![]() ![]() My own research field of particle physics investigates increasingly smaller distances in order to study successively tinier components of matter. The remaining unknowns serve to inspire further investigations. Just as travel can be compelling-even if you will never visit every place on the planet (never mind the cosmos)-increasing our understanding of matter and of the universe enriches our existence. Knowledge can thereby embrace old ideas yet expand over time, even though very likely more will always remain to be explored. Such changes don’t necessarily mean the old rules are wrong, but they can mean, for example, that those rules no longer apply on smaller scales where new components have been revealed. Science thereby incorporates old established knowledge into the more comprehensive picture that emerges from a broader range of experimental and theoretical observations. Scientific theories grow and expand to absorb increased knowledge, while retaining the reliable parts of ideas that came before. Nonetheless, even when improved technology makes a broader range of observations possible, we don’t necessarily just abandon the theories that made successful predictions for the distances and energies, or speeds and densities, that were accessible in the past. Scientific “beliefs” then evolve in accordance with our expanded knowledge. Knowledge advances and the unexplored region recedes when we reach these difficult-to-access distances. We broaden and enrich our understanding as we probe increasingly remote scales. Over time, scientists peel away layers of reality to expose what lies beneath the surface. The universe evolves and so does our scientific knowledge of it. When the 2008 Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee sided with religion over science-in part because scientific “beliefs” change whereas Christians take as their authority an eternal, unchanging God-he was not entirely misguided, at least in his characterization. The ideas and suggestions that excite us today will soon be forgotten if they are invalidated by more persuasive or comprehensive experimental work tomorrow. The sound core of knowledge that has been tested and relied on is always surrounded by an amorphous boundary of uncertainties that are the domain of current research. ![]() The paradox scientists have to contend with is that, while aiming for permanence, we often investigate ideas that experimental data or better understanding will force us to modify or discard. Scientific descriptions certainly change as we cross the boundaries that circumscribe what we know and venture into more remote territory where we can glimpse hints of the deeper truths beyond. Many of the ideas we are currently investigating will prove to be wrong or incomplete. Science is an evolving body of knowledge. ![]() Science certainly is not the static statement of universal laws we all hear about in elementary school. We might neglect the books themselves, but we are careful to preserve the important ideas they may contain. We nonetheless apply the knowledge that has been acquired over time, whether from Newton in the 17th century or Copernicus more than 100 years earlier still. We usually leave that to historians and literary critics. Scientists rarely read such old-let alone ancient-scientific texts. Notwithstanding its very different age and context, we continue to relish the tale of Odysseus’s journey and its timeless descriptions of human nature. Homer created the Odyssey roughly 2,000 years earlier than Genji. During my first visit to Japan, I read the far older Tale of Genji and marveled at its characters’ immediacy, too, despite the thousand years that have elapsed since Murasaki Shikibu wrote about them. Tom Jones was originally published 250 years ago, yet its themes and wit resonate to this day. When discussing Henry Fielding’s novel Tom Jones with her many years later, I learned that the edition I had read and thoroughly enjoyed was the one she helped annotate when she was in graduate school. She loved the way an insightful story lasts for centuries. Ironically, she studied literature for the same reason that drew me to math and science. My friend Anna Christina Büchmann studied English in college whereas I majored in physics. Like most people, I thought of scientific advances as ideas that stand the test of time. ![]() If I was going to invest so much time, energy and commitment, I wanted it to be for something with a claim to longevity and truth. Among the many reasons I chose to pursue physics was the desire to do something that would have a permanent impact. ![]()
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