One thought experiment that I love is the Theseus Paradox, which asks the question that if a ship is repaired and all of its old parts replaced, is it the same ship that was originally built or a new one? When looking at modern theoretical physics, I start to wonder if we’re approaching a similar paradox where physics has been replaced by math and philosophy. In Lost in Math, Sabine Hossenfelder seeks to answer a similar question. Her contention is that desire for a beautiful theorem has become too much of a distraction for theoretical physics. Lost in Math journals her investigation.
TL;DR
Lost in Math by Sabine Hossenfelder is an important investigation into the current biases shared across the theoretical physics discipline. It asks hard questions about the current orthodoxy. Highly recommended.
From the Publisher
A contrarian argues that modern physicists’ obsession with beauty has given us wonderful math but bad scienceWhether pondering black holes or predicting discoveries at CERN, physicists believe the best theories are beautiful, natural, and elegant, and this standard separates popular theories from disposable ones. This is why, Sabine Hossenfelder argues, we have not seen a major breakthrough in the foundations of physics for more than four decades. The belief in beauty has become so dogmatic that it now conflicts with scientific objectivity: observation has been unable to confirm mindboggling theories, like supersymmetry or grand unification, invented by physicists based on aesthetic criteria. Worse, these “too good to not be true” theories are actually untestable and they have left the field in a cul-de-sac. To escape, physicists must rethink their methods. Only by embracing reality as it is can science discover the truth.
The State of Theoretical Physics
Ms. Hossenfelder quite clearly lays out the state of theoretical physics, and she approaches the field as a contrarian. In my idealized view of any science, I see the practitioners as deeply skeptical of the status quo. Else how do we surpass our current knowledge? But Ms. Hossenfelder paints a different picture, one in which questioning the mainstream is increasingly difficult.In Lost in Math, she focuses on the failure to find supersymmetric particles to explore whether we’re looking at the wrong theory, simply because symmetry is beautiful. She investigates this through many interviews with working and prominent physicists. Her journey showed a variation of opinion but a united optimism that the scientific method will prevail. It’s encouraging to see that despite the lack of results, the physicists maintain their excitement and passion for their field. But passion isn’t enough when the experimental results are missing. Ms. Hossenfelder continues to hammer home the point that despite bigger and bigger particle colliders, the supersymmetric particles still elude us.
In the course of her investigation, we see that she’s at odds with the mainstream physics community. In this book, she lays out many reasons for why this is so, and I appreciated that she presents a complex picture. Because, like many things in life, no one prime mover exists that we can point to and say, “fix that to make everything better.” But in addition to shining the spotlight on what she believes to be the problem, Ms. Hossenfelder lists potential solutions. These solutions are the appendix, which, at first, I didn’t like. It seemed too safe to exclude them from the text, but upon reflection, I think it was the correct move to place them in the appendix. Instead of highlighting her solutions, Ms. Hossenfelder showcased the problem, which allows room for solutions other than just her own. Though, I recommend serious consideration of her solutions.
The most technical argument in the book pits natural versus fine-tuning. It’s an interesting discussion that takes a bit to understand, but I think Ms. Hossenfelder explains it well. It’s challenging without reaching too far.
Writing
This text is a curious mixture of physics lessons, interviews, and travel journal. Sabine writes in an academic style that at times slips into deep philosophical prose. While most of the book was accessible for me, often I had to reread and think hard about the concepts in the text. The challenging parts are important in a book like this. The reader needs to think deeply about the topics and where physics goes from here. But these parts are interspersed enough to give the book a sense of pacing. Lost in Math wasn’t a dull, dry lecture; it’s a story of the current state of physics that ebbs and flows. I think it’s very well done and will be looking for more of Ms. Hossenfelder’s work.
In addition to the physics lessons, this book reads as a person questioning if they’re still in love with their profession. One of the important but rarely discussed differences between college and the workforce is what the work actually entails. The things I loved about studying engineering make up less than half of what I do at my job. What we study and love is just a small part of work, and I wonder if this book is born of Ms. Hossenfelder’s disappointment in that regard. By the close of the book, we see that its her love of physics that clashes with the current orthodoxy. The contrarian occupies a difficult place in a society, especially when pointing out needed improvements. So, is it that Ms. Hossenfelder is questioning her career choice, or does she feel the fatigue of pointing out that the emperor has no clothes? I hope it’s the latter and that she continues to provide a reality check to theoretical physics if not to spur on needed changes.
Physics (My Personal Opinion)
No one would accuse me of being without an opinion, and I try to keep them out of my reviews. BUT around this book gathered many questions that I’ve had over the years about physics. To be clear, I love physics. I read a lot about the field and came close to making it my career path. But ultimately I chose engineering for a number of reasons, high among them the need to see a testable product. Over the years of reading about string theory, the standard model, the multi-verse, I’ve fallen in love with these elegant ideas, but a small tickle always accompanied my studies. How do they know these advanced theories are correct? That is the question that drove Lost in Math and that drove me to engineering. Traditionally, the answer to that question has been an experimental correlation. Theory and experiment twist round each other like the double helix of a DNA strand. But increasingly, physics has branched out into areas currently beyond our experimental capabilities. So, the question becomes how do they know?
But at some point we have to say that we don’t know. There is nothing wrong with this, though. Being able to say I don’t know is an essential part of the scientific method, but it isn’t as sexy as talking about the multi-verse or a reality made from music. One day, it may be possible to conduct experiments into the information loss paradox at blackhole event horizons. One day, we might be able to glimpse into the multi-verse to view inflationary bubbles where everything is made of anti-matter. But until then we must be careful to differentiate between what we believe and what we’ve observed. This is even more true when put in context of the anti-science right here in America. These people condemn the word theory when applied to evolution, and it’s hard to explain that theory doesn’t just mean guess. And when theory is all mathematical, it’s even more difficult.
Conclusion
Sabine Hossenfelder’s Lost in Math is a call to action for physics to take a good hard look at itself. It’s a necessary work that will irritate people, which is ultimately the role of a contrarian who loves a subject. Ms. Hossenfelder’s attempts to pull physics back from the borders of pure math and philosophy is admirable. As an anchor to the current realities of the field, this is a must have book for anyone exploring cutting edge theoretical physics.
Coming 12 June 2018 from Basic Books.