Author Archives: woit

Updates

Posted on January 16, 2008 by woit

On the HEP budget problem front, Adrian Cho has an interview with Ray Orbach of the DOE. Orbach is not very encouraging on the prospects for a supplemental FY 2008 appropriation: … my assumption is that the last thing that … Continue reading →

Posted in Experimental HEP News, This Week's Hype | 21 Comments

Have Cosmologists Lost Their Brains?

Posted on January 15, 2008 by woit

There’s a peculiar long article in the New York Times science section today by Dennis Overbye, entitled Big Brain Theory: Have Cosmologists Lost Theirs? It’s about the debate raging among a small number of cosmologists about “Boltzmann Brains”, and the … Continue reading →

Posted in Multiverse Mania | 24 Comments

Update on Plagiarism Scandal

Posted on January 10, 2008 by woit

Last summer I wrote here about a plagiarism scandal involving more than 60 arXiv preprints, more than thirty of which were refereed and published in at least 18 different physics journals, some of them quite prestigious ones (see also the … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 150 Comments

More on FY 2008 HEP Budget Cuts

Posted on January 10, 2008 by woit

The disastrous US HEP budget cuts that were announced just before Christmas, a quarter of the way into the fiscal year, have been getting a lot more attention from bloggers now that the holiday season is over, and their implications … Continue reading →

Posted in Experimental HEP News | 34 Comments

This Week’s Hype

Posted on January 3, 2008 by woit

New Scientist had the good sense to pass on last week’s hype about string theory testability, but is responsible for this week’s hype on the subject, with an article entitled String theory may predict our universe after all. It’s unclear … Continue reading →

Posted in This Week's Hype | 47 Comments

End-of-year Links

Posted on December 30, 2007 by woit

Every year around this time the Edge web-site posts responses from a large number of scientists to some particular question. This year the question is “What have you changed your mind about? Why?”, and the results should be posted tomorrow. … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 20 Comments

This Week’s Hype

Posted on December 27, 2007 by woit

Over the past year or so, as public awareness has grown that string theory is a failed idea about unification due to its inherent untestability, I’ve been surprised by the way in which many in the string theory community have … Continue reading →

Posted in This Week's Hype | 34 Comments

Money, Money, Money

Posted on December 26, 2007 by woit

Theoretical physics and mathematics are much cheaper to fund than experimental particle physics. I don’t know yet what the implications of the FY 2008 budget are for these fields, but it appears that they are not facing large cuts like … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Disastrous FY 2008 DOE Budget

Posted on December 18, 2007 by woit

The White House and the Congress, several months into the 2008 fiscal year, finally seem to have come to agreement on a budget, one that fully funds the Iraq war, but has a huge cut in the budget for DOE … Continue reading →

Posted in Experimental HEP News | 62 Comments

Vogan on the Orbit Method

Posted on December 17, 2007 by woit

David Vogan was visiting Columbia last week, giving the Ritt Lectures, on the topic of Geometry and Representations of Reductive Groups. He has made available the slides from his lectures here. Vogan’s talks concentrated on describing the so-called “orbit method” … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 18 Comments