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MalnadachBot (talk | contribs) m Fixed Lint errors. (Task 12) |
MalnadachBot (talk | contribs) m Fixed Lint errors. (Task 12) |
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::::::::::: Wow, this still? Let me try to boil this down: String theory is not "shown" to be scientific in any particular place because it's status as a scientific theory is not seriously questioned in the scientific community (its correctness, on the other hand, is). If it were not science, there would not be O(1000) or more papers published in peer reviewed physics journals like Physical Review, MIT's course on string theory would be classified as math or something else instead of physics, and so on. Its quite easy to agree that ordinarily the claim that a given scientific theory is, in fact, science would not be noteworthy, but its obvious why this case is an exception: because there is a widely-selling popular-level physics book, as well as one of the most trafficked physics blogs on the internet, claiming otherwise. Im not opposed to having this book, as well as Smolin's, included in the article; since they surely have some significance (though not much in the way of rigorous content bearing on the scientific question itself). However, as long as the claim that string theory is not science is being presented, the article also deserves an explicit recitation of Popper's criterion, as well as the rigorously derivable properties of string theory that show unambiguously that it fits that criterion.
::::::::::: I noticed earlier that the phrase "de facto untestable" was criticized. Let me say that this was my phrase, and I basically chose it as a compromise with whatever was in there before – I dont remember exactly what the previous language was that I replaced, but it seemed too clearly wrong to stand. I choose this language because it does represent a claim about string theory that is not rigorous, and thus may take on varying shades of truth, depending on what a more detailed study of the landscape of phenomenologically viable solutions yields. That string theory is ''testable'' and that it is science according to Popper's criterion are empirical facts. That it may not be feasible to test ''in practice'' is more subtle, and thats what that language I chose was hoping to convey. I dont agree that string theory is de-facto untestable (or at least I think its too early to claim that), but this is at least a claim that is not rigorously ruled out, and I think it accurately captures what many of the more skeptical physicists think, yet it is distinct from the wrong statements that string theory fails to be science. <
:::::::::::: Isocliff, the dispute currently is not whether string theory is science. Personally, I consider string theory within the realm of science, for reasons like "it is done by science departments". Indeed, I think this issue is clear in the article. The first line is, after all: "String theory is an active research framework in particle physics..." No one is saying its Math or English.
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