Louisville Process Theology Network

“Physics is the most fundamental of the natural sciences. It
explains Nature at its deepest level. The edifice it strives to construct is
all-encompassing, free of internal contradictions, conceptually compelling and –
above all – beautiful.

The range of phenomena physics has explained is more than
impressive. It underlies the whole of modern civilization.

Nevertheless, as the physicist travels along his (in this
case) career, the hairline cracks in the edifice become more apparent, as do the
dirt swept under the rug, the fudges and the wholesale swindles, with the
disconcerting result that the totality occasionally appears more like Bruegel’s
Tower as dreamt by a modern slumlord, a ramshackle structure of
compartmentalized models soldered together into a skewed heap of explanations as
the whole jury-rigged monstrosity tumbles skyward.

Of course, many grand issues remain unresolved at the
frontiers of physics. What is the origin of inertia? Are there extra dimensions?
Can a theory of everything exist?

But even at the undergraduate level, far back from the
frontiers, deep holes exist.

Yet the subject is presented as one of completeness, while
holes – let's say abysses – are planked over in order to camouflage the danger.”

Tony Rothman, lecturer in physics at Princeton, in “American
Scientist,” May, 2011.