Has physics reached an impasse, and what can we do about it?
One source of the crisis is that many … theories have many freely adjustable parameters. As a result, some theories make no predictions at all.…
New York Academy of Sciences quotes
View All Authors View SourcesThe most popular theories, such as supersymmetry, have many more free parameters – the simplest supersymmetric extension of the Standard Model has 105 additional parameters. This means that the theory is unlikely to be tested in upcoming experiments.
— Lee Smolin (2006)
p. 13
To continue the progress of science, we have to again confront deep questions about space and time, quantum theory, and cosmology.
— Lee Smolin (2006)
p. 13
One reason string theory is popular is that there is some evidence that it points to a quantum theory of gravity.
— Lee Smolin (2006)
p. 13
A growing number of theoretical physicists … see the present situation as a crisis that requires us to re-examine the assumptions behind our so-far unsuccessful theories.
— Lee Smolin (2006)
p. 13
We have already had the example of the big-bang singularity in the remote past, which seems not to be avoidable. The “disaster” to physics occurred right at the beginning.
— Roger Penrose (1973)
p. 125