New findings about proton size could shake up physics as we know it

It's nice to get a reminder once in a while that science isn't just papers and publishing and long tedious experimentation. Science may not be exactly what I idealized as a kid, but there's still a place and a use for boxes filled with green lasers.

And that makes a part of me very happy.

The hope of physicists is to be able to find a theory that combines the two. Because they fundamentally disagree, we know that one or both, probably both, are both somewhat wrong, but we don't have any idea how and where the theories begin to fall apart. Therefore if we can find experiments which show problems, then we can get insight on what the problems are with the theory, and hopefully that will lead us to a better theory.

To draw a parallel, in the late 1800s it looked like physics was nearly done. The big problems were solved. The remaining discrepancies were small. And of what practical use was it to know more about the movement of light, why black body radiation didn't look like what theory said it should, and whether there was really such a thing as atoms? Yet the answers to those few small puzzles lead to world changing discoveries from nuclear power to transistors.

Nobody can tell you what is left to discover. Nobody can guess the power of unknown scientific theories. But through history, science has proved its worth repeatedly in outside proportions. Isn't the hope that this could happen again worth at least some resources?