". It's hard to believe this, but Susskind's claim is essentially that the lack of predictivity of string theory is a good thing, since it allows so many possibilities that anything can happen. One can then invoke the "Anthropic Principle" to explain why the world is the way it is. It seems that Susskind is even writing a book about this wonderful "discovery".

Amazingly enough, the thread about this on sci.physics.strings, entitled "Conceptual question", has brought a public attack on the "Stanford propaganda machine" by a well-known European string theorist (Wolfgang Lerche), a detailed defense of his ideas by one of the KKLT authors (Kachru), contributions from the inimitable Lubos Motl from Harvard, and, while I was writing this, a defense of the anthropic principle from Joe Polchinski just appeared, which attacks the "cult of monovacuism" embodied by David Gross and Ed Witten.

Thanks are due to the creators of this newsgroup. Pass the popcorn!

-----------end quote-------------

sA you know I very much like the woity style of writing and
fully concur with his assessment that Lubos Motl is inimitable
and moreover I detect within myself distinct leanings towards monovacuism
woit IS the popcorn in this movie

 

[selfAdjoint]

Well, I find Woit kind of a guilty pleasure. It bugs me that the whole discussion is so snarky - I don't see how any of that will affect the outcome one way or another. And I am perfectly willing to get slammed by both sides because I won't play party politics with the future of physics.

Physics is a gift physicists give to humanity. The hard work of creating that gift is a high calling. To play the schoolyard squabbler in the middle of that is very sad to see.

 

[marcus]

... And I am perfectly willing to get slammed by both sides because I won't play party politics with the future of physics.

I agree. The way your interests and intuitions differ from mine (as well as coincide) are like a compass needle to me.
the diversity of honest views from intelligent people is just about the most valuable thing this kind of situation offers

We probably both deplore mafia-like activity or slamming or self-righteous bullying.

Simple squabbling I don't mind. Scholars (Newton/Leibniz) have traditionally conducted squabbles of epic proportion. We small fry may continue the custom without too much embarrassment. Maybe it is a form of mass entertainment. I expect to be permitted to express my leanings---interest in A and non-interest in B---and give reasons without being attacked. I don't object when other people express different interests and give reasons, although I may occasionally disagree.

I also do not object to satire. Sometimes admonishment doesn't work. Mafia-like activity, bullying, thought-policing, slamming people who don't toe the line or belong to the correct "camp" may persist despite moral objection. If someone resorts to satire (whether a big guy like Moliere or a little guy like Peter Woit) I am delighted. It's a literary pleasure that I'm not going to feel guilty for enjoying!

For some reason EB White's book about a mouse called Stuart Little comes to mind. when the mouse taught school there was only one rule (dont be mean) did you ever read that to your kid(s)?

 

[jeff]

What are your feelings on trying for sci.phys.lqg?

 

[marcus]

What are your feelings on trying for sci.phys.lqg?

that is a pleasant question to consider
thanks for asking it, hope some folks will reply
(I can't right now because have to go out on Easter errands)

 

[chroot]

jeff,

You mean, in trying to get such a group created?

- Warren

 

[jeff]

jeff,

You mean, in trying to get such a group created?

- Warren

Yes! Peter woit commented to the effect that he now likes the idea of sps since it's already reflecting the kind of decension among string theorists that characterize his own views. However, the decension on these issues has always been quite open. But I've never seen the same kind of open decension among members of the lqg camp. Maybe they all agree that getting lqg to work is just an unimportant technicality? Anyway, extablishing sci.phys.lqg probably isn't all that realistic.

 

[Haelfix]

If you think petty squabbling is the norm in String Theory, I invite everyone to attend cosmology and astrophysics seminars. Its usually best on the subject of galaxy structure and inflation.

Its Kinda amusing actually, grown men with Iqs off the chart, reducable to something not unlike kindergarden behaviour.

 

[jeff]

If you think petty squabbling is the norm in String Theory

Who said anything about "petty squabbling"?

 

[sol2]

I think everyone accepts the polarizations of these respective camps.

Without some kind of dualism ( not mean spirited), how would we see where such perfection might arise? I find Woit refreshing...even though I like strings.

Being a novice, it brings to mind the idea of the Solvay meetings and gedankin experiments that challenge the mind:) Logic does find its way into the arguement. Just takes a open ear, and mind, that if the spin goes one way it most certainly is simultaneous in another:)

Remember voice of a nOvice:)

 

[selfAdjoint]

Conflict is bound to arise, but mean-spiritedness is not necessary. Everyone now deplores the vicious priority fight between the followers of Newton and those of Leibniz. What do ad hominem attacks and thread ploys do to inspire the audience?

 

[arivero]

What do ad hominem attacks and thread ploys do to inspire the audience?

They hide any other contestants.

 

[marcus]

thread's topic is Peter Woit's blog,
so probably germane to note today's new entry
-----exerpt---
April 22, 2004
HEPAP
"HEPAP" is the Department of Energy's "High Energy Physics Advisory Panel", which holds meetings 3-4 times a year...

...HEPAP also adopted a new report on the "Quantum Universe". This follows the trend of recent years of trying to justify particle physics research by emphasizing its relation to the very healthy and sexy field of cosmology. The acid test of this over the next few years will be to see if it helps with the difficult problem of getting funding for the Linear Collider.

Posted by woit at 11:54 AM
-----end quote---

Personally I don't feel that Woit's blog engages in anything remotely
like what was being discussed just now above namely such things as

slamming for not toeing some party line
ad hominem attacks
meanspiritedness

And I don't think sA's remarks were intended to suggest
anything of that sort about the blog.
I think it's often a breath of the fresh
and if anything sometimes a bit too bland and sanitized
(maybe he's taken a bit of flak and is watching his step)

 

[notevenwrong]

"bland and sanitized"? Oh, no, I may have to quickly find some red meat for my loyal readers.
Maybe they'll like the latest post about Lubos Motl. If anyone feels it is mean-spirited I should point out that I only describe him as a "rabid fanatic" because I'm pretty sure he'd be proud of the designation.

The incoming flak seems to have mostly stopped, perhaps because it was met with devastating retaliation. Not watching my step any more or less than I ever have been. I'm just a sunny-dispositioned guy who always thinks the best of people.

 

[selfAdjoint]

You'll find my opinion on your Lubos post on my congratulation to him thread.

 

[sol2]

"bland and sanitized"? Oh, no, I may have to quickly find some red meat for my loyal readers.
Maybe they'll like the latest post about Lubos Motl. If anyone feels it is mean-spirited I should point out that I only describe him as a "rabid fanatic" because I'm pretty sure he'd be proud of the designation.

The incoming flak seems to have mostly stopped, perhaps because it was met with devastating retaliation. Not watching my step any more or less than I ever have been. I'm just a sunny-dispositioned guy who always thinks the best of people.

I believe as long as the spirit of Solvay is realized, and the counter arguments are sound, then there is nothing to be afraid of. It is a immediate recognition by all sides. From that logic, progress can be made.

To inject mean spiritedness, is something part parcel of the characters, not the math, so we can see where this can be moved past:)

From a child of the universe

 

[marcus]

... I'm just a sunny-dispositioned guy who always thinks the best of people.

...should never have said bland and sanitized. Glad the flak has abated. This loyal reader confesses that a bit of red meat now and then contributes to my own sunny disposition.

 

[marcus]

26 April
Woit blogged today
http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

27 April
and again today

the 27 April post concerns arcane algebraic geometry:
the "Langlands program" and
the recent proof of the Fundamental Lemma by Laumon ( 91 pages in French.)
for the foolhardy or intrepid, here's a sample of Laumon talking about these things in English
http://arxiv.org./alg-geom/9711021

 

[marcus]

Woit blogged 30 April and 8 May
(just a reminder, when there are fresh ones posted,
for folks who don't bother to check the site regularly)

the 8 May one is about Eric Baum's book "What Is Thought"
it has links to a review of Baum's book by Edward Witten
and to some online discussion of the book, as well as to some
condensed presentation of the main ideas

 

[selfAdjoint]

I went back to his site just now to refresh my memory on his Konstant Dirac Operator post. It's still over my head. But what excited me is that he has now added a post criticising Lubos Motl's screed against John Baez on sci.physics.strings. The way that forum has developed makes me wish I had never voted for it.

 

[marcus]

update

10 May blog was the one on Pottery referred to here by selfAdjoint
Today's 15 May blog is about a recent talk by Leonard Susskind
on the stringerous and braneful Landscape

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

[added in edit] again today 17 May, Peter's report from the same
conference: this time on talks by Givental and by Witten

 

[marcus]

more (crack) Pottery

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

Woit blogged again today: 19 May
commenting on a Slate interview with
the highly imaginative Andrei Linde

Woit appears not to relish Linde's pontification

I just checked the site again and Woit has posted a second, longer,
entry for 19 May----commenting on the decline of SUSY's popularity.
This is a followup on the report of Susskind attacking Supersymmetry
as a string hope. The operative word is "epicycle" the extra gadgetry
added to the Ptolemaic model to make the planets go how they should.

"I had thought this point of view was just Susskind being provocative, but today a new preprint appeared by Nima Arkani-Hamed and Savas Dimopoulos entitled "Supersymmetric Unification Without Low Energy Supersymmetry and Signatures for Fine-Tuning at the LHC". In this article the authors go over all the problems with the standard picture of supersymmetry and describe the last twenty-five years or so of attempt to address them as "epicyclic model-building". They claim that all these problems can be solved by adopting the anthropic principle (which they rename the "structure" or "galactic" or "atomic" principle to try and throw off those who think the "anthropic" principle is not science)..."
Can it be that post-modern Theoretical Physics is considering new names for the anthropic principle?

 

[marcus]

Woit blogged 23 May about the Spires database citations report for 2003 that just appeared

I notice that the 4th part, about gr-qc papers, is not even out yet for 2003,
but the hep-th parts are
and Michael Peskin has done his usual review for the year

as might be expected, it illustrates the shift in frequency of citation away from string/M papers and towards
cosmology, neutrino etc papers----a shift of interest in the research world
that is easily seen by comparing the list of topics in the 2003 review with the same list in the 2000 and 1999 reviews

Peskin's reviews reflect the ranking of the topics of the 40 (or howevermany) most-cited papers of that year. for instance in 2003 cosmology papers were apt to be most cited, whereas in 1999 that honor went to string papers.

the particle data group's report is always an automatic first, so the list of interest is what follows. Here is the order of the topic headings from Peskin's reviews for several years:

-------2003-----

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/2003/review.shtml

Particle Data Group - PDG
Cosmology
Neutrinos
Extra Space Dimensions
String Theory
High Energy Physics Resources

---------2000--------

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/topcites.review.2000.html

Particle Data Group - PDG
M-Theory
Non-Commutative Field Theory
Extra Space Dimensions
Cosmology
Neutrinos
High Energy Physics Resources

-----1999------

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/topcites.review.1999.html

Particle Data Group - PDG
Strings and Branes
Neutrinos
Extra Space Dimensions
CP Violation
High Energy Physics Resources

------------------
We actually don't need Peskin's reviews to abstract the trend because anyone can see the pattern for himself or herself by looking at the topcited 40 (or howevermany) listings for several years. Here are the "Top 40" lists for the same years

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/2003/annual.shtml
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/top40.2000.shtml
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/top40.1999.html

It used to be that the ten most-cited papers were mostly string
and now they are more likely to be mostly cosmology or astro of some sort. It is just a way of quantifying what everybody knows already: that cosmology/astroparticle is hot.

Anyway that is what I get out of the 2003 Spires report. Peter Woit called our attention to it and has additional comment in his blog.

 

[jeff]

...topic headings from Peskin's reviews...:

-------2003-----

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/2003/review.shtml

Particle Data Group - PDG
Cosmology
Neutrinos
Extra Space Dimensions
String Theory
High Energy Physics Resources

No surprise that high energy theory remains utterly dominated by strings, with LQG and every other approach languishing unmentioned on the margins.

 

[selfAdjoint]

See Woit's post today. The Spires database shows no new killer string papers. Woit concludes the particle physics (not just string) enterprise flatlined about 5 years ago. I think that it came out of the narrow valley into the wide plain and spread out into many small population threads. But nobody seems to be having the "next big idea". AJL is as good as any.

 

[marcus]

See Woit's post today. The Spires database shows no new killer string papers. Woit concludes the particle physics (not just string) enterprise flatlined about 5 years ago. I think that it came out of the narrow valley into the wide plain and spread out into many small population threads. But nobody seems to be having the "next big idea". AJL is as good as any.

Fascinating thought, that AJL could be an equal contender in the big horserace!
Spires does a separate "top 40" for the GR-QC sector and I haven't seen
the 2003 results yet, many fewer researchers than in hep-th so much smaller scale, but I remember the 2002 report was interesting.

Notice that Ned Wright co-authored the #2 and #3 papers----he whose cosmology FAQ and tutorial we are always linking to here at PF!
A household figure for us, and his papers are the second and third most-cited by HEP researchers in 2003. Way to go Ned!

 

[marcus]

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

the discussion there has gotten lively, with over thirtyfive comments to Woit's 19 May blog last time I looked

He blogged again ("Not Even Not Even Wrong") on 24 May---already six comments including a couple of entertaining ones from JC and Thomas Larsson about anthropisticism.

Posted by JC at May 25, 2004 07:51 PM:
--------------------------------------------
Did anyone ever try to cook up an "anthropic" explanation for something like the Balmer spectra of hydrogen, before the Bohr model ever existed?

It would be interesting to see what sort of phenomena had "anthropic" explanations more than century ago, which today have relatively well established theories and experiments.

It seems like "anthropic" explanations are not much more convincing that saying something happens because of "God's will" or that "it's the work of Satan" type of stupidity.
------end quote--------

Posted by Thomas Larsson at May 26, 2004 01:45 AM:
------------------------------------------------------------

Maybe you can argue that human life requires that the aether wind be neglible, which would explain the Michelson-Morley experiment.

------end quote-------

 

[elas]

Woit concludes the particle physics (not just string) enterprise flatlined about 5 years ago. I think that it came out of the narrow valley into the wide plain and spread out into many small population threads. But nobody seems to be having the "next big idea". AJL is as good as any.

I do not have the 'next big idea' but on one point Woit's critcism is wrong. Woit criticises string theory for predicting an infinite number of forces and particles and compares this with the fixed number predicted by the Standard Model.

Take the quark mass figures from the Particle Data Group, separate them by charge and it will be seen that the mass figures for each charge increase according to a constant. A logarithmic graph of mass and charge shows that the production of particles occurs in steps with no limit to the number of steps. That means that the data used by the Standard Model, can be used to demonstrate the possiblility of an infinite number of fundamental particles and therefore Woit's argument is not necessarily correct on that point. It could simply be that the Standard Model is not being correctly interpreted.

The table and graph have been added to the bottom of my webpage and are up for discussion in the Theory Developement Forum.

 

[marcus]

See Woit's post today. The Spires database shows no new killer string papers. Woit concludes the particle physics (not just string) enterprise flatlined about 5 years ago. I think that it came out of the narrow valley into the wide plain and spread out into many small population threads. But nobody seems to be having the "next big idea". AJL is as good as any.

To have some objective benchmark for comparison I went back to the Spires HEP database top Forty list of 1999 (the "about 5 years ago" Woit estimated) and filtered out everything that appeared in 1995 or earlier. So these are the papers most cited in 1999 which at that time had appeared recently---in the past 4 years. My impression is that it is heavily string. There were in 1999 many new killer string papers as you call them

As a comparison, one could do the same thing for the 2003 list. It would show, I think, comparatively few such----instead, a considerable shift or broadening of interest.

I posted the 2003 list further down the thread. In both cases the stringy papers are bolded to make them easy to pick out and judge what fraction of the list they represent.

----recent top cited papers in 1999---

REVIEW OF PARTICLE PHYSICS. PARTICLE DATA GROUP
By C. Caso et al
1269 citations

THE LARGE N LIMIT OF SUPERCONFORMAL FIELD THEORIES AND SUPERGRAVITY
By Juan Maldacena (Harvard U.).
Published in Adv.Theor.Math.Phys.2:231-252,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9711200
625 citations

ANTI-DE SITTER SPACE AND HOLOGRAPHY
By Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Adv.Theor.Math.Phys.2:253-291,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9802150
464 citations

GAUGE THEORY CORRELATORS FROM NONCRITICAL STRING THEORY
By S.S. Gubser, I.R. Klebanov, A.M. Polyakov (Princeton U.).
Published in Phys.Lett.B428:105-114,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9802109
425 citations

EVIDENCE FOR OSCILLATION OF ATMOSPHERIC NEUTRINOS
By Super-Kamiokande Collaboration (Y. Fukuda et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.81:1562-1567,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ex/9807003
382 citations

THE HIERARCHY PROBLEM AND NEW DIMENSIONS AT A MILLIMETER
By Nima Arkani-Hamed (SLAC), Savas Dimopoulos (Stanford U., Phys. Dept.), Gia Dvali (ICTP, Trieste).
Published in Phys.Lett.B429:263-272,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9803315
285 citations

NEW DIMENSIONS AT A MILLIMETER TO A FERMI AND SUPERSTRINGS AT A TEV
By Ignatios Antoniadis (Ecole Polytechnique), Nima Arkani-Hamed (SLAC), Savas Dimopoulos (Stanford U., Phys. Dept.), Gia Dvali (ICTP, Trieste).
Published in Phys.Lett.B436:257-263,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9804398
215 citations

PHENOMENOLOGY, ASTROPHYSICS AND COSMOLOGY OF THEORIES WITH SUBMILLIMETER DIMENSIONS AND TEV SCALE QUANTUM GRAVITY
By Nima Arkani-Hamed (SLAC), Savas Dimopoulos (Stanford U., Phys. Dept.), Gia Dvali (ICTP, Trieste).
Published in Phys.Rev.D59:086004,1999
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9807344
202 citations

HETEROTIC AND TYPE I STRING DYNAMICS FROM ELEVEN-DIMENSIONS
By Petr Horava (Princeton U.), Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Nucl.Phys.B460:506-524,1996
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9510209
179 citations

M THEORY AS A MATRIX MODEL: A CONJECTURE
By T. Banks (Rutgers U., Piscataway), W. Fischler (Texas U.), S.H. Shenker (Rutgers U., Piscataway), L. Susskind (Stanford U., Phys. Dept.).
Published in Phys.Rev.D55:5112-5128,1997
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9610043
170 citations

WHERE DO WE STAND WITH SOLAR NEUTRINO OSCILLATIONS?
By J.N. Bahcall (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study), P.I. Krastev (Wisconsin U., Madison), A.Yu. Smirnov (ICTP, Trieste).
Published in Phys.Rev.D58:096016,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9807216
170 citations

LARGE N FIELD THEORIES, STRING THEORY AND GRAVITY
By Ofer Aharony (Rutgers U., Piscataway), Steven S. Gubser (Harvard U.), Juan Maldacena (Harvard U. & Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study), Hirosi Ooguri (UC, Berkeley & LBL, Berkeley), Yaron Oz (CERN).
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9905111
170 citations

STRONG COUPLING EXPANSION OF CALABI-YAU COMPACTIFICATION
By Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Nucl.Phys.B471:135-158,1996
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9602070
167 citations

IMPROVED PARTON DISTRIBUTIONS FROM GLOBAL ANALYSIS OF RECENT DEEP INELASTIC SCATTERING AND INCLUSIVE JET DATA
By H.L. Lai, J. Huston (Michigan State U.), S. Kuhlmann (Argonne), F. Olness (Southern Methodist U.), J. Owens (Florida State U.), D. Soper (Oregon U.), W.K. Tung, H. Weerts (Michigan State U.).
Published in Phys.Rev.D55:1280-1296,1997
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9606399
151 citations

EXTRA SPACE-TIME DIMENSIONS AND UNIFICATION
By Keith R. Dienes (CERN), Emilian Dudas (CERN & ORSAY, LPTHE), Tony Gherghetta (CERN).
Published in Phys.Lett.B436:55-65,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9803466
148 citations

TASI LECTURES ON D-BRANES
By Joseph Polchinski (Santa Barbara, ITP).
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9611050
146 citations

INITIAL RESULTS FROM THE CHOOZ LONG BASELINE REACTOR NEUTRINO OSCILLATION EXPERIMENT
By CHOOZ Collaboration (M. Apollonio et al.).
Published in Phys.Lett.B420:397-404,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ex/9711002
146 citations

MEASUREMENT OF A SMALL ATMOSPHERIC MUON-NEUTRINO / ELECTRON-NEUTRINO RATIO
By Super-Kamiokande Collaboration (Y. Fukuda et al.).
Published in Phys.Lett.B433:9-18,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ex/9803006
142 citations

ANTI-DE SITTER SPACE, THERMAL PHASE TRANSITION, AND CONFINEMENT IN GAUGE THEORIES
By Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Adv.Theor.Math.Phys.2:505-532,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9803131
139 citations

WEAK SCALE SUPERSTRINGS
By Joseph D. Lykken (Fermilab).
Published in Phys.Rev.D54:3693-3697,1996
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9603133
137 citations

STUDY OF THE ATMOSPHERIC NEUTRINO FLUX IN THE MULTI-GEV ENERGY RANGE
By Super-Kamiokande Collaboration (Y. Fukuda et al.).
Published in Phys.Lett.B436:33-41,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ex/9805006
137 citations

PARTON DISTRIBUTIONS: A NEW GLOBAL ANALYSIS
By A.D. Martin (Durham U.), R.G. Roberts (Rutherford), W.J. Stirling (Durham U.), R.S. Thorne (Oxford U.).
Published in Eur.Phys.J.C4:463-496,1998
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9803445
131 citations

BOUND STATES OF STRINGS AND P-BRANES
By Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Nucl.Phys.B460:335-350,1996
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9510135
130 citations

ELEVEN-DIMENSIONAL SUPERGRAVITY ON A MANIFOLD WITH BOUNDARY
By Petr Horava (Princeton U.), Edward Witten (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in Nucl.Phys.B475:94-114,1996
e-Print Archive: hep-th/9603142
126 citations

----remaining items got less than 125 so weren't counted---

EVIDENCE FOR NU(MU) ---> NU(E) NEUTRINO OSCILLATIONS FROM LSND
By LSND Collaboration (C. Athanassopoulos et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.81:1774-1777,1998
e-Print Archive: nucl-ex/9709006
124 citations

EVIDENCE FOR ANTI-MUON-NEUTRINO ---> ANTI-ELECTRON-NEUTRINO OSCILLATIONS FROM THE LSND EXPERIMENT AT LAMPF
By LSND Collaboration (C. Athanassopoulos et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.77:3082-3085,1996
e-Print Archive: nucl-ex/9605003
122 citations

A LARGE MASS HIERARCHY FROM A SMALL EXTRA DIMENSION
By Lisa Randall (Princeton U. & MIT, LNS), Raman Sundrum (Boston U.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.83:3370-3373,1999
e-Print Archive: hep-ph/9905221
120 citations

-----end of exerpt----
[edit: I have made an accurate count and added a summary]
to summarize in the 1999 HEP citebase there were 24 papers
which received 125+ citations.
Of these, 15 were recent string papers. (over 60 percent, a substantial percentage)

The number of citations these 15 recent string papers received that year were:
625, 464, 425, 285, 215, 202, 170 170, 167, 148, 146, 139, 137, 130, 126

 

[selfAdjoint]

Yes, heavily string, and only a few topics within string, dominated by the work of Witten and Maldacena. What would be interesting would be a comparison of the number of papers produced in 1993-1998 to the number of heavily cited ones, as a percentage. And then the same thing for 1998-2003. Then compare that to the actual numbers of papers produced (in stringy subjects). My guess would be meany more papers in the later quintennium but a lower rate of citation. Is this because there are no more gurus or because gurus are no longer needed?

 

[jeff]

You guys can play all of these silly games you want, but strings continue to dominate high energy theory and still serve as the richest source of new ideas in addressing the deepest problems of theoretical physics, including those in gauge theory, particle theory and cosmology.

 

[marcus]

Yes, heavily string, and only a few topics within string, dominated by the work of Witten and Maldacena. What would be interesting would be a comparison of the number of papers produced in 1993-1998 to the number of heavily cited ones, as a percentage. And then the same thing for 1998-2003...

I can't easily carry out the comparison you suggest. And BTW I do find it interesting and enlightening (as I suspect you do as well) to see what today's researchers most often cite for reference.

Here's the spires link in case anyone else wants to take a look:
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/

I got started with a FOUR year, instead of a five year, window. 1996 through end 1999.
to make a similar comparison for 2003 we need the topcited list for 2003, with papers appearing during the four years 2000 through end 2003.

when I go to the same Spires listing (now the top 100 instead of the top 40)
and do the same thing I get this. I have bolded those I recognize as by string people so the eye can pick them out:

-----recent topcited papers in 2003, for comparison----

1702
REVIEW OF PARTICLE PHYSICS. PARTICLE DATA GROUP
By Particle Data Group (K. Hagiwara et al.).
Most recent version published in Phys.Rev.D66:010001,2002

0812
FIRST YEAR WILKINSON MICROWAVE ANISOTROPY PROBE (WMAP) OBSERVATIONS: DETERMINATION OF COSMOLOGICAL PARAMETERS
By D.N. Spergel, L. Verde, Hiranya V. Peiris, E. Komatsu, M.R. Nolta, C.L. Bennett, M. Halpern, G. Hinshaw, N. Jarosik, A. Kogut, M. Limon, S.S. Meyer, L. Page, G.S. Tucker, J.L. Weiland, E. Wollack, E.L. Wright.
Published in Astrophys.J.Suppl.148:175,2003 [arXiv: astro-ph/0302209]

0505
FIRST YEAR WILKINSON MICROWAVE ANISOTROPY PROBE (WMAP) OBSERVATIONS: PRELIMINARY MAPS AND BASIC RESULTS
By C.L. Bennett, M. Halpern, G. Hinshaw, N. Jarosik, A. Kogut, M. Limon, S.S. Meyer, L. Page, D.N. Spergel, G.S. Tucker, E. Wollack, E.L. Wright, C. Barnes, M.R. Greason, R.S. Hill, E. Komatsu, M.R. Nolta, N. Odegard, Hiranya V. Peiris, L. Verde, J.L. Weiland.
Published in Astrophys.J.Suppl.148:1,2003 [arXiv: astro-ph/0302207]

0351
FIRST RESULTS FROM KAMLAND: EVIDENCE FOR REACTOR ANTI-NEUTRINO DISAPPEARANCE
By KamLAND Collaboration (K. Eguchi et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.90:021802,2003 [arXiv: hep-ex/0212021]

0285
DIRECT EVIDENCE FOR NEUTRINO FLAVOR TRANSFORMATION FROM NEUTRAL CURRENT INTERACTIONS IN THE SUDBURY NEUTRINO OBSERVATORY
By SNO Collaboration (Q.R. Ahmad et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.89:011301,2002 [arXiv: nucl-ex/0204008]

0197
STRINGS IN FLAT SPACE AND PP WAVES FROM N=4 SUPERYANG-MILLS
By David Berenstein, Juan M. Maldacena, Horatiu Nastase (Princeton, Inst. Advanced Study).
Published in JHEP 0204:013,2002 [arXiv: hep-th/0202021]

0189
MEASUREMENT OF DAY AND NIGHT NEUTRINO ENERGY SPECTRA AT SNO AND CONSTRAINTS ON NEUTRINO MIXING PARAMETERS
By SNO Collaboration (Q.R. Ahmad et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.89:011302,2002 [arXiv: nucl-ex/0204009]

0189
WILKINSON MICROWAVE ANISOTROPY PROBE (WMAP) FIRST YEAR OBSERVATIONS: TEMPERATURE - POLARIZATION POLARIZATION
By A. Kogut, D.N. Spergel, C. Barnes, C.L. Bennett, M. Halpern, G. Hinshaw, N. Jarosik, M. Limon, S.S. Meyer, L. Page, G. Tucker, E. Wollack, E.L. Wright.
Published in Astrophys.J.Suppl.148:161,2003 [arXiv: astro-ph/0302213]

0186
FINAL RESULTS FROM THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE KEY PROJECT TO MEASURE THE HUBBLE CONSTANT
By W.L. Freedman, B.F. Madore, B.K. Gibson, L. Ferrarese, D.D. Kelson, S. Sakai, J.R. Mould, R.C. Kennicutt, H.C. Ford, J.A. Graham, J.P. Huchra, S.M.G. Hughes, G.D. Illingworth, L.M. Macri, P.B. Stetson, P.B. Stetson (Carnegie Inst. Observatories & Caltech, IPAC & Swinburne U., Ctr. Astrophys. Supercomput. & Rutgers U., Piscataway & Carnegie Inst., Wash., D.C. & NOAO, Tucson & Res. Sch. Astron. Astrophys., Weston Creek & Arizona U., Astron. Dept. - Steward Observ. & Johns Hopkins U. & Harvard-Smithsonian Ctr. Astrophys. & Cambridge U., Inst. of Astronomy & Lick Observatory & Dominion Astrophys. Obs., Victoria).
Published in Astrophys.J.553:47-72,2001 [arXiv: astro-ph/0012376]

0180
MEASUREMENT OF THE RATE OF NU/E + D --> P + P + E- INTERACTIONS PRODUCED BY B-8 SOLAR NEUTRINOS AT THE SUDBURY NEUTRINO OBSERVATORY
By SNO Collaboration (Q.R. Ahmad et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.87:071301,2001 [arXiv: nucl-ex/0106015]

0177
THE SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY: TECHNICAL SUMMARY
By SDSS Collaboration (Donald G. York et al.).
Published in Astron.J.120:1579-1587,2000 [arXiv: astro-ph/0006396]

0162
FIRST YEAR WILKINSON MICROWAVE ANISOTROPY PROBE (WMAP) OBSERVATIONS: IMPLICATIONS FOR INFLATION
By H.V. Peiris, E. Komatsu, L. Verde, D.N. Spergel, C.L. Bennett, M. Halpern, G. Hinshaw, N. Jarosik, A. Kogut, M. Limon, S.S. Meyer, L. Page, G.S. Tucker, E. Wollack, E.L. Wright (Princeton U. & NASA, Goddard & British Columbia U. & Chicago U., EFI & CFCP, Chicago & Brown U. & UCLA).
Published in Astrophys.J.Suppl.148:213,2003 [arXiv: astro-ph/0302225]

0139
THE SLOAN DIGITAL SKY SURVEY: EARLY DATA RELEASE
By SDSS Collaboration (Chris Stoughton et al.).
Published in Astron.J.123:485-548,2002

0135
ROLLING TACHYON
By Ashoke Sen (Harish-Chandra Res. Inst. & Penn State U.).
Published in JHEP 0204:048,2002 [arXiv: hep-th/0203211]

0134
A PERTURBATIVE WINDOW INTO NONPERTURBATIVE PHYSICS
By Robbert Dijkgraaf (Amsterdam U. & Amsterdam U., Inst. Math.), Cumrun Vafa (Harvard U., Phys. Dept.). [arXiv: hep-th/0208048]

0133
A MEASUREMENT BY BOOMERANG OF MULTIPLE PEAKS IN THE ANGULAR POWER SPECTRUM OF THE COSMIC MICROWAVE BACKGROUND
By Boomerang Collaboration (C.B. Netterfield et al.).
Published in Astrophys.J.571:604-614,2002 [arXiv: astro-ph/0104460]

0130
THE COSMOLOGICAL CONSTANT AND DARK ENERGY
By P.J.E. Peebles (Princeton U.), Bharat Ratra (Kansas State U.).
Published in Rev.Mod.Phys.75:559-606,2003 [arXiv: astro-ph/0207347]

0126
SOLAR B-8 AND HEP NEUTRINO MEASUREMENTS FROM 1258 DAYS OF SUPER-KAMIOKANDE DATA
By Super-Kamiokande Collaboration (S. Fukuda et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.86:5651-5655,2001 [arXiv: hep-ex/0103032]

0125
TYPE IIB GREEN-SCHWARZ SUPERSTRING IN PLANE WAVE RAMOND-RAMOND BACKGROUND
By R.R. Metsaev (Lebedev Inst.).
Published in Nucl.Phys.B625:70-96,2002 [arXiv: hep-th/0112044]

0125
INDICATIONS OF NEUTRINO OSCILLATION IN A 250 KM LONG BASELINE EXPERIMENT
By K2K Collaboration (M.H. Ahn et al.).
Published in Phys.Rev.Lett.90:041801,2003 [arXiv: hep-ex/0212007]
[Total number of citations in HEP]

...
...
(there are more, but this gives an impression how it goes)

Maybe someone else wants to look at some other years and do a similar count:
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/library/topcites/

[edit: I did a summary]
The Spires HEP topcited list had, when only recent articles are included, 20 papers which garnered 125+ citations.
Of these, 4 were stringy type research (a smaller percentage than in 1999, 25 percent instead of 60 percent)

the numbers of citations for these 4 string papers were:
197, 135, 134, 125

 

[marcus]

Another blog: 27 May
PW found some nice things to say about Lubos Motl!
"Motl is also a fierce opponent of the 'anthropic' arguments that have become popular among string theorists..."

 

[marcus]

About the Spires citations report, it surprised me that there were only 4 stringy papers (in the 4-year "recent" window) that got 125 or more citations----in the HEP publications appearing in 2003.

by contrast, if you look at the 1999 list a few posts back, there appear to be 15 or so recent stringy papers that got 125 or more citations

selfAdjoint has suggested several reasons for this drop-off, and it would
take more a thoughtful approach to the Spires data to see which explanations apply. in any case i guess one can say that nowadays there are fewer heavily-cited string papers than there used to be back in 1999,
and for whatever reasons research interests and research fashions change.
a drop from 15 to 4 is kind of stunning, i thought

 

[jeff]

About the Spires citations report, it surprised me that there were only 3 stringy papers (in the 4-year "recent" window) that got 125 or more citations----in the HEP publications appearing in 2003.

by contrast, if you look at the 1999 list a few posts back, there appear to be 17 or so stringy papers that got 125 or more citations

selfAdjoint has suggested several reasons for this drop-off, and it would
take more a thoughtful approach to the Spires data to see which explanations apply. in any case i guess one can say that nowadays there are fewer heavily-cited string papers than there used to be back in 1999,
and for whatever reasons research interests and research fashions change.
a drop from 17 to 3 is kind of stunning, i thought

These remarks are completely wrong and misleading: The numbers of highly cited papers can't reliably gauge the amount of activity in a research program since this number could be very low even though the total number of papers published - this being a far more accurate measure of levels of activity - is very high.

 

[notevenwrong]

These remarks are completely wrong and misleading: The numbers of highly cited papers can't reliably gauge the amount of activity in a research program since this number could be very low even though the total number of papers published - this being a far more accurate measure of levels of activity - is very high.

The claim is not that there isn't a lot of research activity in string theory, there's probably as many string theory papers being published as ever. What this data indicates is that there are no virtually no significant new ideas in string theory, or at least dramatically fewer in the period 2000-2003 than in any other four-year period during the twenty-year history of modern string theory. Until 2000, at any given moment much of what most string theorists were doing was working out the implications of new ideas that had come up in the past year or so. Since 2000, there just hasn't been much in the way of new ideas to chew on. I don't think anybody who seriously follows the string theory literature can deny this, and the numbers are clear.

 

[jeff]

The claim is not that there isn't a lot of research activity in string theory, there's probably as many string theory papers being published as ever. What this data indicates is that there are no virtually no significant new ideas in string theory, or at least dramatically fewer in the period 2000-2003 than in any other four-year period during the twenty-year history of modern string theory. Until 2000, at any given moment much of what most string theorists were doing was working out the implications of new ideas that had come up in the past year or so. Since 2000, there just hasn't been much in the way of new ideas to chew on. I don't think anybody who seriously follows the string theory literature can deny this, and the numbers are clear.

I said as much in the "Research demographics again" thread:

...The reduction in such highly cited papers merely reflects the fact that D-branes may have taken us about as far as they can on their own and that we need new tools to auger the next revolution in string theory...However, even in the absence of such a breakthrough, stringy papers continue to dominate high energy theory and drive to a considerable and growing extent theoretical cosmology.

 

[marcus]

Today's comment is on the new Michael Douglas paper

the 31 May blog comments on a Michael Douglas paper that
just appeared:


"Statistical analysis of the supersymmetry breaking scale"
Michael R. Douglas (Rutgers/IHES/Caltech)
8 pages
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0405279

Abstract:
"We discuss the question of what type and scale of supersymmetry breaking might be statistically favored among vacua of string/M theory, building on comments in Denef and Douglas, hep-th/0404116."

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

 

[marcus]

Peter Woit's 3 June blog comments on the latest Witten paper
(in Nature vol 429, n. 6991, about electroweak symmetry breaking)
Woit supplies a link to Witten's paper and quotes Witten's opinion
concerning the "Anthropic Principle".

unfortunately the link only works for Nature subscribers
so this may mean a trip to the library

(not the paper in question but a related talk by witten at fermilab
in 2003:
http://conferences.fnal.gov/lp2003/program/papers/witten.pdf)



I am curious to know if the recent Nature article shows evidence of a shift in
the focus of Witten's attention. Since Spires database shows
much of the action in HEP
(recent top-cited papers etc) is outside string theory, I would
expect he might be developing other research interests and this paper
might be a straw in the wind. Has anyone looked at it?

 

[jeff]

Peter Woit's 3 June blog comments on the latest Witten paper
(in Nature vol 429, n. 6991, about electroweak symmetry breaking)
Woit supplies a link to Witten's paper and quotes Witten's opinion
concerning the "Anthropic Principle".

unfortunately the link only works for Nature subscribers
so this may mean a trip to the library

I am curious to know if this article shows evidence of a shift in
the focus of Witten's attention.

The way to answer this is to just email witten and ask him.

 

[marcus]

Peter Woit's 4 June blog:
he was visiting the physics department at Dartmouth this week
and gave a colloquium lecture on
"Quantum Field Theory and Representation Theory"

the blog gives a link to the outline and slides

BTW: the QFT/GroupReps lecture has some history too
and includes a funny conversation between Dirac
and an American newspaperman.

 

[selfAdjoint]

That interview between Dirac and a reporter from the Madison, WI Capital Times (I think it was) was terrific, I wish I had a link to the whole thing. At another point the reporter asks if anything worries Dirac about theory, and Dirac says Goedel.

 

[pelastration]

That interview between Dirac and a reporter from the Madison, WI Capital Times (I think it was) was terrific, I wish I had a link to the whole thing. At another point the reporter asks if anything worries Dirac about theory, and Dirac says Goedel.

Maybe this (a part?)? http://faculty.rmwc.edu/tmichalik/dirac.htm

 

[arivero]

It is not vain that Dirac is buried at the foot of Newton (er, and Newton on the right side of God's altar).

 

[selfAdjoint]

Maybe this (a part?)? http://faculty.rmwc.edu/tmichalik/dirac.htm

Oh I see it was the other Madison paper, The State Journal. Well it was a 50% shot. I notice that "Roundy" got more out of the notoriously taciturn Dirac than most physicists ever did. Also notice Roundy's use of Poincare in his guess of what Dirac's initials P.A.M. might be. R was not quite the ignorant hick he pretended to be!

 

[marcus]

I see Urs Schreiber responded today to one of Peter Woit's blogs

also someone called Roland Schwarz who could have the effrontery to be
related to the dreadful Bogdanov brothers.

Now the "comments" thread attached to Woits 5 June blog
has been taken over by Loons
or by one Loon pretending to be several
and it is already over a dozen posts long in a kind of
Loony Satire of scientific discussion.

they are actually a bit funny, or i suspect Peter Woit would
have squelched them

 

[marcus]

Now the "comments" thread attached to Woits 5 June blog
has been taken over by Loons
or by one Loon pretending to be several
and it is already over a dozen posts long in a kind of
Loony Satire of scientific discussion.

there are some remarkable dramatic characters who have appeared
in the comments of Woit's blog
named petitot
moyentot
and grantot

some appear to be French anti-scientific or "post-modern" parodists.
one may be another name for someone called "crankbuster"
I would like to know what some others think of these strange, sometimes quite funny, creatures.

in french letters there has been a cultivation of the art of sacrilege
going back for many centuries and I suppose it is only to be expected

there was that celebrated contemporary of Einstein called
Alfred Jarry of Pataphysics fame
these people do not seem all that different from jarry
but perhaps more well-versed and diabolically clever

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/blog/

PS: BTW Woit blogged today, 10 June. It was about alleged proofs of the Riemann Hypothesis