Weinberg, Steven. Dreams of a Final Theory 1992

The dust jacket blurb tells us that Prof. Weinberg is a Nobel Laureate "for his work in unifying two of the fundamental forces of nature". What is probably meant (I offer this suggestion only to save the writer from a charge of imbecility) is formulating a theory about the unity of the two forces. This confusion between theory and fact is typical of the book, alas. And typical of the lack of the study of logic among physicists. Cross my heart, I made an effort to persist in reading it. But it is like swimming in a bathtub.

4: that we need a machine to break out of the impasse in which physics finds itself. [I am smart; it's physics which is in the impasse. A poor workman blames his tools]

38: the final laws will be megalaws that determine the probabilities of being in different types of sub‑universes. [mega = super. He means meta‑physics]

44: setting consciousness to one side for a moment [a dangerous invitation to a reader who is already nodding]

47: longing for extra‑terrestrials to confirm our mathematics [and he complains of astrologers]

50: there is no room in nature for astrology or telekinesis or creationism or other superstitions. [Neat glide between astrology & creation. There is no room in nature for creation because nature arises from creation]

59: living things are the way they are because through natural selection they have evolved to be that way [Natural Selection? & he talks of superstitions? The sense of the sentence is: living things are the way they are because that's the way they are]

61: discovering the source of the Nile did nothing to illuminate the problems of Egyptian agriculture [Knowing where the water comes from ‑ how it does ‑ has no effect on agriculture? Has he heard of the Aswan Dam? This is a man who asks for several billion dollars to build a super‑duper‑collider]

66: the historical importance [he means the importance to science, not to history]

246: that Schroedinger's "enough is known about the material structure of life to tell exactly why present‑day physics cannot account for life". W gives his reason: that the genetic information which governs [!] living organisms is far too stable to fit into the world of continual fluctuations described by quantum mechanics and statistical mechanics. Schroedinger's mistake was pointed out by Max Perutz... Schroedinger had ignored the stability that can be produced by the chemical process known as enzymatic catalysis. [Weinberg's error lies in not recognizing that this is just pushing the problem back. What then controls the chemical process? Weinberg's failure is failing to notice that life is far more interesting to us as living creatures than the mechanics that we share with increasingly entropic matter].

And so on. The professor needs a little modesty and respect for other scientists and their work. Newman did warn of a black hole at the center of study ‑ the absence of an independent effort to account for why there is something rather than nothing ‑ would lead to every discipline claiming to be the discipline: claiming to be the final account.

The feeling core of the book ‑ the heart of the book ‑ is his chapter on "God". John Wheeler's memoir is as confused about God ‑ some sort of Ethical Cultural thing ‑ but in his efforts to explain muons and pions and geons, he displays his passion for physics. And explains in the display how physicists came to concocting all these little bits; the necessity to our understanding for these little bits. The old indivisible atoms are not wrong; they are just Ptolemaic. Richard Feynman's passion for his subject was greater than Wheeler's. Feynman spent much time pointing out what was not explained. He dwelt on the limitations, pushing the envelope without breaking it.

Prof. Weinberg's book is stuck in the current theories. He refers to the "holocaust" (which others more accurately call the catastrophe). The distinction is a scientific one, a distinction in our science (knowledge) of morality; and being a distinction in morality is of greater subtlety and greater importance. Failing to leave the matter independent of his speculations in physics, Prof. Weinberg falls back into the superstition of a Great Mother, blind and without the other senses. He is unsettled about the great persecution, but does not realize that the acceptation of the Great Mother theory was the excuse for the persecution. If we be but temporary arrangements of molecules, what difference if one or another, or one or another thousand, or one or another million of these billions of arrangements are re‑arranged? Nor does he take a care, at his age, to watch that his chaotic speculations do not dishonor the fathers and discourage the young. He sneers at creationism; his substitute is less attractive. We are all in the hands of Blind Erda, the Green‑Eyed Torso. And that it was the physicists' curiosity (interest) which made possible the development of the atomic bomb. What if his hero Heisenberg had succeeded in making one?