I just returned from a vacation and caught up with this thread, so please bear with me as I back up to the central question posed by Marta Bunge. She suggested that
anything which even remotedly claims to have applications to physics (particularly string theory) is given (what I view as) uncritical support in our circles.
Is there any evidence to support this claim? I.e., actual examples where such research was disproportionally supported that was uncritical and perhaps unwarranted? There have been several posts seemingly agreeing that this is the case, but none have given concrete evidence. I feel that it is necessary to establish that such practices indeed exist, before discussing what, if anything, needs to be done about it. Can one rule out another possibility, namely that such research is supported because it is original, timely, and interesting? -- Peter Marta Bunge wrote:
Robert Dawson wrote:
It is not clear to me that the majority of theoretical physicists agree with the negative view of categorical string theory held by the cited blog writers; and in the absence of a consensus among the physicists, I for one (with an undergradate degree and some graduate courses in physics) do not feel qualified to take sides; if anything, errors should be on the side of trying out too many ideas, not too few.
I was trying to elicit an open response from those who *do* know about the value (or lack of it) of categorical string theory. In particular, I would like to have an answer to this question. Why is it that anything which even remotedly claims to have applications to physics (particularly string theory) is given (what I view as) uncritical support in our circles?
Best, Marta