Category Archives: Favorite Old Posts

Not Even Wrong: The Book

Posted on August 23, 2005 by woit

There’s a project I’ve been working on for the last couple years that I haven’t wanted to write about here until it was further along, but now seems to be a good time. I’ve written a book, also entitled “Not … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Not Even Wrong: The Book | 81 Comments

Not a Joke

Posted on April 7, 2005 by woit

A week or so ago I wrote up as an April Fool’s joke a posting claiming that the Stanford theoretical physics group was joining a new Templeton foundation devoted to religion and science. At the time I had no idea … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 45 Comments

Coleman Conference

Posted on March 20, 2005 by woit

I spent the last two days up in Cambridge, mainly attending the conference in honor of Sidney Coleman. Sadly, Coleman is in poor health, suffering from Parkinson’s disease, and was unfortunately unable to attend the talks in his honor. They … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 22 Comments

Chern-Simons-Witten, Some History

Posted on October 26, 2004 by woit

Lubos Motl is promoting a revisionist history of topological quantum field theory according to which it was all inspired by string theory. Unlike him, I was working on the subject at the time it was developed, and remember the history … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 24 Comments

2004 Nobel Prizes in Physics

Posted on September 29, 2004 by woit

No, they haven’t announced the Nobel prizes yet this year. The announcement of the physics prize is scheduled for mid-day (Stockholm time) next Tuesday. I have zero inside information about who is likely to get the prize this year, but … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 29 Comments

What the Bleep Do We Know?

Posted on September 27, 2004 by woit

Last night I went to see a movie which was advertised as being about quantum physics, called “What the Bleep Do We Know?”. I was expecting something pretty dumb, but am always interested to see what people think about quantum … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Film Reviews | 21 Comments

Comments From Larry Yaffe

Posted on August 19, 2004 by woit

Jeff Harvey’s comment that it was Larry Yaffe who brought news of the Green-Schwarz anomaly cancellation result to Witten gave me the idea of contacting Larry to get a first-hand recollection of what the reaction was at Aspen back in … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 7 Comments

International Institute of Mathematical Physics in Riga

Posted on June 27, 2004 by woit

The DNS has the following entry for phys-maths.edu.lv domain: phys-maths.edu.lv descr: International Institute of Mathematical Physics admin-c: 23391-LUMII tech-c: 23391-LUMII nserver: DNS1.SUPREMESERVER11.COM nserver: DNS2.SUPREMESERVER11.COM changed: dns-reg@nic.lv 20031201 source: LUMII person: BOGDANOFF IGOR address: none phone: 33608250825 e-mail: igor.bogdanov@wanadoo.fr nic-hdl: 23391-LUMII … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 22 Comments

KKLT Smackdown

Posted on April 7, 2004 by woit

I was dubious of the value of a new “sci.physics.strings” newsgroup when it was first proposed, but now must admit it seems to have been a great idea It started up a week or two ago, and quickly someone asked … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Multiverse Mania | 8 Comments

My (Not So) Brilliant Career

Posted on March 26, 2004 by woit

One of the weirder things that happened yesterday was that I noticed there was a long thread in a discussion group about my academic qualifications. You can find this at Physics Forums My academic career has been a bit unusual, … Continue reading →

Posted in Favorite Old Posts, Uncategorized | 6 Comments