The crisis in physics is real: Science is failing

In which I apologize that my videos sometimes lack nuance and explain why I think we are witnessing the failure of science.

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#science

[hyfy-trjy]

I worked in Academia and during the 90s I bore witness to the moment that research changed. I saw all the Professors have their path to tenure be shifted from "How well have your grad students done and how many prestigious journals have you been published in" to "How many millions of dollars in grants have you garnered for the university". When your metric of success shifts from good science to how much money you can attract to the University fundamentally changes how science is done and motivated

[urbaniv]

I am especially happy that you as a non English native has managed zo get this importance. Every discussion is dominated mostly by US YT and they bring a certain culture and approach to discussions and its good that we get an different approach wih you

[ZiriYounsi]

As a "professional" (astro)physicist, it's my observation that many scientists are now driven by popular trends and what is most "attractive" to funders. They don't want to undertake any serious research which runs counter to these trends for fear of being ostracised, or simply having the work/paper/proposal rejected (sunken cost). The actual scientific value (knowledge, deeper understanding etc.) seems to be secondary. It could be argued that the path of least resistance, and of greatest opportunity for funding, career advancement, prestige etc., is simply to conform to the status quo and climb the academic greasy pole.

As an aside, I remember meeting you many years ago in Frankfurt/FIAS when I was a postdoc, where I was taken aback, and impressed, by your forthrightness! I'm glad you're continuing to raise awareness of these (and other) important issues - thank you.

[J-Kimble]

I have a degree in psychology, and while it's not a STEM branch, I wrote parts of my thesis on scientific fraud, and junk-science. Without getting into the details, one of the biggest problems that I (and many other researchers) discovered is that (in most fields) there is little or no reporting on negative results/failed experiments. Papers only publish novel results. While this in itself is not a problem it's incredibly wasteful. I was arguing on establishing a database for failed experiments or null-results, where researchers can explore what was already tried and didn't work. This way a lot of (unintentional) replication of failed results can be avoided and experiments can be better adjusted. We'd also have a fuller picture of phenomena and potentially we could explore more thorough reasoning through seeing more clearly what worked and what didn't.

[hi]

We got Sabine and Professor Dave beef before GTA 6

[TheActionLab]

wait, so Sabine is my sister?? Sweet.

[ascohn]

You're better than a cheerleader for science - you're science's best friend who loves it enough to tell it if it stays on its present course, it will get thrown in jail for drunk driving.

[DanielSilva-cqvz]

The amount of papers being published also dramatically increased during the 40s. Whereas before one could keep up with everything being published, now it's humanly imposible to track even a tiny fraction of it all, and 80% of papers don't get even 5 mentions.

Even if a groundbreaking paper is published, if it comes from an unkown physist just like Albert Einstein was prior to 1905, it is highly unlikely that anyone will ever read it.

[tddybr]

Please keep talking about the issues in science. Reform is desperately needed.

[courtlandcreekmore]

No funnier scientist exists. I have done the math(s).

[mhm]

As someone who has followed you for about four years, I’m very eager to hear your insights on these problems in physics. It would also be incredibly helpful, as I’m currently a physics graduate student. Thank you for all these years of guidance and education.

[secularsermons]

It's not just in science, it's also in the humanities, architecture and even poetry.

The problem is that hiring and tenure committee members are selected among insiders who have self-interest, and therefore incentives other than those of non-insiders; especially to avoid devastating fundamental criticism.

[andykrull]

Science is evidence based; funding is eminence based.

[jimreed]

Please keep doing this like you're talking to your brother. (I come armed with a degree in Electrical Engineering and a minor in Physics.) As others have already said, your honesty in calling out B S is a very large part of what makes your channel worth watching.

[Beautiful-ModelBarbara-Hut-sj]

8:56 "But then again I also eat instant coffee powder with a spoon, so maybe I'm not a good sample group" - Sabine, please, do us all a favor and never change :D

[officialstorage]

So, as far as I can distill from the video, the summary is as follows:

- Too much funding is being allocated to coming up with and disproving theories in physics, using a "guess and check" methodology. Theoretical physicists should be coming up with better theories that end up being proven correct.

- Given that theoretical physics hasn't come up with a proven theory in 50 years, the field therefore has a unique methodological problem that has not been fixed.

- This is embarrassing for the field and the scientific community as a whole, and would be unacceptable and "insane" in any other field. Its absurdity is argued by comparing theoretical physics to chemistry and neurology.

- At the same time, given that theoretical physics is wasting time and money, she says she doesn't "trust scientists", including those in other fields.

- "Science deniers are right when they say that academia has a big problem." It is not clearly specified what the big problem is- it might be the lack of progress in theoretical physics.

That's the meat of the video. Someone please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm ignoring the banter and advertisements as I don't think they're relevant.

I am neither a physicist nor a scientist.

I have three questions. Sabine mentioned she's tired of going over the same old things, so she must have gone over the details in prior videos. If someone were to direct me to the answers I'd be grateful.

1) What is the "big problem" of academia she mentioned? Is it this specific issue with theoretical physics? Is it the replication crisis? Is it economic inefficiency?

2) How would she improve the methods of theoretical physics? I gathered that the "guess and check" method is bad, but the video has no suggestions for improvement.

3) When she says she doesn't "trust scientists", what does she mean? That she doesn't trust scientific consensus? I know she's not a climate change denier. She doesn't trust money is being used efficiently? Is she talking about the replication crisis?

Anyway, I'm hoping I can grab some answers, and crossing my fingers that they aren't summarized by "she wants you to buy her book."

[TimeFlies-db]

As a physicist, I can confirm this is the norm today.

[eddiet]

I hate it when others say you shouldn't criticize the institution of academic physics because it causes others to lose trust in it. They are more concerned about the optics of science rather than the integrity of it.

[seylaw]

I see the same thing with my law work. The contrast between university and the actual practice is stark. I came to the conclusion recently that the whole justice system is a self-serving puppet show.

[dreinhard]

I'm so honoured to be part of your family Sabine :)