Podcast
StarTalk Radio
It was written to explain why there hasn't been much progress in the foundations of physics in the last 50 years, and why physicists got too enchanted by certain ideals of beauty that have often derailed discoveries.
And that person is in the house right now except dialing in from Germany. We have Sabine Hasselfelder. Do I pronounce that right, Sabine?
— Episode: Cosmic Queries – Fixing Physics with Sab...
Episode: Cosmic Queries – Fixing Physics with Sabine Hossen...
It was written to explain why there hasn't been much progress in the foundations of physics in the last 50 years, and why physicists got too enchanted by certain ideals of beauty that have often derailed discoveries.
And that person is in the house right now except dialing in from Germany. We have Sabine Hasselfelder. Do I pronounce that right, Sabine?
And one of my favorite works of hers is an earlier book that was indicting the expectation that elegance and beauty and math should guide science.
So my first book dealt with the question why there's been pretty much no progress in the foundations of physics in the past 50 years or so since the standard model was completed.
The message that I'm trying to get across in the book is that the problem is that physicists got too enchanted by certain ideals of beauty.
Existential Physics, a Scientist's Guide to Life's Biggest Questions.