To me, it seems that TED talks have become a platform for just about anyone to spout just about anything and have it greeted with the kind of belief normally reserved for itinerant preachers performing healing miracles.
Dr. Harry Cliff, a researcher at CERN , gave a TED talk proclaiming that we are nearing the end of physics.
“The next few years may tell us whether we’ll be able to continue to increase our understanding of nature or whether maybe, for the first time in the history of science, we could be facing questions that we cannot answer.”
That’s total BS. That kind of quote has been said every generation for long time.
“So many centuries after the Creation, it is unlikely that anyone could find hitherto unknown lands of any value.” – Spanish Royal Commission, rejecting Christopher Columbus’ proposal to sail west.
or
“When I began my physical studies [in Munich in 1874] and sought advice from my venerable teacher Philipp von Jolly… he portrayed to me physics as a highly developed, almost fully matured science… Possibly in one or another nook there would perhaps be a dust particle or a small bubble to be examined and classified, but the system as a whole stood there fairly secured, and theoretical physics approached visibly that degree of perfection which, for example, geometry has had already for centuries.”
– from a 1924 lecture by Max Planck (Sci. Am, Feb 1996 p.10)
or
“We are probably nearing the limit of all we can know about astronomy.”
– Simon Newcomb, early American astronomer 1888
or
“There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement” – Lord Kelvin 1900
or
“It would appear that we have reached the limits of what it is possible to achieve with computer technology, although one should be careful with such statements, as they tend to sound pretty silly in 5 years” John von Newmann, 1949.
or
Lee was alluding to my book, The End of Science, released earlier that year. In it, I made the case that science—especially pure science, the grand quest to understand the universe and our place in it—might be reaching a cul-de-sac, yielding “no more great revelations or revolutions, but only incremental, diminishing returns.” John Hogan 2006, referring The End of Science published in 1996.
Now, there are a few things that I need to acknowledge right off the bat.
First, there are things that we have reached (probably) the limit of our understanding. These are systems which have matured to the point where it would take radical rethinking and some pretty startling discoveries in other fields to change what we know. Things like expansion of gases under various condition. Or how land forms are formed on Earth. Yes, these are very specific things and that’s the point. We study the genetics of cat coat colors and understand a great deal about it. At some point, a mutation may come along and we get a cat with purple fur. And when that happens, the owner of that cat will make millions and some geneticists will have a field day figuring out what gene mutated.
Second, there are, we think, physical limitations. Current computers can only be made so small before quantum effects take over and it costs more computing power to process the errors than are generated in the CPU. Of course, we’re starting to get functioning quantum computers now too. The speed of light is a hard stop… for now.
Third, there are things that happened in situations where we don’t know and can never know exactly what happened. The formation of life on Earth for example or all those dinosaur species that were never fossilized. We can make some guesses about life on Earth based on chemistry. All the steps, so far, work. But we’ll never know exactly how it happened.
Finally, while there have been many predictions of the demise of science over the years, just because those have not come true doesn’t mean that this one won’t. Past performance is no guarantee of future profits.
Now, with all that out of the way, just discovering how the Higgs particle and field work or the nature of dark energy (to name the two that Cliff mentioned), doesn’t mean that physics has ended.
Wikipedia has a list of unsolved problems in physics. And if you want to burn a few days of your life, read them and the links and everything at those links.
The first particle accelerators (atom smashers) were developed in the 1920s. Nearly a century later, we have CERN. China is planning a larger one. Some researchers at Stanford may have found a way to build accelerators with 500 times the power of current ones.
There’re hints that we have discovered gravity waves. And once we find the thing, we can soon manipulate the thing.
What is impossible for one generation is the challenge for the next generation and a common tool for the third generation. My grandfather grew up when manned flight was just becoming possible. Their ice box was a box, with a huge chunk of ice that was delivered every morning. No one had phones, or TV, or electricity. Indoor toilets were not common in some places in the US. My mom talks about going to the outhouse when visiting her grandmother, in the early 50s.
Cliff says this
“We may be entering a new era in physics. An era where there are weird features in the universe that we cannot explain. An era where we have hints that we live in a multiverse that lies frustratingly beyond our reach. An era where we will never be able to answer the question why is there something rather than nothing.”
I would say to any scientist who says this, Go home. You’re done as a scientist. If, at any point, you think that there are systems that we cannot, eventually, figure out, then you have given up.
If there is anything we don’t understand. Someone will find a way to study it and provide evidence for how it works. There is always someone who is not satisfied by not knowing.
