More on the reverse Sokal

Jim Farmelant farmelantj at juno.com
Sun Nov 10 15:22:57 PST 2002


Les,

So in your judgement are string theories best regarded as science or as metaphysics. given the apparent fact that they do not seem to admit to experimental verification or falsification? As I recall, for a number of years Sheldon Glashow criticized them on precisely that ground.

Jim F.

On Sun, 10 Nov 2002 14:43:28 -0500 Les Schaffer <schaffer at optonline.net> writes:
> > Also, the work of these two...well, these two whatever-they-are is
> > in *theoretical* physics, and my impression is that even the best
> of
> > these folk are regarded with suspicion by their experimental
> peers.
>
> in addition, there are the elders amongst the __theoretical__
> particle
> physics community who also are suspicious of string theories
> (plural!!!).
>
> > Is there any result of "string theory," for example, that so far
> has
> > admitted of experimental verification?
>
> none.
>
> string theories, in so far as they are "valid", can be shown to be
> __consistent__ to predictions of standard model theories, and have
> the
> additional "nice" feature that gravity might be pulled in under the
> quantum umbrella.
>
> there is always some excitement generated when the string theorists
> __suggest__ that the unification energy might be lower than
> previously
> thought, as that would allow at least __some__ form of experimental
> verification to occur sooner rather than later in the future.
>
>
> les schaffer
>
>

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