The universe in a nutshell

About Dan Falk's book "The Universe on a T-Shirt - The Search for the "Final Theory". From English: Shlomit Canaan. Crown Publishing, 2005

This book has a combination of broad historical evidence and excellent popular writing. Although its title refers to the aspiration to reach the final formula that will describe the physical world, there is not even one mathematical formula in it. The mathematics is replaced by the historical and biographical descriptions mixed with a hint of humor seasoned with several caricatures. I am not one of those who claim that excessive popularization distorts the image of science - and physics in particular. Even the modern physicists who try to explain to themselves and their colleagues the meaning of their theories need pictorial descriptions in the usual space, as this is mainly reflected in the drawing on the blackboard. These are only partial descriptions which are a means of conveying the message, when in the extreme case the descriptions are not accompanied by mathematical formulas. For example, string theory in particle physics, which deals with eleven-dimensional strings, is explained using two-dimensional illustrations. The purpose of such popularization is not to train physicists but to give a general picture of physics to the intelligent reader. In addition to the social-historical insights, Falk discusses in his story also tastes from the philosophy of science.

The book describes the search for the "final theory" that will explain in a simple and uniform way the vast variety of natural phenomena using simple formulas such as E=mc^2 or Maxwell's equations (which are sometimes seen printed on T-shirts). Such theories have appeared since the dawn of history: from the theory of the four The foundations and the atomistic theory among the ancient Greeks up to the theories of symmetry and the superstring theory nowadays.

The author identifies the "scientific method" developed by Galileo and Newton with the experimental method. It is true that the latter characterizes science from the 16th and 17th centuries, but to that must be added the mathematical component and the close integration between it and the experimental component. He claims that there are two fields "in which it is difficult, almost impossible, to conduct experiments in the field", these are high-energy particle physics and cosmology. This claim is true regarding cosmology because we cannot directly investigate, for example, processes that happened at the beginning of the universe. And to our knowledge of the big bang we can refer only as an educated guess. However, high energy physics using giant particle accelerators is the pinnacle of experimental physics. On the other hand, the superstring theory, which is considered the most promising theory in particle physics and which also has significant implications for cosmology, is a theory that is largely considered speculative because it cannot be tested experimentally. This theory tries to fulfill the dream of a unified and final theory after which there will be no employment left for physicists.

The book deals with the history of scientific ideas and the people who conceived them. And when talking about people, there is no place for luck. Indeed, as we will see, luck plays an important, and not just a marginal, role in the story. There are two aspects to the development of science: the conceptual aspect and the human-anecdotal aspect. The author mixes both and treats them as equivalent. Even when he moves to modern physics he emphasizes the anecdotal aspect of creating ideas. And this comes at the expense of describing and explaining the ideas themselves.

The beginning of the story in ancient Greece where the gradual transition took place from a mythology dominated by the gods to a philosophy of nature in which the forces of nature take the place of the gods. The author mentions Thales, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Empedocles, Leukippus and Democritus who raised the first scientific hypotheses regarding the composition of the material world. Hypotheses according to which all material objects are made of water or air, fire, the four elements and atoms. It can be said that unlike the modern physicists who strive to reach a final theory that would unite previous theories, the above thinkers created their theories from the very beginning as "final" theories. However, the author claims that the Greeks were also looking for a unified and final theory that would unite religion and science, that would give a sense of mental security. In connection with this, he quotes (on p. 28) the British writer and physicist John Barrow (1998)1 who claims that the ancient thinkers, and the Greeks in general, "did not want anything to remain outside the scope of theory", and that they had "a deep - religious tendency, one could say - to strive for a single and coherent description of everything around us". It can be said that these were the first steps in the direction of belief in a single "God" - that is, in science.

When the story of the discovery of the hydrostatic law by Archimedes (29) - the famous "Eureka" event - is described, the event is presented as an unusual and spicy event. However, it can be presented as one of a series of foundational discoveries in the history of science - the serendipitous, or privileged discoveries (in which luck plays a central role. See also below). In this type of book, where human stories largely take the place of technical-mathematical descriptions, it would be possible to expand more on the phenomenon of serendipitous creativity in the development of science, which is both interesting and important and does not require technical descriptions.

The chapter on the Copernican revolution deviates from the description of the search for the final theory and becomes a standard chapter in the history of science that reviews the contribution of the Middle Ages and the Arab world to science - a contribution that is mainly "technical" and not conceptual. Both the Arabs and the Church did not foster innovation or originality, but only preserved, taught and translated the traditional knowledge. It can be said that they did not do science, but only maintained the ancient science and applied it. In the words of the author, their description of the world was "too rigid" (39). Whereas in modern science, a theory is changed or replaced when it does not fit the facts, and it is not treated dogmatically or "too rigidly" as one treats a religious belief. Thus, the geocentric view (placing the earth at the center of the universe) was immune to criticism and the "unruly" phenomena that did not fit this model were tried to be "saved" in various ways. For example, according to Ptolemy, the planets were supposed to move at a uniform speed in circular tracks. And to explain why the planets Mars, Jupiter and Saturn sometimes appear as if they are going backwards in their orbits, it was necessary to assume that the planet moves on a sub-circle - an epicycle - whose center moves across the main track of the planet, or on epicycles that move on top of epicycles, so All the epicycles together will provide the necessary "corrections" in order for the track to match the observations. These are ad hoc corrections designed to preserve the principle of the uniform circular motion of the planets. Such corrections are considered unscientific in modern science. In particular, Karl Popper summed it up this way: preserving the principle of uniform circular motion by adding epicycles on top of epicycles is an example of a persistent attempt to defend the theory against refutation, in contrast to the Popperian approach that a scientific theory must be falsifiable and it is necessary to try to disprove it.

The epicycles passed away with Johannes Kepler and his mathematical laws that paved the way for mathematical physics. Kepler's laws survived only in part. And basically no theory has survived in its entirety, as the author reminded us (p. 55). It can be said that this is the lesson that Popper teaches us in his theory of refutation. The author claims that "Kepler's laws, in almost all cases, are completely correct; That's why they are included in the undergraduate curriculum today." Well, inclusion in any study program cannot be used as a benchmark for correctness. Newtonian physics is also taught in the first year at university, while general relativity replaced it at the beginning of the last century. Newtonian physics can be used as a good approximation for engineering needs, but Einsteinian gravitation is conceptually completely different from the Newtonian one.

The author writes that the scientific revolution, i.e. "the series of discoveries that lasted from the days of Copernicus to the days of Newton approximately... created a new and rational world picture based on empirical science and mathematical inference. It was the greatest flood of new ideas that ever swept the world" (p. 59). What does this mean that the picture of the world was "based" on empirical science and mathematical inference? This reflects an inductivist position, that is, a mathematical-logical derivation of the theory (picture the world) from the facts. However, this approach leaves no room for creativity and the appearance of innovative ideas. And it is true that a large part of the philosophers of science today do not take such an approach. The more accepted approach is the approach whereby new ideas are arrived at through hypotheses, guesswork, selection of ideas, intuition, incubation , Halima, etc. (an extensive discussion of these topics appears in my books from Amba to Einstein). Only after the idea or theory is confirmed can the theory be accepted (at least temporarily).

The peak of the scientific revolution occurred with the advent of the Newtonian theory of gravitation. According to the author, Newton came to the law of gravity following the apple that fell from the tree while he was probably deep in thought. However, the law of gravity was not created/discovered only as a result of "a combination of experiments and mathematical analysis" (p. 71). Its creation process can be interpreted as follows. He was in the process of formulating ideas and gathering details of information and fell into a state of mental incubation. The event of the apple falling triggered the missing link that was needed to complete the picture in Newton's head. The enlightenment stage, which is not related to conducting experiments or mathematical analysis, which follows these, is the critical stage in the creative process. Other stories of this type are the Archimedean eureka event that occurred while immersing in the bathtub or the discovery of the ring structure of the benzene molecule by Kekola when he fell asleep while traveling on the bus. That is, science is not only a rational process, in addition to experiments and mathematical analysis there is an unconscious or unintentional process that leads science to the great discoveries. According to this approach, the author's assertion that the scientific method that began with Galileo and was established by Newton is the one that relies on precise measurements and mathematical analysis (p. 77) gives only a partial picture of the process of scientific discovery. This picture ignores the non-directive creative part of the process which is the most interesting part which is also considered "irrational".

The author describes the works of Isaac Newton and Clark Maxwell in light of the central theme of his book, namely the quest to find a unifying theory of nature. Newton unified the physical laws that apply to terrestrial and celestial bodies just as Maxwell unified the laws of electricity and magnetism and added to them the laws of physical optics.

On page 113, the author describes how Einstein arrived at his theory of gravity, that is, the theory of general relativity. As he describes it, it was an illumination similar to that experienced by Newton when he saw the falling apple. But this time it wasn't watching a falling apple, but a thought experiment about a person who is in free fall in an elevator and doesn't feel the force of gravity. The author points out that Einstein himself said about this "it was the most discounted idea in my life". The use of the word "discounted" by the translator is interesting. In the article I published in the journal Eyon, I used the word "mamoloz" as a translation of the word "serendipity", and this was according to the advice of the editor Professor Adi Tzemach. I refer to the concept of cheapness as the ability to discover a solution to one problem while you were looking for a solution to another problem or when you were generally busy with something else. Since I don't have the original book, I don't know the original English word used by the author. In addition, the source of the quote from Einstein is not specified.

The author emphasizes Einstein's failure to reach a unified physical theory. "He was the embodiment of this search" (p. 125). He devoted most of his time to this from the twenties of the last century until his death - over thirty years - and failed. He failed to unify gravity and electromagnetism. He remained on the fringes of physics which progressed in other directions. He did not feel comfortable with quantum theory and did not participate in its development. The great revolutionary in the field of space-time and gravity stayed behind and focused on his "Uniform Field" theory, as the last of the eccentricities. "In his last years, Einstein was perceived by his colleagues as a kind of museum exhibit, an old man with outdated ideas" (p. 120). And as the author rightly points out (p. 129), of the two revolutions of the twentieth century, relativity and quantum theory, it was precisely the latter that posed the greatest challenge to common sense. The author does not attempt to provide an explanation for this. The explanation can be found in the social dimension of modern science. Einstein was not completely cut off from the scientific community, but he spent the beginning of his career outside of academia in the Ministry of Standards. Relativity was largely the work of one man. Then he was unable to connect to the quantum theory which was developed by a growing number of scientists in competition and cooperation. Such a style of operation created a fertile ground for the emergence of innovative ideas that went further and further away from common sense. This type of collaboration in the creation of knowledge characterizes modern physics where there is no place for individualistic scientists. I will touch on this point later.

The paradoxes and oddities of quantum theory are an expression of moving away from common sense. The author describes and explains them as much as possible in a fairly up-to-date manner. Here philosophy invades the field of physics and deals with the interpretation of quantum theory. The translator uses the word "interpretation" here (p. 146). However, it is customary in this case to translate interpretation to "interpretation", since the reference here is to the philosophy of quantum theory. However, most physicists do not deal with this field and leave it to the philosophers of physics. Most physicists "take advantage of the fact that quantum mechanics works and leave the rest to the philosophers". That is, you can continue working even if not everything is understood. It is only important that you know how to calculate experimental results correctly, this is the motto of quantum physics.

When the author moves on to Paul Dirac's contribution to quantum mechanics (p. 147), he talks about the antimatter whose existence is guaranteed by Dirac's theory. He claims that "the first antiparticle - the antiproton - was discovered in 1954", but the truth is that the antiparticle The first was the positron discovered in 1932.

When the author describes the development of quantum field theory, and in particular quantum electrodynamics, he tells us that one of the main characters in the story (Richard Feynman) was also a bongo drummer and prankster, and that he received a "modest score of 125 points on an IQ test" and that a well-known magazine declared that He is "the smartest man in the world," and in response to this his mother was stunned and said: "If this is the smartest man in the world, may God help us" (p. 148). The author mentions all these unimportant trifles, while not bothering at all to explain to the reader who is not in the field what quantum fields are. One gets the impression that the gossip about scientists comes here to fill the void when the author has nothing to say about scientific matters. This can be compared to physicist Anthony Zee's book Fearful Symmetry (1984)2. This book is very similar in character to Falk's book: it is intended for the general public, does not include formulas, is interspersed with cartoons and humorous gossip, but it also has simple explanations of the field concept and quantum field theory. Falk's book does not include such explanations.

In his speech about the particle accelerators, the author writes: "Perhaps one is asked to assume that in order to discover these tiny particles, tiny devices were also required - but the opposite is true" (149). But why is it asked to assume that there is a direct relationship between the size of the observation device and the size of the observed object? Is an electron microscope with which you can observe smaller molecules than a normal optical microscope with which you observe dust grains or bacteria? The smaller the object, the more complex and sophisticated technology is required to detect it. Therefore, what the author says "may be asked to assume" is completely unfounded.

The author jumps to the "standard model" that is currently at the forefront of particle physics, when he skips the previous step that led to this model. This phase was developed by Mary Gal-Man and Yuval Na'eman and is called the "Eight Way", after the two eighths of the particles - the thugs and the mezons - that starred in it. Some have compared the way of eight to Mendeleev's periodic table which could be used to predict the existence of new chemical elements. And indeed the greatest achievement of this theory was predicting the existence of the omega minus particle with great accuracy. But the most important thing is that this theory led to quarks - the elementary particles that are the basis of today's standard model.

The author draws a parallel between fermions, which are particles of matter, and bosons, which are the particles that "mediate" between the fermions and carry the forces between them, and heads of state and ambassadors who pass messages between them (151). This acceptance is not accurate. The status of heads of state is much higher than that of ambassadors, while the bosons do not merely convey messages but determine the nature of the forces between the Fermions.

The question arises: why "despite its revolutionary nature, quantum theory never ignited the public imagination the way relativity did in those first decades of the 20th century"? (156). One of the reasons the author gives for this is that relativity is the work of a single thinker while quantum theory is the work of many thinkers over many years. He adds and says that this theory is "even further from the human experience" - more than the theory of relativity. These things can be interpreted as follows. Quantum physics is far from the human experience because it involves experiments that create physical conditions that are far from those that prevail in the natural environment in which the human race evolved. In these experiments, the physicists measure, for example, sub-microscopic distances or invest very high energies. The human race developed in an environment where such extreme conditions do not prevail and therefore did not develop the ability to adapt to these environmental conditions. Science is the tool with which man expands his ability to orientate himself in extreme conditions, far from the "human experience". Therefore, only scientists who belong to the scientific collective and use the conceptual tools developed by it can navigate the world picture of quantum physics. This is a possible interpretation according to the author that quantum physics is incomprehensible to the "intelligent hobbyist" and a scientist engaged in this field becomes "an even more wonderful figure, but also distinguished from the rest of humans as if he belonged to a different species". However, this wonderful figure is not the lone scientist but the scientist as part of a community. Indeed, according to the evolutionary picture of science, science can be seen as a new breed, or species, that developed at the cultural level out of the human race.

The author ends the chapter on quantum physics with a feeling of "qualified success" and disappointment that we have not yet arrived at a unified theory that simply explains everything. However, there is no place for this disappointment if we adopt the evolutionary view that science progresses by way of improvisation and tossing and not by planning in advance. Then the idea of ​​the unified theory also drops from the chapter. Indeed, "the standard model is too baroque, too Byzantine, to be a comprehensive and satisfactory picture", as the former director of the most famous research center in particle physics (156) says. Now we are in the "Baroque-Byzantine" period and maybe in the future a more compact picture will develop. According to such a view we will never arrive at a final theory that will explain everything, just as there will never be a "final" species that is highly adaptive. The human race can also continue to develop at the technological-scientific level.

String theory is the closest to the idea of ​​the unified theory, but there are still no experimental tests to confirm it. Here comes the author and blurts out some trite, unfocused and imprecise statements concerning the philosophy of science. He claims that "theories that contradict the results of the experiments eventually find their way to the dustbin of history". However, this is an inaccurate claim. Sometimes the theory contradicts some experimental findings and the scientists continue to hold to it. Sometimes the theory is temporarily abandoned and then comes back in a big way. The concept of refutation is not sharp and a theory can always be maintained if some auxiliary assumptions are changed. Here the author cites a quote from the philosopher of science Bas Van Prasen who claims that scientific theories "are born into a life of fierce competition, into a predatory and cruel jungle" - and only those that match the results of experiments survive (182). This is a nutshell expression of the evolutionary concept of science. The author therefore tells the story of science in a broader context when he incorporates in his review a glimpse of the philosophy of science. This glimpse goes a little beyond the framework of journalistic gossip.

When a theory seems elegant or mathematically beautiful, sometimes people continue to hold on to it even when it is apparently disproven or encounters difficulties. And the author is right in his claim that mathematical beauty cannot be accurately characterized and that the standard for beauty is not always shared by all scientists. The author gives examples of scientists who talked about the beauty of their equations. He quotes, for example, Dirac who claims that "it is more important that the equations have beauty than that they correspond to the results of experiments" (183). And it is true that Dirac believed in his equation because of the mathematical beauty he found in it even though it predicted the existence of a particle that was not found. It was only a few years later that this particle was discovered. That is, mathematical beauty can be used as a measure of truth or proximity to truth. Similarly, when the author comes to string theory, he quotes the words of a physicist who deals with this theory that it is "the most beautiful and consistent structure we have". And now it remains to wait and see if her predictions will really be as successful as the Dirac equation predictions were. And the author concludes: "It cannot be denied that theories endowed with beauty have a proven history of more impressive performances than 'ugly' theories..." (184). If we ask the broader question why mathematics is so suitable for describing nature, the answer can be found in the evolutionary theory which claims that the human cognitive mechanism is the product of natural selection and is therefore suitable for its natural environment. Mathematics is a product of this mechanism and is therefore suitable for describing nature. The standard model has been very successful in experiments, but the theory is not considered particularly beautiful because it has many free parameters. It is therefore to be expected that it will be replaced by a more elegant and economical theory, for example string theory. But the latter is still too speculative.

When the author discusses the concept of beauty, he cites the words of the philosopher James McAllister who "puts forward the hypothesis that unconsciously, our perception of aesthetic beauty is dictated by the success of a certain theory in the field: if we came to know that its predictions about nature are correct, eventually it will be perceived in our consciousness as a beauty ” (189). However, according to this, the standard model can be considered good because it is successful "in the field". And basically, any theory can be adapted to experience through ad hoc changes. In that case, will it always be considered kippa? The beauty of a theory lies in its simplicity and other non-objective factors. For example, in adapting it to an accepted worldview. Success "in the field" cannot be considered a measure of beauty. The opposite is true: if the theory fits the facts nicely, then it will be considered successful.

In the last chapter, the author returns to dealing with topics from the field of philosophy of science. He discusses the issue of realism. and listed nine different approaches to the subject. And adds to that the names of nine physicists and philosophers who have a position in relation to realism (204). Stephen Hawking, for example, expresses an instrumentalist or anti-realist position - accepted by many physicists. The author refers to the extreme anti-realist view - "social constructivism" - as "the strangest breed" of anti-realism. According to this view, "we do not discover quarks and quasars but invent them" (205). The social constructivists "believe that science is nothing more than a series of beliefs arising from the cultures of the scientists who weave them". The author agrees that scientists are indeed influenced by their cultural environment, but this does not mean that their discoveries are social products and nothing else. And he adds a quote from the philosopher James Robert Brown: "The personal view affects the direction of the research, but not the facts themselves." But what does "the facts themselves" mean? Are these facts without a hint of cultural influence? It has been a long time since most philosophers of science think that "the facts themselves" are objective. They are influenced by the "culture of science", that is, by the scientific worldview that prevails at a given moment.

Finally, the author moves on to discuss the question of the limits of human reason. He quotes the physicist and author John Barrow as saying that "it is certainly conceivable that the universe does not run on tracks that correspond to human intuition, ... the universe may be ... chaotic and completely irrational in general, but it is possible that here and there there are enclaves of rationality..." (217 ). However, this question has the following answer: after the big bang, the symmetry in the universe was maximal. After that the universe gradually cooled and the symmetry was broken and today we are in the conditions in which evolution took place and is taking place. Our cognitive mechanism is the product of evolution and therefore it must be assumed that it is suitable for orientation in the evolutionary environment because the unsuitable mutations do not survive. Therefore, contrary to Barrow's words, the universe indeed "runs on tracks that correspond to human intuition". Therefore "we may finally conclude that the scientific activity is related to the requirements of our neurobiological system". And as the author points out, this opinion is in line with Immanuel Kant's words that "our intellect imposes structures on the raw data that we absorb through our senses". And this neurobiological system is the basis of our cognitive mechanism.

The author writes: "Our biological structure may limit our ability to understand. We are equipped, after all, with finite brains that weigh about three-quarters of a kilogram, and which have evolved to help us survive in the African savannah and have hardly changed during the last 100,000 years" (223). However, the author does not take into account the collaborative nature of science, which relies on the activity of many thousands of interconnected minds. That is, the collective scientific mind is immeasurably superior in its cognitive ability over the mind of the individual scientist. Most of the physicists the author talked to believe that we are not approaching the limits of human understanding. They certainly do not mean the understanding of a single scientist.

The last chapter of the book discusses the question of how we will know whether we have arrived at the final theory, if indeed there is one. To this end, quotes from some of the greatest philosophers of science and physicists in the 20th century are given. For Popper there is no final theory and progress is a way of solving problems that leads to the appearance of new deeper and more general problems. Einstein expresses a similar opinion, but the author ignores that his ambition to reach the uniform field theory contradicts this opinion, since this theory is supposed to be the final theory. He adds and says about the final theory that "it is quite possible that to formulate such a theory it will take another genius on the level of Newton..." The question arises why he does not also mention Einstein? Newton united terrestrial and celestial mechanics, while Einstein aspired to find a final theory that would unite gravitation with the electromagnetic field, after the emergence and confirmation of general relativity. There is no reason to prefer one over the other.

In conclusion, this book mainly brings the story of natural philosophers and scientists from ancient times to the present day and deals less with the content of their ideas.

The article was first published in the Spring 2007 issue of Catharsis journal: Journal of criticism in the humanities and social sciences. This journal is published by Carmel Publishing. The priests: Yohanan Glocker, Alon Harel, Doron Mendels, Yehuda Friedlander.

The article was published in the spring of 2007