The direction of science March 30th, 2010
Science as it is defined today revolves around a method of cycling experiment and theory. At the universities this cycle is taught as the scientific method. And clearly defines a direction going from observation to theory and round and round until the theory fits the empirical data.
The method as such is quite sound, and a minimum of bias from human expectation is achieved if the observer/scientist keeps evolving the method and theory based on observation.
In modern physics, especially high energy particle physics, things have gotten a bit reversed. Experiments takes years to build, and just as long to
. On the other hand theories can be produced at the flick of a neuron. As a result of this decrepancy between time to invent a theory and time to produced data have grown larger and larger. Even worse, a disconnect between the people building a theory and people producing experimental data have grown as well. Optimally it should be the same person devising theory and experiment.
Todays physics is basically a game of catching up with fantasy rather then describing reality, no matter how enchanting the thought of extra dimensions, time travel and super strings may be, it is so far just a figment of imagination without much basis in reality.
While it’s easy to get caught up in a dream, especially one as profound as the one modern theoretical particle physics provides, it is so far, just that – a dream.
