Are the laws of nature beautiful? Book Trailer 'Lost in Math'

This is a trailer for my book "Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray" to be published by Basic Books on June 12th, 2018, and in the German translation by Fischer, on September 26th, 2018.

[RWin-fpjn]

Just finished the book... Let me summarize it in 4 words: GO and BUY it !!
Reading this will provide you with all the essentials you need to know considering the (lack of) progress in the past century so you can skip all other books on specific subjects and save yourself a lot of money. Sabine is no 'one trick pony' person. She knows her stuff and cuts right through the bombastic tone most writers use when selling their 'flavor of the day bandwagon'. As for the book: Although beauty in itself may be a defendable (and very just) design parameter, reading this you can't help to think the top physicists will somehow not be the ones to find any SIMPLE essentials of physics. But come as may, the Jeanne D.Arc of physics will shine her light if ever a new silver bullit will been found....

[cat_lover]

Thank goodness that your book was also written for laypeople like myself who is not an expert. I thoroughly believe that the masses can also gain numerous insights from this book regarding science and beyond. Btw, I love your writing style (& your intelligence) from reading your blog posts over the years. Excited to start reading it. :-)

[brysonjacobs]

I really enjoyed your book, even if it did crush my spirits for a little while. But they grew back healthier and happier and more accepting of the grand mysteries. The candor and introspection you weren't at all shy about sharing in your book is greatly appreciated :)

[patricialauriello]

Is there nothing new under the sun? Nature is what it is and we should not invent it to be otherwise. Looking forward to reading her book.

[Jean-Pierre-PETIT]

Sabine Hossenfelder is very talented and composes wonderful songs. But she is also a scientist who in 2008 laid the foundations for a cosmological model where the universe is made up of a mixture of positive and negative masses. It is then described not, like Albert Einstein's model which is summarized by a single field equation, but by a system of two coupled field equations. 

From this angle Sabine is therefore the successor of Albert Einstein. But she could not build from her model elements that could be compared with the observations. 

In France, we developed in 2014 a system also based on similar equations that we have exploited with great success by showing a dozen points where it matches observational data. Sabine accused us of plagiarizing her own model. 

But these two systems are not identical. So we looked at how our model could be considered a special case of her model, which would not bother us at all. But we were unable to show it. 

Sabine may hold the key to this case. Under these conditions she should, as we have asked her several times, publish an article showing this and we would be happy if this story could be cleared up in good faith because this accusation of plagiarism, formulated in the emails she sends to correspondents, puts us in a very unpleasant situation. Jean-Pierre Petit and Gilles d'Agostini, from France

[Achrononmaster]

(1) Nature is not cruel. Cruelty implies intention.

[Thomas-gk]

I began my "career" as interested layman by reading Hawking's brief history of time and Weinberg's first three minutes, and stuff like this. Since some time l had a vague 'feeling', that something's wrong about the flood of new and confusing ideas in the popular science media. Now I found an insider who can exactly explain my 'feeling'. Everyone, who's interested in science has to read this book, I'm working on the last chapter now. Sabine Hossenfelder is a great, self- deprecating and humourous Writer, and, what l like especially, she's a rebel.

[THE-X-Force]

How did sales go? I really wish this message was spread wider. Thank you .. sincerely .. for your honest and thoughtful work.

[Jiaphet]

Although I agree with the premise you're putting on. I disagree that beautiful theories is what drives all of physics. I have seen plenty of interviews and read a few books by Steven Weinberg, Sean Carroll and Carlo roveli. All of them state quite clearly that the theories regardless of their beauty and simplicity can be wrong. Of course there will be scientists who will get their drive from looking at some elegant theory. I think it happens not because people want to push an agenda but simply because even at the highest level of intellect humans can be very irrational. There is no way around a group of people thinking completely rational. Still going to read the book eventually but this is just a thought.

[Achrononmaster]

(2) Beauty is not simply defined. Predictive success and explanatory power are, to me, beautiful and over-ride mathematical "elegance" (say, as measured by information complexity). So it seems kind of dumb, to me, to reject beauty as a criterion, since in a real sense it is the only criterion. What I'd agree with you on is that many theoreticians are using very narrow conceptions of "beauty".

[fattyz]

Nature's not cruel just hungry. Go without food awhile and see if the menu choices increase

[robertword]

Today the critique of a theory has become more important than the properties of simplicity and beauty. What has worked before might never work again.

[rememberrohit]

Looking forward to this book. I love the topic although I wish the title was a bit reader friendly for lay people. For folks with technical background, this seems like a delicious feast! :)

[cymoonrbacpro]

For the sense of beauty or ugliness are Subjective, for The concept of beauty or ugliness is in the eyes of the beholder, Nevertheless the ugly can be transformed into beauty once it is understood.

[noelcollins]

It seems that physics could be a tool to find out about truth, but obviously it is not the truth in itself. Math is great for building useful things.

[herwighuener]

Beautifulness is in the eye of the beholder. There is no objective criterion of whether something is beautiful. But another thing is objective: the effort to make oneself grasp a theory. And there you can manipulate definitions, proofs, analogies and so on until they seem simple - and beautiful. That is the way of learning about physics. We have invested a livetime into exactly that. And maybe that livetime was not enough - there is no natual law which entitles us to grasp physics! - Beautifulness and understanding some physics imply each other. By the way: same thing with software. Beautifullness and Simplicity are a way to working programms. Or do you know someone who can deal with software of millions of code-lines?

Excuse my English that early in the morning.

[discogodfather]

Hey Sabine, just on page 62 of the book. I love your writing style and it is a very well explained for the non-physicist. I'm starting to understand the long standing tradition of Physicists to use beautify as some kind of criterion for judgement that may in fact be detrimental to the entire endeavor. I feel like you are kind of like a Martin Luther for theoretical physics- and "Lost in Math" is the 25 Thesis. My question to you is what would you rather institute as a criteria beyond "beauty"? Are there physiological ramifications of changing that standard, meaning do we risk messing with the personal motivations of physicists if we attempt to ween them from their beloved "beauty"?

[geoffknot]

hi Dr. Hossenfelder. i am just catching up with your work, and intending to read your book. however, i would like to ask anyway, Do you consider this inclination toward beauty in other fields (art, music, literature... ), and compare it to this beauty inclination in science?

[fattyz]

I found the audio book but you didn't narrate it. : (

[regard-fkhl]

Bonjour Sabine, je viens de terminer votre livre "Lost in Maths", merci pour votre regard original sur la physique fondamentale.
Mais sur l'extrait page 276: ".. nous sommes incapables de prêter attention aux informations qui ne sont détenues que par quelques personnes." ma question est: Pourquoi avez-vous refusé de vous intéresser à la théorie Janus de Jean-Pierre PETIT ?