Quick Book Review: Lost in Math

There has been a ton of ink spilled about this book over this summer just past, most of it with a slightly sheepish "yeah, that's about right; dunno what to do though" tone throughout.  Here, read the blurb from Amazon, and then I'll have a bit more to say afterward:

Whether pondering black holes or predicting discoveries at CERN, physicists believe the best theories are beautiful, natural, elegant, and this standard separates popular theories from disposable ones.  This is why, Sabine Hossenfelder argues, we have not seen a major breakthrough in the foundations of physics for more than four decades.  The belief in beauty has become so dogmatic that it now conflicts with scientific objectivity; observation has been unable to confirm mind boggling theories, like supersymmetry or grand unification, invented by physicists based on aesthetic criteria.  Worse, these "too good not to be true" theories are actually untestable and they have left the field in a cul-de-sac.  To escape, physicists must rethink their methods.  Only by embracing reality as it is can science discover the truth.

Yeah, that's about right.  Dunno what to do though.  And the problem is that there are still so many unanswered questions.  (For a fun popular-level dive into that topic, see Cham and Whiteson's book, We Have No Idea.)  With the price tag of the next-generation accelerator estimated to be somewhere in the $100 billion range though, we do need to carefully consider our next steps.

Back to the above-quoted blurb, it really boils down the key points of the book, but of course the blurb can't capture the humanity, the wit, the tone of the book itself.  It's worth the read just for the interviews with leading physicists, for the travelogue, for the occasional wackiness of wanting a cup of coffee after a long flight before the next interview begins.  If you are at all the kind of person who at all considers these sorts of things (either big, deep questions, or where that next cup of coffee is coming from), this book is this year's indispensable reading.


ps: Yeah, I know that all the cool kids already blog-reviewed this back in July.  What can I say, I've been busy.