Quote:
Originally Posted by kennyc
This topic is quite a significant issue (for some of reasons expressed above). It was also addressed in a different sort of way in
The Trouble With Physics: The Rise of String Theory, The Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next by Lee Smolin where in part he more or less compares the scientific research community and peer publication process to a kind of "group-think" process that preserves the status quo and prevents new idea and approaches from being seriously considered.
http://www.amazon.com/Trouble-Physic...7316986&sr=8-8 |
For another opinion on
The Trouble with Physics: The Rise of String Theory, the Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next by Lee Smolin, read "All Strung Out," the
American Scientist review of the book by Joseph Polchinski. Here's a sample:
Smolin presents the rise and fall of string theory as a morality play. He accurately captures the excitement that theorists felt at the discovery of this unexpected and powerful new idea. But this story, however grippingly told, is more a work of drama than of history. Even the turning point, the first crack in the facade, is based on a myth: Smolin claims that string theorists had predicted that the energy of the vacuum—something often called dark energy—could not be positive and that the surprising 1998 discovery of the accelerating expansion of the universe (which implies the existence of positive dark energy) caused a hasty retreat. There was, in fact, no such prediction. Although his book is for the most part thoroughly referenced, Smolin cites no source on this point. He quotes Edward Witten, but Witten made his comments in a very different context—and three years after the discovery of accelerating expansion. Indeed, the quotation is doubly taken out of context, because at the same meeting at which Witten spoke, his former student Eva Silverstein gave a solution to the problem about which he was so pessimistic. This episode also goes to show that, contrary to another myth, young string theorists are not so intimidated by their elders.
As Smolin charts the fall of string theory, he presents further misconceptions. For example...
To read the full review, go to
http://www.americanscientist.org/boo...all-strung-out.