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AI has dramatically changed the way scientists, including myself, practice science. In the last few months alone, advances made by AI in mathematics and the physical sciences have prompted many to think critically about the role we play in scientific research. Some have dubbed this new science “Physics 2.0”.
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In my life, I’ve worn many hats. I’ve worn the hat of a student, a photographer, an athlete (not a good one), and so on. I’ve also literally worn many hats, which many of my friends can attest to when my hair is too long or just looks unkempt.
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It’s been jarring to watch public trust in science deteriorate so rapidly since I began my career in academia. Maybe it started with vaccine misinformation in the early 2000s. Or maybe it was the growing politicization of climate change throughout the 2010s. Or maybe what really did it was COVID, when doctors—often in vain—pleaded with people to mask up and keep their distance to slow the pandemic. And now we’ve arrived at a moment where the Trump administration has made a firm financial statement that, in theory, reflects the electorate’s perception of science. A part of me still hopes that isn’t true.
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At the tail end of a meeting with my awesome PhD adviser the other day, he made a point to share with me a metaphor about mathematics originally discussed by the esteemed mathematician and physicist, Freeman Dyson, in 2009:
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It is an exciting time to be a physicist! Physicists are lucky to get extraordinary scientific results maybe once a year or every few years; in the past week, two major scientific breakthroughs have been made. Here I want to attempt to illuminate the significance of my favorite. I’ve always had a sweet spot for black holes.
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I was raised Hindu but do not actively practice due to personal opinions on the socioeconomic destruction Hinduism has inflicted on marginalized groups in the South Asian subcontinent, particularly women and people in poverty (see: caste system, female infanticide in India). Developing a cosmological perspective through my studies in physics and of the Big Bang has made me comfortably agnostic. I needed a good answer for the Big Bang question in order to fall asleep at night, and because I am neither smart enough nor dedicated enough to pursue that scientifically, I turned to a God at this point, whom I choose to call Nature. And I am simply ok with Nature not sharing all her secrets on the Big Bang, but I wanted to share here what she’s revealed so far.
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Anytime that physics finds a rare opportunity in the spotlight, it’s an exciting time for me. Whether it’s an actual scientific discovery, the announcement of the Nobel prize, or an astoundingly rare occurence of people enjoying physics in popular culture, this seems to happen at least once annually. The holy grail of the latter, to me, was 2014’s Interstellar. Interstellar not only managed to capture some of the most interesting and complex consequences of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity in a way that was captivating for the viewer, but it was also just a phenomenal film.
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I recently asked my particle physics professor a question that I feel he really disliked. I wasn’t necessarily trying to poke him (but I had a hunch this question would), but at this point in my career, I am trying to absorb every ounce of knowledge and opinion out of the professors I interact with. Because now, it’s not sufficient to just know physics (that might be an oxymoron). I need to start forming educated and defensible opinions on the modern state of physics.
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Math is one of the non-negotiables of being a physicist. I do math a lot, every day. It is as natural for a physicist to do math as writing is for an author. But I’ve recently took some time to reflect on the math I know and do so frequently, and when math transitioned for me as just another subject in school to something profoundly important and necessary. One day I was doing multiplication tables, the next I was considering infinite dimesional vector spaces in Quantum Mechanics. How the fuck does that happen?
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I have a feeling some of you (if anyone reads this, ever) might have seen this coming. I’ve been pretty vocal in the past about my feelings towards astrology. I’m not the biggest fan.