ST - The E-Channel Biography
E Channel biographies are highly formulaic: Young person, armed only with looks, charisma, indomitable spirit, and, sometimes, talent, overcomes formidable obstacles to become a star. As money and adulation come flooding in, the usual bogeymen show up to drill a little hole in the fairy tale castle wall: sex, drugs, and hubris - that pride by which the gods bring down those who look like potential competitors. The significant other splits. The fans get bored. Financial inflow drops while outflow mounts. As the crisis mounts, we can all see what is coming next: 30 or 40 consecutive commercials.
It's a bit of a stretch to say that String Theory has reached this point in its career, but tiny cracks in its public facade have widened. Peter Woit and Lee Smolin are hardly the first or most prestigious critics to go public. Philip Anderson, a long time critic, is one of the most important twentieth century physicists. Robert Laughlin, another condensed matter Nobel prizewinner has made his disapproval known. Roger Penrose has likewise been critical.
None of them has been as detailed and forceful as Peter and Lee in their respective booklength critiques, though, and none has resonated so much with the intellectually curious public. The reaction of the string elite has mainly consisted of hunkering down, apparently in the hope that if they ignore the critics, they will fade away.
In the best E-Channel tradition, this public attack has crowned string theory's own internal crisis over the problem of the vast landscape of apparent solutions, which itself threatens to destroy any predictivity of the theory.
So how will it all come out? If you can stay tuned through the commercials, either comeback or trajedy may await just around the corner.
It's a bit of a stretch to say that String Theory has reached this point in its career, but tiny cracks in its public facade have widened. Peter Woit and Lee Smolin are hardly the first or most prestigious critics to go public. Philip Anderson, a long time critic, is one of the most important twentieth century physicists. Robert Laughlin, another condensed matter Nobel prizewinner has made his disapproval known. Roger Penrose has likewise been critical.
None of them has been as detailed and forceful as Peter and Lee in their respective booklength critiques, though, and none has resonated so much with the intellectually curious public. The reaction of the string elite has mainly consisted of hunkering down, apparently in the hope that if they ignore the critics, they will fade away.
In the best E-Channel tradition, this public attack has crowned string theory's own internal crisis over the problem of the vast landscape of apparent solutions, which itself threatens to destroy any predictivity of the theory.
So how will it all come out? If you can stay tuned through the commercials, either comeback or trajedy may await just around the corner.
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