[BoiledCabbage]

What's more mind-boggling to me is all these thousands of scientists running around looking at the extreme oddity of multi-dimensional string theory, and nobody bothered to check if the cosmological constant is actually real.

It seems like physics is really being held back by perverse incentives.

And of course my pocket view that string theory will turn out to be the single largest waste of brilliant human minds in history.

[eloff]

I'm not a physicist, but I don't think string theory is a total waste. It agrees with our existing theories and predictions, so it can be viewed as just an alternative mathematical abstraction, and there is value in that.

Whether or not tiny vibrating strings are really at the heart of things is neither here nor there. It's about as relevant to science as god.

[tylerjwilk00]

The problem with string theory is that there are limitless physics universes you can create within its framework so saying that ours fits in it is not saying a lot. Many universes could be described by it.