Most Physicists Don't Agree on Most Things

JohnFen•about 4 hours ago

The title is radically untrue. Most physicists agree on the overwhelming majority of physics. The body of the article makes clear that the title is deceptive:

> asking physicists what they actually believe about ten of the most contested questions in physics.

In other words, most physicists don't agree on ten specific questions that have not been settled. That's a tautology and is a very far cry from "most things".

xscott•about 2 hours ago

There's a link you can click to see the personal background of the respondents. It's tough to know what "researcher in a field not listed" means, but it's possible that over 60% are not even physicists:

    30.8% - A researcher in a field not listed above
    21.2% - A science enthusiast
    18.0% - A researcher studying quantum physics
    12.0% - A researcher studying astrophysics or cosmology
     9.2% - A researcher studying gravity
     8.8% - Other

umpalumpaaa•about 3 hours ago

Yeah. And they are contested not because physicists can’t agree but because there is a lack of evidence. With evidence most will agree.

JohnFen•about 1 hour ago

Excellent point. It's a little sad that this has to be explained, but it very often does.

chermi•about 3 hours ago

Trash. When you say "most", your sample should at least pretend to cover the range of "things".

hangsi•about 2 hours ago

It sounds like you might be a physicist who disagrees?

chermi•about 1 hour ago

Yeah. But I think its a little more complicated than my quick dismissal. The headline would be true of any honest field. Both the question and the answer are biasing toward thoughts of controversial things. A better approach would be pre-compilation or "things" irrespective of the activity and public perception, then ask opinion on each. If you only ask about unsettled things, how couldn't there be disagreement? Otherwise they would be settled!

streetfighter64•about 2 hours ago

Surprised at the quick dismissals in the comments here. Of course the title is a bit sensationalist, that's the case for all pop-sci articles. I don't think anybody would reasonably believe physicists disagree about for example Newtonian mechanics. Aren't the following facts still pretty interesting?

> The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics came in at 36%.

> Although it's often reported in the press that the black hole information paradox has been resolved in favour of information preservation, the survey found that 19% of physicists still side with Stephen Hawking's earlier view that information is lost.

To see how the survey is useful, consider the "null hypothesis" so to speak, that a majority of physicists agree that one answer is most likely. Such as the Collatz conjecture from mathematics, where if surveyed, probably around 80% of mathematicians would agree that it's true, even though it's not been settled yet. Clearly this is not the case for most of the ten questions in this survey.

JohnFen•about 1 hour ago

The title isn't a bit sensationalist, it's a straight-up lie. That matters because most people won't actually read the article but will see the title and take it at face value. I see the erroneous title as disparaging to science.

> Aren't the following facts still pretty interesting?

Well, firstly, as another commenter pointed out, it's not clear that the respondents are actually representative of physicists.

But regardless, how interesting it is that those 10 questions are subject to debate depends, I suppose, on how familiar you are with the field of physics. I would feel better about the article if it addressed the same topic with higher quality.

chermi•about 1 hour ago

I'm not surprised by the copenhagen one, but it also isn't really load bearing for most of physics. Not discounting it as a true disagreement, it just doesn't have the impact popular science would have you believe.

Physics is an enormous field. You would be hard pressed to find anyone who knows the latest majority opinion on every problem, not to mention finding someone who thinks they are qualified to give an informed opinion. I guess the whole thing is kind of circular and the poll could be formed to give any answer.

For example your first sentence, if you DIDNT ask physicists if they thought newtons mechanics were disproven, then you have a biased poll. If you DID, you would think it was a kind of silly poll (although I guess it would be good signal to reject data). I don't know where you draw the line. I guess my true objection is how this poll will be interpreted, which is more about popular perception of how science works than anything else.

Most Physicists Don't Agree on Most Things

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