[an0malous]

If we had a machine today with unlimited intelligence could it figure out a cure for cancer with our currently available data, or would it just request more data and ask us to conduct more studies? Is the bottleneck our ability to recognize patterns in the current data (i.e. intelligence) or the lack of sufficient data to determine a pattern? Or is it some other more nebulous thing that we aren’t considering?

[bee_rider]

IIRC this question is complicated by the fact that there are many types of cancer. There are probably some in either category.

[fc417fc802]

A gross understatement. In approximate terms, cancer is any time cell proliferation goes off the rails. More possibilities than you can shake a stick at.

A bit like asking how close are we to being able to fix electronic devices that have lost their magic smoke.

[an0malous]

Ok, pick one charitably. Is there any type of cancer whose cure could be found with an unlimited amount of intelligence but only the currently available data?

[jiggawatts]

I’m personally convinced that at least for physics we have sufficient data for the next big theoretical breakthrough and we lack only the imagination and the computer power required to numerically validate the maths through simulations.

It feels an awful lot like the decade before Einstein’s landmark papers on quantum mechanics and relativity.

Watch how people like Terrence Tao et al are transforming how mathematics is done: with AI assistance and the Lean theorem prover, at a level of collaboration and consistency never before possible.

Something similar is just around the corner for the other sciences, the ability to mechanise the integration of vast tracts of previously disconnected facts and insights.

Surely something of value will pop out of the result…

[catlifeonmars]

Physics research is not particularly in a state of stagnation, so I’m not really sure what you mean by the “next big theoretical breakthrough”.

[jiggawatts]

I firmly disagree:

No new successful fundamental theory has even gotten off the ground since the Standard Model, which is half a century old at this point.

Our understanding of gravity hasn’t improved substantially in a century. String Theory is dead, stop whipping it. Other quantum gravity theories each have one proponent going in circles futilely looking for a big breakthrough that never comes.

Superconductivity was discovered 115 years ago and we still don’t understand it! We’re “finding” new HT materials by accident and then attempting to explain how they work. Nobody can figure out how to predict a new one, ab initio.

Our understanding of the universe is improving only in the sense that we’re now more certain that we don’t know much at all about: its early history, far future, present behavior of gravity, or its content.

I’m not aware of any “sea change” akin to the scale and scope of QM or GR in many decades despite clear need for one.

Physics has stagnated for a long time now.

My conspiracy theory is that there has been a brain drain into the finance industry, but that doesn’t explain everything.

[bonsai_spool]

> No new successful fundamental theory has even gotten off the ground since the Standard Model, which is half a century old at this point.

How long has scientific inquiry about physics been going on? In that frame, is 50 years a long time or a short time?

This feels a bit like the perspective of a non-specialist with access to the findings that end up in the popular press vs. things that are discussed at conferences/in journals.

[jiggawatts]

The volume of journal papers published isn't well-correlated with progress, sadly.

I have a physics degree and I regularly read the latest published research. Please don't make ad hominem attacks.

> How long has scientific inquiry about physics been going on? In that frame, is 50 years a long time or a short time?

Unlike all other sciences, on a long horizon, eventually Physics will be "completely solved", with no more fundamentals to discover, only applications, which are generally considered other sciences or engineering. We far from achieving this end-state.

The point is that we made giant strides every few years for decades, and then... nothing. The field has hardly advanced since the 1970s!

[bonsai_spool]

> I have a physics degree and I regularly read the latest published research. Please don't make ad hominem attacks.

It was not an attack, I just don't know the authority from which your comments derive (and there wasn't really evidence provided outside your opinion which I think others disagree with).

> The point is that we made giant strides every few years for decades, and then... nothing. The field has hardly advanced since the 1970s!

I think my subtle argument is that we've been writing for about 4,000 years, so something discovered in the last 50 years is relatively new.

Even limiting yourself to the current era of post-Enlightenment inquiry, 50 years is still relatively new.

Separately, if you truly accept that physics is completely knowable, then it would stand to reason that as we asymptotically approach knowing 'everything', the marginal rate of acquiring new knowledge would slow.

So I guess I don't see which way you are leaning - are we not learning things because we know everything, or are we being impatient and not recognizing how fast our progress has been?

[wasabi991011]

You are still mainly describing fundamental physics and cosmology, with superconducting tacked on.

But there's been tons of advances in experimental physics, biophysics, quantum sensing, condensed matter, topological materials, computational methods especially tensor networks like DMRG, quantum information, astrophysics, and probably many more I'm forgetting.

There's really not that much need for a sea change except for the areas you mention that get a lot of attention.

I know a lot of current physics are being built on QM, because it is a solid foundation with tons to explore. Just because interpretations of QM is hard to probe doesn't mean there's not a ridiculous amount of applications to progress through.

[catlifeonmars]

I think what you mean to say is select topics in specific fields in physics have stagnated. Possibly because they are not necessarily the most interesting fields of study. Astrophysics is doing just fine, as one counter example.

[jiggawatts]

> Astrophysics is doing just fine, as one counter example.

I would argue that almost all of that is due to improvements in instrumentation that have lead to no new fundamental theories with wide acceptance. If anything, several older theories are now being increasingly questioned, but with no viable alternatives. (Or too many viable alternatives.)

However, there have been many "medium sized" astrophysics theoretical achievements in recent decades, which puts astrophysics head and shoulders above much of the rest of physics.

I.e.: we now better understand the theory of elemental synthesis and can account for the origins of the entire periodic table, which is research from this century. That's pretty decent chunk of fundamental knowledge that we've acquired only recently!

[giardini]

jiggawatts says >"My conspiracy theory is that there has been a brain drain into the finance industry, but that doesn’t explain everything."<

If the top brains went into the finance industry wouldn't we by now have better theories of how an economy works? Prediction in economics seems far poorer than in physics.

Or perhaps economics is inherently a much more difficult problem than physics?