What can be observed of the physical world (and said about such) is far more important than the physical world in itself. Basically because there is no such thing as the physical world in itself. The physical world is always related to what is observed (and said about such). And vice versa. Otherwise how would we know that what was observed (and said) was even related to the physical world, let alone being of the physical world.
Now the moment you sever this connection between observations and the physical world, one or the other disappears. One is left with either an observation (in search of an explanation) or an explanation (in search of an observation).
Many theoretical physicists prefer the latter situation - maintaining the notion of a physical world (it's explanation) without the need to involve observations. For such theorists, observations are just questions (not answers). However, without an observation, the physical world becomes no different from the mathematical concepts that would otherwise "explain" an observation. There's nothing wrong with this idea but it's questionable whether it's really physics. However we can maintain it's at least a rehersal.
For example, one could program a computer, using the developed explanations (the mathematical models), to display an animation of some physical process. But the result is not itself the physical process. Its an animation of the physical process. A representation. A rehersal. Until the explanation is used to manipulate the actual physical world in some way, it remains somewhat removed from the physical world - living in it's own little bubble of sorts. Its not a bad bubble and there's all sorts of problems to be solved in that context.
But it's really important to connect an explanation back to the observations it otherwise "explains" - which means doing physical experiments - not just animations. Seeing if the physical world, when reconnected to observations, behaves in the way that is otherwise modeled or represented (eg. by an animation).
Of course, most of these experiments have already been done - but that's no reason not to do them again - precisely because, when they're not actually done, the explanation ends up back in it's own little bubble again, going nowhere, doing nothing but encouraging the perverse idea that the physical world really is no more than the explanation. For example, the idea that the physical world is fundamentally mathematical, has it's origin in this sort of bubble.
But an explanation only makes sense when there is something to be explained. Of course that's no reason to stop rehersing explanations. We never know when it will be needed. We want to be sure we have our game hat on when a real world problem is to be solved. Rather, it is say that an explanation can be not the entire truth - that there is a world bigger than the explanation - and that this always involves observations (actual experimental observations - not just the idea of such). That the physical world is not just the "physical world" of which the theorist prefers (that which can be modeled on a computer), but that real physical world which actually takes place and is expressed in actual physical experiments.
Anyway all of this is to suggest why explanations, on their own, can't be nailed down in terms of which is correct and which isn't. They are somewhat impervious to criticism - mathematical models particularly so. They will be correct regardless of the real observable physical world.
C