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this post was submitted on 06 May 2025
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ELI5 why this is bullshit again?
Not necessarily this one. But in general the problem with most quantum gravity theories is that they are made from mathematics alone. All the successful theories were developed from experimental results. From real data.
You can say a lot with just mathematics. Doesn't mean that it is real.
A good theory explains the current tests we have and can make predictions about new tests. Otherwise it is useless.
The more I think about this, the more I'm not sure I 100% agree... For example, special relativity essentially came from the observation that Maxwell's equations were not Galilean invariant, and instead invariant under this weird other group (what we now call the Lorentz group); and QED essentially came from Dirac wanting to take a "square root" of the Klein-Gordan equation.
(Of course, real history is more intricate than this.)
You’re too polite. This guy is absolutely full of shit. Our awareness of black holes emerged from pure math, as just one example off the dome. Experimental data came later. And decades later, in fact. A lot begins in the math.
That's the "make predictions" part, smartass. There is a big difference between calculating the limits with a theory and inventing new limits and trying to find maths that fit.
And even then is the experimental evidence still the most important part. Wormholes, warp drives and white holes are also mathematically possible. Doesn't mean they are real. We didn't call the higgs field real until it was experimentally proven.
Yes, people found a whole lot out via maths. But they didn't just have some idea about how they think nature works and then invented some formulas for that. They built on prior theories and evidence.
This is not really true. Lots of very well tested theories in physics came from math first, and then experimentation upheld them.
Einstein developed general relativity based on mathematical principles (Riemannian geometry and the equivalence principle) with little direct experimental input. And then successfully predicted the light of distant stars bendng around the sun.
Paul Dirac formulated a relativistic equation for the electron. The math naturally predicted the existence of a positron which was discovered years later.
Peter Higgs and others proposed the Higgs field to explain why particles have mass within the Standard Model, in 1964. It wasn't detected in experiments until 2012.
Maxwell’s unification of electricity and magnetism led to the prediction of electromagnetic waves. 20 years later Hertz detected them.
Just months after Einstein published general relativity, Karl Schwarzschild found a solution predicting black holes. With no data at all! Sure enough, we've observed them and their effects many times.
Mathematics often leads the way in physics.
When the theory of everything happens, it won’t be phys.org reporting it.
Until then, you’ll see lots of blogs reporting various papers to get those clicks.