Theos-Talk Archives (August 2003 Message tt00153)

In a message dated 08/26/03 2:38:30 AM, may74nard@yahoo.com writes:

>some theosophists claim that these theories support
>notions presented in the SD and other related
>theosophical works. this article highlights the fact
>that we must question the validity of everything, even
>everything HPB had to say.....

..... Including what this guy has to say about String Theory (which he 
apparently knows very little about and is just spouting his personal opinions with 
no scientifically sound counter argument)... As most reductive scientists do in 
defense of materialism (or, as they call it, "physicalism"). 

Theosophical metaphysics -- and its correlation's with string theory as well 
as with relativity and quantum theory, that are admittedly incompatible and 
fundamentally flawed, although they seem to work in limited areas of physical 
reality (which is only one small part of absolute reality) -- stands on its 
inherent logic and reasonableness starting from fundamental principles (that have 
to be taken as unassailable givens) and then studied solely from BOTH a 
subjective and objective point of view. 

While theosophical metaphysics, per se, can't "objectively" or scientifically 
be proven to be correct, neither can science prove that it isn't... And, it 
answers many questions related to consciousness and mind (as well as 
scientifically demonstrated psi phenomena) that science cannot even get close handle on. 
If you read all the contradictory nonsense written by scientists about these 
subjects during the past ten years in their online consciousness and mind 
study forums, as well as in their so called "scientific journals," you would know 
exactly what I mean.

It's a sad commentary that science is so limited in its scope as to only 
accept as reality the "evidence of their (physical) senses."

>
>--- Maynard Smith <may74nard@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> American Scientist, March-April 2002 v90 i2 p110(3) 
>> Is string theory even wrong? (Macroscope). Peter
>> Woit.
>> 
>> Full Text: COPYRIGHT 2002 Sigma Xi, The Scientific
>> Research Society 
>> 
>> For nearly 18 years now, most advanced mathematical
>> work in theoretical particle physics has centered on
>> something known as string theory. This theory is
>> built
>> on the idea that elementary particles are not
>> point-like objects but are the vibration modes of
>> one-dimensional "string-like" entities. This
>> formulation hopes to do away with certain lingering
>> problems in fundamental particle physics and to
>> offer
>> the possibility of soon explaining all physical
>> phenomena--everything from neutrinos to black
>> holes--with a single theory. Fifteen years ago
>> Edward
>> Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study made the
>> widely quoted claim that "string theory is a part of
>> 21st-century physics that fell by chance into the
>> 20th
>> century," so perhaps it is now time to begin judging
>> the success or failure of this new way of thinking
>> about particle physics. 
>> 
>> The strongest scientific argument in favor of string
>> theory is that it appears to contain a theory of
>> gravity embedded within it and thus may provide a
>> solution to the thorny problem of reconciling
>> Einstein's general relativity with quantum mechanics
>> and the rest of particle physics. There are,
>> however,
>> two fundamental problems, which are hard to get
>> around. 
>> 
>> First, string theory predicts that the world has 10
>> space-time dimensions, in serious disagreement with
>> all the evidence of one's senses. Matching string
>> theory with reality requires that one postulate six
>> unobserved spatial dimensions of very small size
>> wrapped up in one way or another. All the
>> predictions
>> of the theory depend on how you do this, but there
>> are
>> an infinite number of possible choices, and no one
>> has
>> any idea how to determine which is correct. 
>> 
>> The second concern is that even the part of string
>> theory that is understood is internally
>> inconsistent.
>> This aspect of the theory relies on a series
>> expansion, an infinite number of terms that one is
>> supposed to sum together to get a result. Whereas
>> each
>> of the terms in the series is probably finite, their
>> sum is almost certainly infinite. String theorists
>> actually consider this inconsistency to be a virtue,
>> because otherwise they would have an infinite number
>> of consistent theories of gravity on their hands
>> (one
>> for each way of wrapping up six dimensions), with no
>> principle for choosing among them. 
>> 
>> The "M" Word 
>> 
>> These two problems have been around since the
>> earliest
>> work on string theory--along with the hope that they
>> would somehow cancel each other out. Perhaps some
>> larger theory exists to which string theory is just
>> an
>> approximate solution obtained by series expansion,
>> and
>> this larger theory will explain what's going on with
>> the six dimensions we can't see. The latest version
>> of
>> this vision goes under the name of "M-theory," where
>> the "M" is said variously to stand for "Membrane,"
>> "Matrix," "Mother," "Meta," "Magic" or
>> "Mystery"--although "Mythical" may be more
>> appropriate, given that nearly eight years of work
>> on
>> this idea have yet to lead to even a good conjecture
>> about what M-theory might be. 
>> 
>> The reigning Standard Model of particle physics,
>> which
>> string theory attempts to encompass, involves at its
>> core certain geometrical concepts, namely the Dirac
>> operator and gauge fields, which are among the
>> deepest
>> and most powerful ideas in modern mathematics. In
>> string theory, the Dirac operator and gauge fields
>> are
>> not fundamental: They are artifacts of taking a
>> low-energy limit. String theorists ask
>> mathematicians
>> to believe in the existence of some wonderful new
>> sort
>> of geometry that will eventually provide an
>> explanation for M-theory. But without a serious
>> proposal for the underlying new geometry, this
>> argument is unconvincing. 
>> 
>> The experimental situation is similarly bleak. It is
>> best described by Wolfgang Pauli's famous phrase,
>> "It's not even wrong." String theory not only makes
>> no
>> predictions about physical phenomena at
>> experimentally
>> accessible energies, it makes no precise predictions
>> whatsoever. Even if someone were to figure out
>> tomorrow how to build an accelerator capable of
>> reaching the astronomically high energies at which
>> particles are no longer supposed to appear as
>> points,
>> string theorists would be able to do no better than
>> give qualitative guesses about what such a machine
>> might show. At the moment string theory cannot be
>> falsified by any conceivable experimental result. 
>> 
>> There is, however, one physical prediction that
>> string
>> theory does make: the value of a quantity called the
>> cosmological constant (a measure of the energy of
>> the
>> vacuum). Recent observations of distant supernovae
>> indicate that this quantity is very small but not
>> zero. A simple argument in string theory indicates
>> that the cosmological constant should be at least
>> around 55 orders of magnitude larger than the
>> observed
>> value. This is perhaps the most incorrect
>> experimental
>> prediction ever made by any physical theory that
>> anyone has taken seriously. 
>> 
>> With such a dramatic lack of experimental support,
>> string theorists often attempt to make an aesthetic
>> argument, professing that the theory is strikingly
>> "elegant" or "beautiful." Because there is no
>> well-defined theory to judge, it's hard to know what
>> to make of these assertions, and one is reminded of
>> another quotation from Pauli. Annoyed by Werner
>> Heisenberg's claims that, though lacking in some
>> specifics, he had a wonderful unified theory (he
>> didn't), Pauli sent letters to some of his physicist
>> friends each containing a blank rectangle and the
>> text, "This is to show the world that I can paint
>> like
>> Titian. Only technical details are missing." Because
>> no one knows what "M-theory" is, its beauty is that
>> of
>> Pauli's painting. Even if a consistent M-theory can
>> be
>> found, it may very well turn out to be something of
>> great complexity and ugliness. 
>> 
>> What exactly can be said for string theory? In
>> recent
>> years, something called the Maldacena conjecture has
>> led to some success in using string theory as a tool
>> in understanding certain quantum field theories that
>> don't include gravity. Mathematically, string theory
>> has covered a lot of ground over the past 18 years
>> and
>> has led to many impressive new results. The concept
>> of
>> "mirror symmetry" has been very fruitful in
>> algebraic
>> geometry, and conformal field theory has opened up a
>> new, fascinating and very deep area of mathematics.
>> Unfortunately for physics, these mathematically
>> interesting parts of string theory do little to
>> connect it with the real world.

(etc., etc.,)