Can anybody explain the relevance of cosmology and astrophysics to societal progress? I'm sure these are very worthwhile fields of study in other respects.. but societal progress?
Careful observation of the orbit of Mercury —> Special Relativity —> General Relativity —> GPS satellites able to keep exact time —> the map app on your mobile phone.
That it was able to explain Mercury's orbit was a nice bit of empirical confirmation after the theory was developed. Having such evidence probably helped get the theory accepted faster; but probably wasn't necessary. Almost by definition, a theory that is ultimately useful can be confirmed without need of astronomy. If the theory is useful to do X, then we can try doing X as an experiment and see if it works how the theory predicts.
As a secondary point, we could probably get GPS to work even without relativity. The core idea makes just as much sense under any theory of a finite speed of light. When we actually launched a GPS constellation and try it, the engineers would notice that the clocks were drifting for some unknown reason. Some ad-hoc corrections later and the engineers could account for the drift based on empirical evidence, likely with regular re synchronization and recalibration of the fudge factors.
What special relativity did was solve the purely theoretical contradictions between Newtonian mechanics and Maxwell's electrodynamics (hence the title of Einstein's paper "On the electrodynamics of moving bodies"), reinterpreting Lorentz' math for the description of movement through the ether as transformations of spacetime itself and doing away with the ether.
There is a myth of Einstein that just isn't credible, which is that Einstein, while working as a patent clerk just came up with Special Relativity out of the blue without anyone's input, without the benefit of history.
But Special Relativity was in the air. Henri Poincare was already writing about relativity, and so were others in years previous to Einstien's publication. If Einstein hadn't published when he did, someone else would have within a few years at best.
Einstein was amazing, also, just a man, but definitely was not the myth taught to us in elementary school, like Abe Lincoln carrying an ax, these are childish and frankly false ideas. Einstein stood on the shoulders of giants, and there was massive amounts of empirical evidence for Special Relativity going back thousands of years, really, billions.[1]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_special_relativity
Heroes, such as Einstein, are good in that they motivate certain people, me included, to go into natural sciences, but once you start grasping more of historical context of scientific breakthroughs you begin to wonder why some scientists were elevated to that rank in general public's mind.
I would say that this is some kind of PR type selection. It's natural that general public is aware of science communicators (amongs other things) like Carl Sagan, Jacob Bronowski or Neil deGrasse Tyson, but it is interesting that they wouldn't know as much about Lorenz, Poincare or Riemann, even though they have played significant roles in Special and General Relativity developments.
There seems to be a preference for scientists that deal with more concrete problems, easier to understand in a very generic way (Cosmology seems to be a good pick).
Also particular personal struggle like in Hawking's case or personality (Feynman comes to mind).
So it is easier to talk about black holes and expanding universe (Hawking, Einstein) than abstract mathematics with none/loose/difficult to grasp connection to reality (Poincare, Riemann). Outside CS it might even be rare for people to know about Von Neumann.
I wonder from current generation of scientists who will be remembered and what would be a reason behind it.
There seems to be a requirement for some form of mystic atmosphere around a person in order to be talked about.
I don't know how it was in Riemann's, Einstein's or Feynman's times, but today, most of the actual original research in sciences and math (and CS) is done not by the big prof but by the lower tiers, all the way down to PhD students. Those are doing the footwork, write the papers, work long hours with ridiculous pay. Sure you need some visionary at the top, but the actual results are not produced by those.
Everybody is well aware that Elon Musk didn't personally build the first Tesla or the first SpaceX rocket. But big theorems or theories are still named after by the big prof instead of the person who actually did the work.
For general relativity, yes.
> My understanding was that experimental impetus for relativity was the Michelson–Morley experiment
This was one of the results that pointed the way to special relativity. It had nothing to do with general relativity.
> General relativity was then developed on a purely theoretical basis.
No, it wasn't. There was a huge body of experimental evidence already about gravity. It was true that all of that evidence, except for the anomalous precession of Mercury's perihelion, could be explained by Newtonian gravity; but general relativity, as a proposed new theory of gravity, had to also account for all of that experimental evidence. In other words, in the appropriate limiting case (weak fields and low speeds compared to the speed of light), general relativity had to reproduce all of the correct predictions of Newtonian gravity. That was a huge, and very important, experimental constraint.
> Almost by definition, a theory that is ultimately useful can be confirmed without need of astronomy.
Not if the differences between its predictions and the predictions of the previous theory (in this case Newtonian gravity) are only measurable in astronomical observations at the time the new theory is proposed. That was true of general relativity in 1915 and for at least a couple of decades afterwards. The differences between GR and Newtonian gravity for earthbound experiments were simply too small for the technology of the time to measure. So astronomical observations were the only way to test GR when it was proposed.
> we could probably get GPS to work even without relativity
Technology can of course be developed on a purely empirical basis, if you're prepared to make a lot of mistakes along the way that you wouldn't make without a good theoretical foundation. If it hadn't been for the knowledge of relativity on the part of the scientists involved, the GPS satellites probably would have been launched without any capability for adjusting their clock rates. Which would have meant that, once clock rate drift due to relativistic effects was seen, there would have been no way to adjust for it. So those satellites would have become expensive but useless toys, and a new constellation of satellites would have had to be built and launched.
Yes. I assumed that reproducing Newtonian gravity in the classical limit would be considered theoretical, as we had a solid theoretical understanding of Newtonian physics. Implicit in that would be a bunch of empirical evidence; but Einstein wouldn't need to explicitly think about the details of what evidence supported Newtonian mechanics (beyond the general understanding that it was all in the classical limit).
> Not if the differences between its predictions and the predictions of the previous theory (in this case Newtonian gravity) are only measurable in astronomical observations at the time the new theory is proposed.
Such a theory is not "useful", for many definitions of useful. Astronomical observations allowed us to verify Relativity earlier than we otherwise would be able to; but eventually technology advanced to the point where we could conduct satellite based experiments to directly confirm it. The theory was not practically useful until we had this technology.
> Technology can of course be developed on a purely empirical basis, if you're prepared to make a lot of mistakes along the way that you wouldn't make without a good theoretical foundation. If it hadn't been for the knowledge of relativity on the part of the scientists involved, the GPS satellites probably would have been launched without any capability for adjusting their clock rates.
Its not like we launched the entire GPS constellation then just hoped it would work. Before launching the GPS constellation, we launched the experimental Timation satellites to act as a proof of concept. Difficulties with maintaining accurate clocks in orbit would have been noticed then (if not sooner).
GR itself is a classical (i.e., non-quantum) theory. The Newtonian limit of GR is not usually considered a "classical" limit, just a weak field, slow motion limit.
> would be considered theoretical
Ok, then we just have different definitions of "theoretical". To me, having to account for a mass of experimental data is an experimental constraint. It might be easier for a theory to meet it if the theory can be shown to reduce in an appropriate limit to a previous theory that accounts for all that data.
By contrast, for researchers investigating possible quantum theories of gravity, any quantum constraints on their theories can only be theoretical, since we have no experimental data at all on quantum aspects of gravity. But to me, the fact that a quantum theory of gravity has to account for all of the classical experimental data on gravity is an experimental constraint (which any such theory would presumably meet by reducing to GR in the classical limit).
> Such a theory is not "useful", for many definitions of useful.
No theory is useful for all definitions of useful.
> Before launching the GPS constellation, we launched the experimental Timation satellites to act as a proof of concept.
As I understand it, the Timation satellites did not keep independent time using clocks aboard the satellites. They just re-broadcast time signals from the ground. One of the major difficulties with getting GPS operational was the additional complexity involved in having independent clocks on the satellites that would keep their own time, with only periodic updates from the ground. And one of the major issues with that was that many non-scientists involved in the GPS project did not understand relativity and did not believe that the "natural" clock rates of the clocks on the satellites would be different from those of ground clocks, so some kind of adjustment would have to be made. And there was no data from previous projects to convince them since the relative clock rates of previous satellites vs. ground clocks had not been measured. If the non-scientists in the GPS project had not given in to the scientists who wanted to include the capability for adjusting the clock frequency in the initial set of GPS satellites, those satellites would indeed have been useless.
I mean the original context is societal contribution, so getting something import understood faster I think counts, no?
I wished everyone would read "Law, Legislation & Liberty" by Hayek, where he criticizes people who think systems, like economy, work like an organization. That is, that one can through rational planning and arrangement achieve some goal. That is NOT how markets, economy, society etc. works. That is of course an attack on the utilitarian principles.
Only uneducated minds could fall into the trap of thinking in exploitative utilitarian ways about everything, including themselves by self-abusive through productivity obsession. This discussion could not be more US American.
I do think particle theory probably does push knowledge forward, the problem is it is quite a bit further from something that can be tested, it is more akin to mathematics these days where they're not really trying to describe reality because as she says, susy and friends could be morphed to fit anything. In fact, and this might be a stretch, but I feel like there is a motivation not to have predictions sometimes because then you could be proven wrong. Perhaps this is still "pushing knowledge in general forward" as opposed to knowledge that actually describes reality, similar to mathematics perhaps.
Not really related to societal progress, but the difference between particle theory with mathematics is mathematicians are actually rigorous while particle physicists get by with the usual lack of rigor (relatively) of physics in general. The argument usually employed by theorists in other physics fields is that this lack of rigor is okay because physics is science and you could always do an experiment afterwards to validate theory. Particle physics less and less has that, so, where does it sit? I feel like may be a valid path forward is for particle physicists to embrace that they are no longer really doing science and are rather doing mathematics, and probably to even adopt some of the rigor of mathematics, then particle theory could really bloom into a really valuable field of study on the "pushing general knowledge forward" side of things.
It’s become a bottomless trap of sorts.
Given that resources—money and bright minds—aren’t infinite, she then proposes that there are other areas of research that received less attention and are ripe for discovery.
Those days have ended.
There never was a golden age of interoperability on the internet, at least not after HTTP. Maybe there was a lot of cooperation when it was purely academic in the late 70s and 80s. BBS operators often were cooperative. But commercial internet has always and forever been cutthroat.
But why you brought this up in a discussion about the invention of the web, I have no idea.
Just because TBL happened to work at CERN and have a need for hypermedia, doesn't mean that we wouldn't have the WWW in approximately the same shape in approximately the same time frame without CERN or TBL.
[1] http://www.art.net/studios/Hackers/Hopkins/Don/hyperlook/ind...
[2] https://donhopkins.medium.com/hyperlook-nee-hypernews-nee-go... (with screen shots)
[3] https://libarynth.org/hyperlook (larger screenshots)
based on
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NeWS
running atop of whatever, maybe even
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRON_project
&
[6] http://tronweb.super-nova.co.jp/homepage.html
instead of the bloat we have now.
And that's important to keep in mind because money is a limited resource and what's relevant is where that money didn't go rather than just speaking idealistically about the potential benefits of a megaproject.
Also not sure where you got the 23 billions from. Total budget for LHC is less than 8 billion euros. And that's over quite a long time frame. The whole CERN budget is only 1.1 billion a year (and they run quite a few different experiments apart from the LHC). That's within a factor of a few of a major sports club!
This is extremely false. The new engineering science required to make the incredibly strong magnets for each collider (newer colliders requiring stronger magnets) is one obvious counterexample.
(BTW, with 100k, in experimental physics, you can't even pay for a postdoc at an US institution for a year)
That shouldn't mean NASA should get less money. But 23 billion for a world-wide, multi-decade project isn't that much.
I’ve heard that, yes, as well as NASA inventing velcro and zippers and teflon, and all of it has a faint tinge of “not actually true at all” to it.
What they do seem to question what immediate, house hold, benefit you get from putting people on the moon. Common examples such as vecro and teflon turn out to be wild hyperbole based on at most "NASA made their own version of existing technology".
This is a fair remark and something I actually had in mind when I made the comment originally: science doesn't provide very much direct and immediate benefit, all the concrete examples are actually sort of boring things of the "this existing thing is now better (for a surprising reason)" type.
But there are also lots of indirect benefits as you say, from the inspiration and philosophical satisfaction (tricky thing to put a monetary value on) to just the plain old developing of technical skill that transfers to other specialised areas of society.
No, not since World War 2. Examples?
Out of (off-topic) curiosity, what is the reason for that choice of life style? Just minimalism?
https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/536/voyager-1s-pale-b...
The effect is more psychological than technological, but it shows the foolishness of global warfare and resource exhaustion in the name of short-term profit, and encourages people to live together peacefully and work together to solve global-scale problems.
Hey, guess what? It didn't work. Have you read the news lately?
Besides, I know a few sociopaths that would look at that Pale Blue Dot and think "I want it all".
https://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_is_the_world_getting...
But can a dataset really encapsulate human suffering? Is there a lower percent of people suffering but are they each suffering more individually? What is the quality of the suffering? Is it better to suffer 30 years with pain or to die after a month of it?
Yes
> Is there a lower percent of people suffering but are they each suffering more individually?
No
> What is the quality of the suffering?
Lower
> Is it better to suffer 30 years with pain or to die after a month of it?
Depends on quality of life.
> Yes
Suffering its subjective so it is impossible. And you proved it with:
> Depends on quality of life.
because quality of life depends on how much suffering you can live with.
It is like asking artists what the benefit on society is, it does not make sense to ask that question in that context, because it is not about exploiting something for a moment in time for some purpose which is supposedly "progress".
I think Sabine is way overdoing her position for marketing purposes and everyone is biting..
What is "societal progress" anyway? I'd argue that society is regressing, not progressing. I'd further argue that the worth of your pursuits and endeavors have no relation to the progression or regression of society at large.
1) Direct means: this is stuff like finding helium in the sun, and from there being able to see its signature and find it elsewhere (we can say this for other atoms and molecules too). Stopping nuclear war, due to tracking the proper origin (and providing an explanation) of the source of gamma bursts. Studying reactions in nature and then attempting to replicate them on earth (fusion is an obvious example but there are others). These tend to be kinda weak if we don't include things like justification to go to space, which is iffy either way.
2) Indirect means: These are probably providing the most value. This is pretty true for any advance science though. When you're pushing the extremes of our knowledge you have to invent new things to measure and test. You might say that these could be built by industry, but the thing is that these are often extremely expensive. So one can also think of science as a means for governments to inject innovation into their economies. You need to detect a star really far away? Well you're going to also be building cutting edge mirrors, radio instruments, and other things. Want to detect gravitational waves? You got to write code that is really good at detecting noise and differentiating a signal that is smaller than fp64 precision. These all have huge benefits. The science becomes public and as these things are being invented papers are being written and industry is able to learn from these challenges and transfer the lessons learned to their own applications, which dramatically reduces R&D costs. Additionally, a lot of mathematical frameworks and tools are build out of this (I was considering putting this under #1). These maths apply far beyond a specific problem. You might find things like how to do fast QR decomposition or signal analysis.
I'll add a bit to #2 too. You might ask why not push that money into industries. Well there's a few reasons. First, science is exploratory by nature. You may have no idea about all the challenges you're going to face and all the things you need when undertaking big projects like these (that's why there's constant delays). I mean we got the internet out of a problem like this with CERN. Second off, scientists don't give a shit about industry (well not to the same degree). They say that happiness is worth 10 IQ points. If you've ever talked to scientists in a big lab they will nerd out on you. It is exciting just exploring what makes the universe and us. Maybe it is just my degree in physics, but I also think there's something poetic to trying to understand the environment around us. Does everything have to have a direct monetary value? What's wrong about learning for the sake of learning? Also, sometimes the return on investment on science is hundreds of years, but it does seem to always pay dividends.
What I'm saying here is essentially "idle hands are the devil's playground." Keeping wonks fascinated by the minutae of the nature of the universe is, in my mind, better for society than many alternatives I see.