The book presents the conclusions of a psychologist seeking to make
sense of contemporary particle physics as described in a number of
popular science texts and media articles, written by physicists,
seeking to explain the workings of the sub-atomic world. The accounts,
it is argued, are a) mutually exclusive and contradictory, and b)
metaphysical or magical in essence. Themes of the book include: a
discussion of the way we allow physicists to invent things that have
no perceivable qualities, on the grounds that they 'must' be there
because otherwise their preconceptions are wrong or their sums don't
work; that, from a psychological perspective, contemporary theory in
particle physics has the same properties as any other act of faith,
and the same limitations as belief in God; and that physics has now
reached a point at which increasingly physicists research their own
psychological constructions rather than anything which is
unambiguously 'there' or real. It encourages people to ask basic
questions of the type we often use to question the existence of God;
such as 'Where is he/it?', 'Show me?', 'Do it then', 'When did it
happen?', 'How do you know it exists?', and so on, and suggests that
people take a leaf out of Dawkins' text, The God Delusion, but apply
it to high-end physics as much as to religious dogma: turning water
into wine is a mere conjuring trick compared to producing an entire
universe out of nothing.
Les mer
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781845405595
Publisert
2019
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Andrews UK
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter