9 February 2011

Fed up with supersymmetry

In a recent posting somewhere, a string theorist answered the question how string theory could be disproved experimentally. He did not answer: by not finding supersymmetry, or by lack of hints for higher dimensions, or by showing that dark matter is purely made of black holes, or by showing that the anomaly issue can be solved in other ways. He answered that essentially it is impossible to prove string theory wrong, because it is correct and established. For people like him, string theory is not a description of nature, it has become a mental condition.

It can only be repeated: there is not a shred of experimental evidence for supersymmetry. It is a brainchild of a number of theorists in the 1970s that lacked better ideas. (I do not even mention higher dimensions, which is a false idea whose track record is even worse: it never led anywhere since about 100 years.) Supersymmetry was invented to poke a hole into the Coleman-Mandula theorem, which was seen as a stumbling block to unification by people with too narrow an imagination. But there are dozens of other options to achieve unification. Why are thousands of people still riding the dead horse called supersmmetry? The whole situation is so depressing that is starts being disgusting.

It will not take long and we will have the following multiple choice question: Which one does not fit into the list: Delusional, paranoid, phobic, superstitious, string theorist? And the answer will be: none - all of them live in dream worlds.

1 comment:

  1. I forgot to copy, from the other blog where I posted this, the answer of a male string theorist:

    [...] swine.

    He proved that for him, supersymmetry has indeed become a mental condition.

    ReplyDelete