The first paper they link to is not about string theory. It's using math that was developed for string theory, and is perfectly valid outside it, to make predictions that can be (and are) experimentally validated.
It has exactly none of the problems of string theory, and I am not sure why it's clumped with a physics paper in the blog. How is it a problem to say "hey they used string theory tools!" in a press release? If anything it might get other people to look at the math and get something good out of it...
This quote explains why the author thinks that it is a problem :
> with string theorists now virtually unemployable unless they can figure out how to rebrand as machine learning experts.
Their issue is (seemingly) not with the paper, but with the claim that these headlines feed a hype that attribute to string theory capabilities it doesn't have.
To be clear this is OP's argument, not mine. I am not sure I buy it, except perhaps for the fact that every other academic is expected to rebrand as an ML expert nowadays. It has more to do with ML hype than with string theory hype.
Left this on his blog but it’s awaiting moderation:
It would be helpful to have more clearly targeted and titrated criticism, because you’ve mentioned press releases, a sciam article, the paper, and Sabine all without differentiation.
I hope it’s clear enough the paper itself is legit and doesn’t seem to make any inappropriate claims. Beyond that, the PRs seem to be the real offenders here, the sciam article less so (could be argued that’s healthy popsci), and I’m not sure what comment you’re making about Sabine. The title of her video may be click baity but the content itself seems to appropriately demarcate string theory from the paper.
I'm certainly a lay person here, so take this with a grain of salt. But my understanding is that this is part of the problem, or more the issue that people criticize.
I think it's largely uncontroversial that the math in string theory could be useful in other areas. But if that's your argument for the legitimacy of string theory then the question arises what string theory is and if it is still part of physics. Because physics has, of course, the goal of describing the real world, and, my understanding is, string theory failed to do that, despite what many people have hoped.
If string theory is "just a way of developing math that can be useful in totally unrelated areas", it's, well, part of mathematics. But I don't think that's how the field sees itself.
Peter Woit, the Columbia maths department computer systems administrator, makes his bread by googling the word String Theory and then posting what ever latest results come up in a disingenuous way on his blog to stir reactions from his readers.
It reminds of this quote from Roger Penrose's book, Fashion, Faith, and Fantasy in the New Physics of the Universe:
“My nervousness was perhaps at its greatest because the illustrative area that I had elected to discuss, namely string theory and some of its various descendants, had been developed to its heights in Princeton probably more than anywhere else in the world.”
“Moreover, that subject is a distinctly technical one, and I cannot claim competence over many of its important ingredients, my familiarity with these technicalities being somewhat limited, particularly in view of my status as an outsider.”
“Yet, if only the insiders are considered competent to make critical comments about the subject, then the criticisms are likely to be limited to relatively technical issues, some of the broader aspects of criticism being, no doubt, significantly neglected.”
The fact that Penrose felt nervous criticizing string theory has made me think less of string theory (or rather, the humans behind it) ever since.
That's from 2003, when the string theory theorists were riding high and attacking string theory was bad for a physicist's career. Now, "with string theorists now virtually unemployable unless they can figure out how to rebrand as machine learning experts...", the situation has reversed.
String theorists understand high-dimensional math, so maybe they can do something for machine learning theory. Probably not, but we can hope. It's frustrating how much of a black box machine learning systems are.
Well... Penrose got himself into serious trouble speaking on issues beyond his expertise. I respect that he is now being more careful. And it's entirely possible that he isn't up to date on their tech. Why would you doubt his own words?
Unfortunately my understanding of physics stops at general relativity and quantum mechnics (which I did study both at uni, with some mathematical framework of understanding).
How would I advance from this point, what should I read to get a grip on string theory, including the concepts and maths involved? Could you recommend some resources?
Like why did they come up with the concepts they came up with, how does that help explain established theories and experimental phenomena on a deeper level, etc.
Also I've noticed there are several competing theories in this domain (like Quantum Gravity, String Theory, hope I'm not wrong), what are the odds that these theories end up being equivalent?
As others have pointed out, compared to classical physics, quantum mechanics describes the world of tiny distances and energies in greater detail while relativity becomes useful at the opposite end.
How would one construct an experiment whose results depend on both phenomena?
Well, it is a surprisingly natural path from Quantum Field Theory (QFT). So many things we get for free (primarily: gravitation), I would be surprised if it were just a random coincidence.
Yet, no one knows how to turn it into an actual theory in physics. It feels like we had QFT but weren't able to create the Standard Model.
It is, obviously, possible that the String Theory framework is just too broad. Or that it is in principle true, but we reached a level where it is too hard. Or it is just a step in the right direction, but we are missing something.
Given the effort of the smartest minds and still no progress (I do not think there is any hype left), it is possible that we need to wait for something more. Like the revival of artificial neural networks in the 2010s, after decades of slumber.
Hasn't it just been subsumed by AdS/CFT now? IIUC that's a layer of abstraction but still primarily string theory under the hood. That's still an active area isn't it? Or is that dying too?
Among theoretical physicists there is little doubt that Edward Witten is currently the greatest living theoretical physicist. Here is an interview with him from a few weeks ago:
Yeah Witten is unusual. He's not just a little bit better than everyone else, he's on a different league.
I knew a someone who was a temp visitor at the Institute for Advanced Studies who was given temp office next to Witten. And he said he wouldn't hear a noise, and the one day he starts typing and doesn't stop until 100 pages of paper are written, like he has it finished in his mind before he starts typing. Somehow I'm inclined to believe it can't be far from truth.
Hasn't stopped Weinstein from publishing. That nobody takes him seriously isn't Witten's fault. At least... not directly. Witten just happens to be very rigorous and a very gifted mathematician, so he sets a high bar for the rest of the field.
Yes, and RFK Jr. says certain vaccines have never worked.
I guess what I want to convey is how sad your comment makes me. What went wrong that makes you, and anyone really, trust that man's opinion on physics?
Here is a cynical but overall rather accurate takedown of Mr. Weinstein:
I notice not-even-wrong-woit doesn't bother refuting any of the claims on their merits. Just calls it "ridiculous hype" and moves on. It's about the same level of rigor he applies to his research in LQG - Loony Quantum Gravity.
High-energy physics is kind of stuck on that. Most of the interesting questions involve energies or distances way beyond what's reachable by experiment today.
Meanwhile, there's interesting experimental action in low-energy physics, down near absolute zero. Many of the weirder predictions of quantum mechanics have now been observed directly. Look at the list of Nobel laureates in physics since 1990.
A big fraction of them involve experiments with very low energy states,
where thermal noise is small enough that quantum effects dominate.
Some of that work led to useful technology. That's forward progress.
Kind of interesting to think about how the scale (range or magnitude) in which we are able to detect something has such striking implications for the model that gets developed based on these findings.
Even when we are able to operate at higher resolution sometimes the model makers still operate on their own scales. For example, I believe political science and economics ought to be studied from a biological perspective if they are to be fully understood, since gene by environment interaction determines so much. However, there seems to be little interest among political scientists and economists to study the nitty gritty of molecular and population genetics, and little interest among the molecular and population geneticists to study political science and economic theory. And because of this, seems to me such models will always fall short compared to models that operated on a perhaps more appropriate scale of inputs.
One day when I'm not being lazy I might publish a point by point refutation of the usual nonsense anti-string theory memes. Until then, here's what I said on this point 25 days ago, specifically the first paragraph starting with "like another commenter".
OK, but if there are no predictions that we can test for several generations, how do you tell the difference between science and science-sounding nonsense?
> If, then, it is true that the axiomatic basis of theoretical physics cannot be extracted from experience but must be freely invented, can we ever hope to find the right way? Nay, more, has this right way any existence outside our illusions? Can we hope to be guided safely by experience at all when there exist theories (such as classical mechanics) which to a large extent do justice to experience, without getting to the root of the matter? I answer without hesitation that there is, in my opinion, a right way, and that we are capable of finding it. Our experience hitherto justifies us in believing that nature is the realisation of the simplest conceivable mathematical ideas. I am convinced that we can discover by means of purely mathematical constructions the concepts and the laws connecting them with each other, which furnish the key to the understanding of natural phenomena. Experience may suggest the appropriate mathematical concepts, but they most certainly cannot be deduced from it. Experience remains, of course, the sole criterion of the physical utility of a mathematical construction. But the creative principle resides in mathematics. In a certain sense, therefore, I hold it true that pure thought can grasp reality, as the ancients dreamed.
There is no a priori reason why a bunch of meatbags would have the ability to test all laws of physics of this universe. I think we may have gotten lucky for a while there. String theory is so far out there that a new methodology has been developed, namely using beauty or symmetry or Occam's Razor to choose between competing theories. None of these have the pedigree of empiricism, but they may also not be wrong. I hope some aesthetic could be applied to the laws of the universe, but that is also not at all guaranteed.
Occam's razor is perfectly empirical: "entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity". It's what people repeatedly accuse string theory of violating in low-rent popsci criticism.
The other things you refer to are still Occam's razor: symmetry is handy because it eliminates symmetry-breaking entities even though we know they can happen in the standard model (Higgs) and "beauty" is really just another way of saying Occam's razor - you'd prefer your theory to not be full of dozens of free parameters because it starts to fit any possible outputs and be less predictive.
At all points the issue is that unless you've fully explored a simpler space with less entities, don't start adding them because you can always keep adding them to solve any problem but predict nothing (ala epicycles keeping geocentric solar models alive. You could probably run a space program assuming the Earth is the center of the universe, but it would be fiendishly difficult to model).
Mathematics often does apply to the real world, but that isn't the goal. Physics is about the study of the real universe. If you want to call string theory a branch of mathematics I'd be fine with it, but they keep trying to claim they are physicists and that puts a higher bar on what we expect from them.
Of course physicists sometimes do make wrong predictions and it can take some time to figure out the hypothesis is wrong. However the goal is always to make something they can test to prove the hypothesis holds, which string theory has so far failed to do.
Good question, I touch on this on the same comment, in the paragraph starting with "I keep repeating these things on HNs".
The TLDR is that you can never expect the same level of certainty when you don't have direct experiments, but you can still rule out _some_ hypothesis, and see how far other hypothesis take you. This is called theoretical physics. Just because you can't make an experiment doesn't mean you can't do anything.
String theory isn't a theory it's a family of related theories sharing some common mathematical tools.
People talk about this as though it's an attempt at deception, whereas two people notionally working in string theory could in fact be proposing highly incompatible models which would be conclusively ruled out (and a lot of them have been in so far as that can be done - i.e. experimentation has put tight bounds on their possible parameters).
They are getting close to making a testable prediction, any day now. Have been for the last 30 years. History is not always an indication of the future, but it is often a good sign.
It feels like Woit is just being a hater at this point. In a meritocracy, talent and funding gravitate toward the most promising options. If string theory took up a large proportion of people and resources, it’s because it solved technical problems no other framework could. Even if it hasn't yielded a Theory of Everything, the fact that its toolkit is now solving problems in other fields suggests the program has led to some success. Now that the field is in a lull, we're seeing a natural institutional rebalancing. Talent is simply self-allocating toward more fertile ground, which is exactly how a healthy scientific ecosystem should function.
The problem is the 'most promising option' is affected by hype and loud voices. Many of the string theory crowds made predictions that did not pan out at all and still did not acknowledge their mistakes. I think that's the problem. Sure there was a lot beautiful mathematics discovered, and it can be used in some other fields, but the acknowledgement of failure of string theory is needed, rather than trying to point here or there where some of the tools from ST could be used.
(I am a physicist, but nowhere near the strings theory)
I’m reporting a -1 day here because I’m lazy and tired.
Apple passwords are not case sensitive anymore, especially when porting between iPhone and windows
QR codes lol
The first paper they link to is not about string theory. It's using math that was developed for string theory, and is perfectly valid outside it, to make predictions that can be (and are) experimentally validated.
It has exactly none of the problems of string theory, and I am not sure why it's clumped with a physics paper in the blog. How is it a problem to say "hey they used string theory tools!" in a press release? If anything it might get other people to look at the math and get something good out of it...
This quote explains why the author thinks that it is a problem :
> with string theorists now virtually unemployable unless they can figure out how to rebrand as machine learning experts.
Their issue is (seemingly) not with the paper, but with the claim that these headlines feed a hype that attribute to string theory capabilities it doesn't have.
To be clear this is OP's argument, not mine. I am not sure I buy it, except perhaps for the fact that every other academic is expected to rebrand as an ML expert nowadays. It has more to do with ML hype than with string theory hype.
Left this on his blog but it’s awaiting moderation:
It would be helpful to have more clearly targeted and titrated criticism, because you’ve mentioned press releases, a sciam article, the paper, and Sabine all without differentiation.
I hope it’s clear enough the paper itself is legit and doesn’t seem to make any inappropriate claims. Beyond that, the PRs seem to be the real offenders here, the sciam article less so (could be argued that’s healthy popsci), and I’m not sure what comment you’re making about Sabine. The title of her video may be click baity but the content itself seems to appropriately demarcate string theory from the paper.
I'm certainly a lay person here, so take this with a grain of salt. But my understanding is that this is part of the problem, or more the issue that people criticize.
I think it's largely uncontroversial that the math in string theory could be useful in other areas. But if that's your argument for the legitimacy of string theory then the question arises what string theory is and if it is still part of physics. Because physics has, of course, the goal of describing the real world, and, my understanding is, string theory failed to do that, despite what many people have hoped.
If string theory is "just a way of developing math that can be useful in totally unrelated areas", it's, well, part of mathematics. But I don't think that's how the field sees itself.
Peter Woit, the Columbia maths department computer systems administrator, makes his bread by googling the word String Theory and then posting what ever latest results come up in a disingenuous way on his blog to stir reactions from his readers.
It reminds of this quote from Roger Penrose's book, Fashion, Faith, and Fantasy in the New Physics of the Universe:
“My nervousness was perhaps at its greatest because the illustrative area that I had elected to discuss, namely string theory and some of its various descendants, had been developed to its heights in Princeton probably more than anywhere else in the world.”
“Moreover, that subject is a distinctly technical one, and I cannot claim competence over many of its important ingredients, my familiarity with these technicalities being somewhat limited, particularly in view of my status as an outsider.”
“Yet, if only the insiders are considered competent to make critical comments about the subject, then the criticisms are likely to be limited to relatively technical issues, some of the broader aspects of criticism being, no doubt, significantly neglected.”
The fact that Penrose felt nervous criticizing string theory has made me think less of string theory (or rather, the humans behind it) ever since.
> Penrose book...
That's from 2003, when the string theory theorists were riding high and attacking string theory was bad for a physicist's career. Now, "with string theorists now virtually unemployable unless they can figure out how to rebrand as machine learning experts...", the situation has reversed.
String theorists understand high-dimensional math, so maybe they can do something for machine learning theory. Probably not, but we can hope. It's frustrating how much of a black box machine learning systems are.
Well... Penrose got himself into serious trouble speaking on issues beyond his expertise. I respect that he is now being more careful. And it's entirely possible that he isn't up to date on their tech. Why would you doubt his own words?
He's just saying he doesn't want to be eviscerated by Ed Witten, which is a pretty commonly shared sentiment in the community.
Unfortunately my understanding of physics stops at general relativity and quantum mechnics (which I did study both at uni, with some mathematical framework of understanding).
How would I advance from this point, what should I read to get a grip on string theory, including the concepts and maths involved? Could you recommend some resources?
Like why did they come up with the concepts they came up with, how does that help explain established theories and experimental phenomena on a deeper level, etc.
Also I've noticed there are several competing theories in this domain (like Quantum Gravity, String Theory, hope I'm not wrong), what are the odds that these theories end up being equivalent?
As others have pointed out, compared to classical physics, quantum mechanics describes the world of tiny distances and energies in greater detail while relativity becomes useful at the opposite end.
How would one construct an experiment whose results depend on both phenomena?
Well, it is a surprisingly natural path from Quantum Field Theory (QFT). So many things we get for free (primarily: gravitation), I would be surprised if it were just a random coincidence.
Yet, no one knows how to turn it into an actual theory in physics. It feels like we had QFT but weren't able to create the Standard Model.
It is, obviously, possible that the String Theory framework is just too broad. Or that it is in principle true, but we reached a level where it is too hard. Or it is just a step in the right direction, but we are missing something.
Given the effort of the smartest minds and still no progress (I do not think there is any hype left), it is possible that we need to wait for something more. Like the revival of artificial neural networks in the 2010s, after decades of slumber.
Hasn't it just been subsumed by AdS/CFT now? IIUC that's a layer of abstraction but still primarily string theory under the hood. That's still an active area isn't it? Or is that dying too?
Among theoretical physicists there is little doubt that Edward Witten is currently the greatest living theoretical physicist. Here is an interview with him from a few weeks ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAbP0magTVY
I think it is a great watch for anyone with an interest in the field.
Yeah Witten is unusual. He's not just a little bit better than everyone else, he's on a different league.
I knew a someone who was a temp visitor at the Institute for Advanced Studies who was given temp office next to Witten. And he said he wouldn't hear a noise, and the one day he starts typing and doesn't stop until 100 pages of paper are written, like he has it finished in his mind before he starts typing. Somehow I'm inclined to believe it can't be far from truth.
eric weinstein said that witten is the dark lord of string theory; scotching any advance in theoretical physics.
Hasn't stopped Weinstein from publishing. That nobody takes him seriously isn't Witten's fault. At least... not directly. Witten just happens to be very rigorous and a very gifted mathematician, so he sets a high bar for the rest of the field.
Yes, and RFK Jr. says certain vaccines have never worked.
I guess what I want to convey is how sad your comment makes me. What went wrong that makes you, and anyone really, trust that man's opinion on physics?
Here is a cynical but overall rather accurate takedown of Mr. Weinstein:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUr4Tb8uy-Q
I notice not-even-wrong-woit doesn't bother refuting any of the claims on their merits. Just calls it "ridiculous hype" and moves on. It's about the same level of rigor he applies to his research in LQG - Loony Quantum Gravity.
Lumpy Quantum Gravy is real. I've seen it at Thanksgiving.
All it needs is an experiment that can test it.
High-energy physics is kind of stuck on that. Most of the interesting questions involve energies or distances way beyond what's reachable by experiment today.
Meanwhile, there's interesting experimental action in low-energy physics, down near absolute zero. Many of the weirder predictions of quantum mechanics have now been observed directly. Look at the list of Nobel laureates in physics since 1990. A big fraction of them involve experiments with very low energy states, where thermal noise is small enough that quantum effects dominate. Some of that work led to useful technology. That's forward progress.
Kind of interesting to think about how the scale (range or magnitude) in which we are able to detect something has such striking implications for the model that gets developed based on these findings.
Even when we are able to operate at higher resolution sometimes the model makers still operate on their own scales. For example, I believe political science and economics ought to be studied from a biological perspective if they are to be fully understood, since gene by environment interaction determines so much. However, there seems to be little interest among political scientists and economists to study the nitty gritty of molecular and population genetics, and little interest among the molecular and population geneticists to study political science and economic theory. And because of this, seems to me such models will always fall short compared to models that operated on a perhaps more appropriate scale of inputs.
> Most of the interesting questions involve energies or distances way beyond what's reachable by experiment today.
Astronomers can observe extremely energetic environments from a great distance.
It's not a controlled experiment, but sometimes they get lucky and see something that suggests new physics.
I have no idea what might be needed to provide astronomical evidence for string theory.
One day when I'm not being lazy I might publish a point by point refutation of the usual nonsense anti-string theory memes. Until then, here's what I said on this point 25 days ago, specifically the first paragraph starting with "like another commenter".
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46336655
OK, but if there are no predictions that we can test for several generations, how do you tell the difference between science and science-sounding nonsense?
> If, then, it is true that the axiomatic basis of theoretical physics cannot be extracted from experience but must be freely invented, can we ever hope to find the right way? Nay, more, has this right way any existence outside our illusions? Can we hope to be guided safely by experience at all when there exist theories (such as classical mechanics) which to a large extent do justice to experience, without getting to the root of the matter? I answer without hesitation that there is, in my opinion, a right way, and that we are capable of finding it. Our experience hitherto justifies us in believing that nature is the realisation of the simplest conceivable mathematical ideas. I am convinced that we can discover by means of purely mathematical constructions the concepts and the laws connecting them with each other, which furnish the key to the understanding of natural phenomena. Experience may suggest the appropriate mathematical concepts, but they most certainly cannot be deduced from it. Experience remains, of course, the sole criterion of the physical utility of a mathematical construction. But the creative principle resides in mathematics. In a certain sense, therefore, I hold it true that pure thought can grasp reality, as the ancients dreamed.
- Albert Einstein
There is no a priori reason why a bunch of meatbags would have the ability to test all laws of physics of this universe. I think we may have gotten lucky for a while there. String theory is so far out there that a new methodology has been developed, namely using beauty or symmetry or Occam's Razor to choose between competing theories. None of these have the pedigree of empiricism, but they may also not be wrong. I hope some aesthetic could be applied to the laws of the universe, but that is also not at all guaranteed.
> I hope some aesthetic
Certainly internal self-consistency will take you a long way if you don't have experiments. Some people find beauty in this :-)
This is good and all but then it is not really physics as it is generally intended
Occam's razor is perfectly empirical: "entities must not be multiplied beyond necessity". It's what people repeatedly accuse string theory of violating in low-rent popsci criticism.
The other things you refer to are still Occam's razor: symmetry is handy because it eliminates symmetry-breaking entities even though we know they can happen in the standard model (Higgs) and "beauty" is really just another way of saying Occam's razor - you'd prefer your theory to not be full of dozens of free parameters because it starts to fit any possible outputs and be less predictive.
At all points the issue is that unless you've fully explored a simpler space with less entities, don't start adding them because you can always keep adding them to solve any problem but predict nothing (ala epicycles keeping geocentric solar models alive. You could probably run a space program assuming the Earth is the center of the universe, but it would be fiendishly difficult to model).
It might be worth considering what you think research in a field like mathematics actually entails when asking such questions.
Because you can write a lot of mathematics with no practical applications for generations (then whoops: number theory and cryptography!)
Mathematics often does apply to the real world, but that isn't the goal. Physics is about the study of the real universe. If you want to call string theory a branch of mathematics I'd be fine with it, but they keep trying to claim they are physicists and that puts a higher bar on what we expect from them.
Of course physicists sometimes do make wrong predictions and it can take some time to figure out the hypothesis is wrong. However the goal is always to make something they can test to prove the hypothesis holds, which string theory has so far failed to do.
Good question, I touch on this on the same comment, in the paragraph starting with "I keep repeating these things on HNs".
The TLDR is that you can never expect the same level of certainty when you don't have direct experiments, but you can still rule out _some_ hypothesis, and see how far other hypothesis take you. This is called theoretical physics. Just because you can't make an experiment doesn't mean you can't do anything.
In other words as we probe lower scales, string theory predicts thtat Lorenz invariance will never break,
as long we have to do with a consistent string like theory.
Is my understanding correct?
Provide a viable test, and you will be sure that an experimentalist will jump at the chance
If they had that the hype could die. Luckily it cannot be tested so the hype will continue in perpetuity
Heh... as someone on the outside, I feel the need to ask:
Has it been rigorously shown that it can never be tested? Or is that your prediction?
Test which version? Part of the problem is that string theory is a meta theory. There will always be ways to escape any negative experimental result.
String theory isn't a theory it's a family of related theories sharing some common mathematical tools.
People talk about this as though it's an attempt at deception, whereas two people notionally working in string theory could in fact be proposing highly incompatible models which would be conclusively ruled out (and a lot of them have been in so far as that can be done - i.e. experimentation has put tight bounds on their possible parameters).
They are getting close to making a testable prediction, any day now. Have been for the last 30 years. History is not always an indication of the future, but it is often a good sign.
But yes, not rigorous.
It feels like Woit is just being a hater at this point. In a meritocracy, talent and funding gravitate toward the most promising options. If string theory took up a large proportion of people and resources, it’s because it solved technical problems no other framework could. Even if it hasn't yielded a Theory of Everything, the fact that its toolkit is now solving problems in other fields suggests the program has led to some success. Now that the field is in a lull, we're seeing a natural institutional rebalancing. Talent is simply self-allocating toward more fertile ground, which is exactly how a healthy scientific ecosystem should function.
The problem is the 'most promising option' is affected by hype and loud voices. Many of the string theory crowds made predictions that did not pan out at all and still did not acknowledge their mistakes. I think that's the problem. Sure there was a lot beautiful mathematics discovered, and it can be used in some other fields, but the acknowledgement of failure of string theory is needed, rather than trying to point here or there where some of the tools from ST could be used. (I am a physicist, but nowhere near the strings theory)
not a physicist but this video by Angela Collier is a fun watch:
“string theory lied to us and now science communication is hard.
https://youtu.be/kya_LXa_y1E?si=WTfOSS61YeUQbqgf
Thanks to Michio Kaku.
I’m reporting a -1 day here because I’m lazy and tired. Apple passwords are not case sensitive anymore, especially when porting between iPhone and windows QR codes lol
People need to get fired
Sabine Hossenfelder seems to think the paper on natural networks is pretty legit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj5b0ieVWSo
Even if string theory cannot explain the universe, there may still be some value in it.