The Conservatism of Hiring a Theory Physicist

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You don't get a lot of chances at the prize, okay? You have to hire someone. When you hire them, you might very well be stuck with them as colleagues for the next four decades. And so it would be nice to take some chances, take a shot here and there,. But there is a natural conservatism that creeps in because you don't have that many chances to hire a theoretical physicist.

Physics is in crisis, what else is new? That's what we hear in certain corners, anyway, usually pointed at "fundamental" physics of particles and fields. (Condensed matter and biophysics etc. are just fine.) In this solo podcast I ruminate on the unusual situation fundamental physics finds itself in, where we have a theoretical understanding that fits almost all the data, but which nobody believes to be the final answer. I talk about how we got here, and argue that it's not really a "crisis" in any real sense. But there are ways I think the academic community could handle the problem better, especially by making more space for respectable but minority approaches to deep puzzles.

Blog post with transcript: https://www.preposterousuniverse.com/podcast/2023/07/31/245-solo-the-crisis-in-physics/

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