What is the argument behind the confident negative attitude towards string theory/M-theory? I am not a physicist, but in layman’s eyes it seems elegant. Is there any special argument or is it just general skepticism towards big unproven theoretical models?
It’s hideously inelegant, and it makes no testable predictions. That means it gets low marks from both Bayes and Science. It might conceivably be excusable to argue that most of the structure of the universe is hidden if you can actually produce elegant math or come up with some new predictions from that basis, but after thirty years the string theorists can’t even agree on how many dimensions to do the math in. A massive investment of effort has gone precisely nowhere, and there’s no reason to believe it’ll do better in future. I’ll pass.
What is the argument behind the confident negative attitude towards string theory/M-theory? I am not a physicist, but in layman’s eyes it seems elegant. Is there any special argument or is it just general skepticism towards big unproven theoretical models?
At risk of necromancy, I’ll reply.
It’s hideously inelegant, and it makes no testable predictions. That means it gets low marks from both Bayes and Science. It might conceivably be excusable to argue that most of the structure of the universe is hidden if you can actually produce elegant math or come up with some new predictions from that basis, but after thirty years the string theorists can’t even agree on how many dimensions to do the math in. A massive investment of effort has gone precisely nowhere, and there’s no reason to believe it’ll do better in future. I’ll pass.