Is string theory dead?

...

Was it ever alive?

>Was it ever alive?
Yeah but string theory has dominated pop-sci bigly.
What do very smart physicists pursue today?

So it was always as good as dead. Good to know.

so being a string theorist is basically like being a mathematician except nothing you do will ever have practical applications, right?

Nope. But the most interesting areas of research are so mathematical that a standard physicist would have no hope of understanding what is going on.

It's like being a mathematician except you never actually prove anything rigorously and your whole theory might actually be inconsistent (lulz)

M-theory is a modification to string theory which Edward whitten suggested the idea string theory and it's five different components were actually people looking at the same prism but from different angles

>"practical"
What are you, a fucking engineer. We don't do science because it's practical, we do it because it's the one thing worth doing.

AS far as I can tell M-Theory is just 11-dim sugra

11d SUGRA is the low energy limit of M-Theory

Same way each of the 5 superstring theories have a 10d SUGRA theory as a low energy limit.

>doodling theories that can never be proven or disproven on a piece of paper that will never have any use besides time wasting
>only thing worth doing
sure friend

>being this much of a pleb

>What do very smart physicists pursue today?
Conformal field theory
Topological quantum field theory
Geometric quantization
Quantum algebra
Quantum integrability
Singularity theory
Twistor theory
tt* geometry
Mirror symmetry

this

String theories.

String "theory" isn't science. It's some interesting speculative math. And it's certainly not a "theory". But that won't prevent mathematicians from strutting around and blowing string "theory" out of their asses and pretending to be scientists and deep and profound for years to come. That's just what they do.

String theory was never really a theory, it was hardly a hypothesis.

you're dead, kiddo

What areas of math do I study to start learning about the cool physics?
t. Physics brainlet

You forgot Loop Quantum Gravity.

Also, not all physicists are focused on the ultra-ultra-microscopic. Condensed matter, superconductivity, and many other fields.

>Yeah but string theory has dominated pop-sci bigly.

Not sure if trolling or just stupid. String theory dominates beyond standard model research. Popsci loves to talk about LQG, E8 or other supposed "alternatives" to string theory, but few of actual researchers take those seriously. If popsci would be any good there would be MORE stringy popsci coverage.

>Condensed matter

There is a significant stream of string theory inspired papers in condensed matter over last decade.

differential geometry is a must and very good as introduction, then it depends but algebraic geometry and algebraic topology both get some use

>LQG
kek, 40 papers on average per year, all from the same 10 authors is active? fuck off with this brainlet abomination that's been debunked over and over again

what do you call this haircut?

The Dirac fade.

...

If all experimental tests of string theory require more energy than can be localized in this universe, then isn't it vacuously true that string theory doesn't apply to our universe?

Sorry in advance for brainletposting

the branelet

>I know nothing about modern theoretical physics now allow me to make a statement and please assume it to be true

QED every framework we have in science isnt anything because it is "speculative math". Both of you are turbo brainlets on the grandest scale.

>What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch?

how quickly do you think i'd be banned if i linked this thread on his blog?

Find out and tell us.

>Loop Quantum Gravity
>ultra-ultra-microscopic
>Condensed matter, superconductivity, and many other fields
Seriously?

Untestable=fantasy. Math lends itself to the creation of valid but non-existent universes. More to the point, the way Lubos combs his hair reeks of failure.

>Theory seeks to explain reality
>Quantum "physicists" now assert the big bang never happened to accomodate their calculations
Really makes you think huh

>Untestable=fantasy
So is most of astronomy pure fantasy now?
>Math lends itself to the creation of valid but non-existent universes
Math can do that, or it can just describe our universe. This depends on the axioms you choose
>More to the point, the way Lubos combs his hair reeks of failure
Not an argument

If it's not subject to physical experiment or at least confirmation by observation, it's:

Not. Science.

Mathematicians pretending to be scientists will revert science back to the middle ages, pre-Novum Organum, pre-scientific method, where things only had to seem logical to be accepted.

Logic and math are great, indispensible tools. But without physical confirmation, they do not add up to science.

Math. Alone. Is. Not. Science.

...

math is quite literally our best science.

Literally speaking, math isn't science at all.

>"I don't understand what a science is"

>So is most of astronomy pure fantasy now?
You can see stars - you can't see extra dimensional mathematical gremlins.
>Math can do that, or it can just describe our universe. This depends on the axioms you choose
That seven headed dragon you defeated in that last video game was perfectly mathematically modeled. Does that make it real?

Not that I don't expect good things to come out of String Theory. Some of our best discoveries have come out of similar mathematical efforts, even when they were running down rabbit holes they knew went no where just to see how far down they went. (One-electron Universe leading to Feynman's path-integral formulation and related Nobel Prize being one good example of many.)

There are certainly better paths to grand unification, but the exploration isn't without inherent value. Even if they do just start moving goalposts, every time we find some way to test the math against reality.

Guys, if you were better at philosophy (the superset within which both math and science are subsets) you'd recognize that semantic debates are pretty much just a waste of time. Yes, math and science are different, but they have plenty of overlap in terms of utility and the focus on the virtues of reason.

Yeah, it's still an incredibly active field of study
You might want to include things like Turbulence and hydrodynamics (and connections with gravity ala strominger's work), non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, applications of Floer homology, and generally trying to understand phase transitions, especially in qcd.

What would you expect from LQG shill.

such passion for sucking cocks, wow!

To stay silent much like their field but apparently lack of meaningful results isn't enough to teach them a lesson.

>t. engineer

t. a hobo with a passion for cocks

not the same user, but please go back to your containment board

actually tell that to a philosopher and they will shit on you and tell you semantics are EVERYTHING