Monkeys do not die as lizards - part 9

This week, i read an interesting Nature paper (https://rdcu.be/c2Wf9) about the decline in innovation across the sciences. The authors (Park, M., Leahey, E. & Funk, R.J) conclude that scientific papers are becoming less and less disruptive over the last 70 years and they give a number of reasons for this decline, like the increasing amount of knowledge that one has to muster in order to advance to the frontier of a given field. Or like the trend to only enhance small patches of specialized knowledge.?I feel that i can add another possible cause.

In my latest book called "Monkeys do not die as lizards" i argue that there are a number of causes for stagnation in physics (my book is about physics only). Foremost are the characteristics of dominant contemporary theories themselves. In physics, we have the Standard Model and Quantum Theory as dominating theories. These theories, i find, have intrinsic methodological flaws, causing stagnation.

In my book i try and direct the attention of the reader to these methodological flaws. I define for example a "theoretical bridge", connecting so called experimental "input events" and "output events", thus explaining and/or predicting how input and output events are related. These theoretical bridges can contain mathematical concepts as well as ontological concepts. The last type creates references to real world phenomena. I propose, as a good methodological practice, to use the shortest theoretical bridges possible and to prefer ontological concepts over mathematical concepts.

As an example, one can argue that waves at the seashore are created by the friction between moving air and streaming water. This is a fairly short ontological bridge between the motions of air and water (as input events) and the creation of waves (as an output event). Now we can zoom in on the friction proces and describe what happens there. A more modern explanation could be that there is a water-vector creating waves as part of a wave-matrix, containing a set of spatial correlated air-water-states. This second explanation only contains abstract mathematical notions that do not refer to any real world phenomenon. We could nevertheless calculate the height of the waves with such a theoretical bridge. What is worrying to me, is that there is nothing to zoom in on anymore. Exploration then takes on the form of creating ever more complex and more refined mathematical bridges. No real innovation anymore. There we have a root cause for stagnation.

In physics, almost any contemporary paper contains long theoretical bridges with almost no ontological concepts. More and more papers contain purely mathematical bridges only. And then, if there is some sort of confirmation through experiment, all the concepts in such a mathematical bridge, like quarks and virtual particles, are thought to be "real". In my book, i go at great length to explain this trend.

I consider this methodology (or lack there-off) flawed in many ways. Theories become shielded against critique. Their concepts lay more and more outside of experimental falsification. The most disturbing consequence of this is that many concepts, like the "Higgs boson", are regarded as real phenomena. Mainstream physicists expect any new theory to incorporate their existence. Meanwhile, there is nothing real about a Higgs boson. It is just a highly questionable part of a complex mathematical bridge, like the many virtual particles in Quantum Mechanics are. To ask of new theories to replicate these figments of human imagination is a clear recipe for stagnation.

I, Peter Schuttevaar, have a truly disruptive idea. I can build all particles of nature with only one fundamental particle, having an intrinsic speed. I can show the calculations. They match with a broad set of experimental facts. It is all in my book. But no journal had the courage to publish these ideas because it is too disruptive, too risky to them and too confronting for their readers.?They can keep me at a distance quite easily because i cannot (and will not) reproduce such non-events like quarks or the Higgs boson.

Peter Schuttevaar

Feel free to download a free pdf copy of my book at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.20733877.v1 and share this link freely with your peers. Or order the book at divers internet outlets....