Peter Woit still thinks string theory is a gory mess

[Ninshub]

The Admiral of the String Theory Wars
After a decade, Peter Woit still thinks string theory is a gory mess.

Bob Henderson, Nautilus

Woit’s major complaint about the theory, then and now, is that it fails to make testable predictions, so it can’t be checked for errors—in other words, that it’s “not even wrong.” Contrast this with general relativity, for example, which enabled Einstein to predict, among other things, the degree to which a star’s light is deflected as it passes the sun. Had measurements of this effect not agreed with Einstein’s prediction, general relativity would have been disproved. Such falsifiability is a widely cited criterion for what constitutes science, a perspective usually attributed to philosopher Karl Popper. Plus, general relativity took Einstein only 10 years. String theory has taken more than 30 so far.


Woit’s secondary grievance is aesthetic. He, like many physicists, perceives an intricate beauty in the math underlying successful physical theories like Einstein’s. In contrast, Woit says, string theory’s math is “a gory mess.”

So his blog routinely condemns the theory as a “failure, ” and decries the “faddishness,” “mania,” and “arrogance” of physicists who promote its promise. He has publicly urged agencies like the National Science Foundation to cut string theory funding. The reaction from the community is plainly evident online, where he is called an “incompetent, power-thirsty … moron” and a “stuttering crackpot-in-chief” guilty of crimes as contemptible as those of Osama bin Laden.