Author Archives: woit

String Phenomenology and the Landscape

Posted on August 11, 2006 by woit

Science magazine this week has an article about the anthropic string theory landscape controversy, entitled A ‘Landscape” Too Far, by Tom Siegfried. The only theorist quoted as opposing anthropic landscape arguments as not science is David Gross, although experimentalist Burton … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 43 Comments

A Counterexample to the Hodge Conjecture?

Posted on August 11, 2006 by woit

A paper appeared last night on the arXiv by K.H. Kim and F.W. Roush entitled Counterexample to the Hodge Conjecture. The authors claim to construct an example using K3 surfaces for which the Hodge conjecture is false. If they’re right … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 36 Comments

Topology Board Resigns

Posted on August 10, 2006 by woit

One of the most prestigious journals in mathematics is called Topology. It is based at Oxford, its first issue was in 1962 and it has published many of the most important papers in the the field of topology. Since 1994 … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 49 Comments

Yet More Links

Posted on August 7, 2006 by woit

A pretty random collection of interesting things I’ve noticed recently: The Mathematical Institute at Oxford has a newsletter, and from the latest issue I learned that Quillen is retiring and that they’re planning construction of a new building. There are … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 14 Comments

Nobel Prize Winning Orgiasts

Posted on August 2, 2006 by woit

DealBreaker, which is described as “an online business tabloid and Wall Street gossip blog”, has a story about supposed Jeffrey Epstein parties “in which Nobel prize winners and various wealthy folks were all surrounded by young, ‘nude eastern european girls, … Continue reading →

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Reviews and Errata

Posted on August 2, 2006 by woit

The August edition of Seed magazine is out on the newstands, and it contains a joint review entitled “No Strings Attached” by Charles Seife of my book and of Lee Smolin’s The Trouble With Physics. The article and magazine issue … Continue reading →

Posted in Not Even Wrong: The Book | 26 Comments

P. University Press

Posted on August 1, 2006 by woit

I really am trying to ignore Lubos, but there’s just too much material… Back in early 2004, after it became clear that Cambridge University Press was very unlikely to ever publish Not Even Wrong due to intense opposition from string … Continue reading →

Posted in Not Even Wrong: The Book | 61 Comments

Susskind on KQED

Posted on July 31, 2006 by woit

Someone wrote in to tell me that KQED this morning had Leonard Susskind on to discuss string theory and his book The Cosmic Landscape. Most of the program consisted of him promoting his usual line about the string theory anthropic … Continue reading →

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Templeton Funding for Physics Research

Posted on July 31, 2006 by woit

The Templeton-funded FQXI organization has announced today the awarding of 30 grants totalling more than $2 million dollars for foundational research in physics. On the one hand I’ve always been dubious about this organization since it is funded by a … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 43 Comments

Conferences, etc.

Posted on July 27, 2006 by woit

Lattice 2006, the big yearly conference on lattice gauge theory, is going on the week in Tucson. The program is here, and both plenary and parallel session talks are being posted. Georg von Hippel is blogging from the conference, his … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 17 Comments