Is String Theory Testable?
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In my opinion, no. String theory is a mess. It doesn't work, so they keep playing mathematical tricks to try to make it work. It now seems to exist solely for the benefit of itself.
Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine. - P.J. O'Rourke
Yeah, after reading The Elegant Universe[^], I arrived at pretty much the same conclusion. According to the book, some of the mathematics is so complex, that it is impossible to solve! For a "unified theory", it sure does seem way too complicated and unnecessary, especially when you compare it to the elegance and simplicity of something like
E = MC2!
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Ravi Bhavnani wrote:
myString.Equals
What do you have against the equals operator? :-)
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Yes, here is how you do it:
bool TestString(string MyString)
{
if(MyString=="Hello, world") return true;
else return false;
}:-D
Shorter: ;P
bool TestString(string MyString)
{
return MyString == "Hello, world";
}A polar bear is a bear whose coordinates has been changed in terms of sine and cosine. Personal Site
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Yeah, after reading The Elegant Universe[^], I arrived at pretty much the same conclusion. According to the book, some of the mathematics is so complex, that it is impossible to solve! For a "unified theory", it sure does seem way too complicated and unnecessary, especially when you compare it to the elegance and simplicity of something like
E = MC2!
Sunrise Wallpaper Project | The StartPage Randomizer | A Random Web Page
Miszou wrote:
For a "unified theory", it sure does seem way too complicated and unnecessary
Yet QM's maths are darker and more complicated than string theory's. I believe that ST (the M Theory in particular) is the TOE. Yet it'll take too much to prove it, at least with the quantity of enery we are able nowadays to produce. BTW, I also read that book, very interesting one. You could take a look to the ST site[^] as well.
A polar bear is a bear whose coordinates has been changed in terms of sine and cosine. Personal Site
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In my opinion, no. String theory is a mess. It doesn't work, so they keep playing mathematical tricks to try to make it work. It now seems to exist solely for the benefit of itself.
Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine. - P.J. O'Rourke
I agree. If you create a system with enough degrees of freedom (dimensions) you can make it fit any solution so it's no wonder it appears to work.
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Miszou wrote:
For a "unified theory", it sure does seem way too complicated and unnecessary
Yet QM's maths are darker and more complicated than string theory's. I believe that ST (the M Theory in particular) is the TOE. Yet it'll take too much to prove it, at least with the quantity of enery we are able nowadays to produce. BTW, I also read that book, very interesting one. You could take a look to the ST site[^] as well.
A polar bear is a bear whose coordinates has been changed in terms of sine and cosine. Personal Site
Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
Yet QM's maths are darker and more complicated than string theory's.
If you are talking about Quantum Mechanics, string theory is an extension of QM. String theory is much more complex then Quantum Field Theory which is the most complicated form of Quantum Mechanics. It also happens to be the most accurately tested theory mankind has been able to develop to date.
I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon
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Fernando A. Gomez F. wrote:
Yet QM's maths are darker and more complicated than string theory's.
If you are talking about Quantum Mechanics, string theory is an extension of QM. String theory is much more complex then Quantum Field Theory which is the most complicated form of Quantum Mechanics. It also happens to be the most accurately tested theory mankind has been able to develop to date.
I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon
General relativity is the 2nd most accurately tested theory (actually I thought it was the other way around, but regardless GR and QFT are the top 2). superstring/m-theory is the simplest melding of the two that doesn't produce obviously nonsense results. The fact that is appears to be pointing towards an (effectively) infinite multiverse instead of a single set of rules for the universe is potentially troubling but IMO no more so than the dozens of magic numbers that the existing theories set by fiat to make themselves work. The CMB may contain data that would shed light on the multiverse issue if we can measure with enough extra digits of precision. Limitations of current math preclude anything definitive, but math being well ahead of physics has only been true for the few centuries between newton and the present. The fact that physic theory has caught up with the math theoreticians shouldn't be seen as a flaw with the physics itself.
-- CleaKO The sad part about this instance is that none of the users ever said anything [about the problem]. Pete O`Hanlon Doesn't that just tell you everything you need to know about users?
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General relativity is the 2nd most accurately tested theory (actually I thought it was the other way around, but regardless GR and QFT are the top 2). superstring/m-theory is the simplest melding of the two that doesn't produce obviously nonsense results. The fact that is appears to be pointing towards an (effectively) infinite multiverse instead of a single set of rules for the universe is potentially troubling but IMO no more so than the dozens of magic numbers that the existing theories set by fiat to make themselves work. The CMB may contain data that would shed light on the multiverse issue if we can measure with enough extra digits of precision. Limitations of current math preclude anything definitive, but math being well ahead of physics has only been true for the few centuries between newton and the present. The fact that physic theory has caught up with the math theoreticians shouldn't be seen as a flaw with the physics itself.
-- CleaKO The sad part about this instance is that none of the users ever said anything [about the problem]. Pete O`Hanlon Doesn't that just tell you everything you need to know about users?
The biggest problem I have with theoretical physics right now is that they are trying to preserve our ignorance in the theory. There is a huge gulf between the energies that we can study and the energies that we know where things get interesting and quantum mechanics and gravity interact. Physicists can predict out a little bit past the energies that we can reach, but we have no idea about the forces and particles that exist between the strong force and the unification scale which is a larger energy range then that between humans and the nucleus. All the current theories are based on the assumption that there are no new interesting physics in that entire energy range. That's why I think the current theories are interesting mathematics, but I don't think they will provide much insight, since I think there is a very slim chance that we won't find anything in that gulf.
I can imagine the sinking feeling one would have after ordering my book, only to find a laughably ridiculous theory with demented logic once the book arrives - Mark McCutcheon
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Yes, here is how you do it:
bool TestString(string MyString)
{
if(MyString=="Hello, world") return true;
else return false;
}:-D
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Ravi Bhavnani wrote:
Nothing! But the original method won't compile.
What do you mean? Oh, you're compiling in Java. ;P
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