DDRIG: Enigmatic Nature: Absent Laws and Hidden Objects in Theoretical Physics

本博士论文研究改进基金资助一项有关理论物理学史的科学史研究项目，研究时间为1967年至2004年。这个项目探讨了理论物理学家是如何将自然视为神秘的，在要求和抵制解释的意义上。对于这些物理学家来说，有可能认为自然是由法则塑造的，而这些法则只是在自然中得到了微弱或间接的证明，并且可以把人类的感知世界想象成某种缺失的、未知的秩序原则的印记、人工制品或影响。在过去的五十年里，这种观点的转变对科学理论的特征产生了重大的影响；特别是，它的影响可以在理论概念的扩散中看到，这些理论概念将可观察到的世界嵌入到一些更大的物理或数学空间中，通常是通过吸引未观察到的或“隐藏”的实体。本研究的总体目标是对科学思想中的这一转变做出第一个系统的历史描述，并以此为大众科学节目和公共宣传工作做出贡献，为公众提供对著名在世物理学家的口述历史采访，并为物理学家和哲学家之间关于理论物理学未来的对话带来历史视角。本研究通过档案研究、口述历史访谈和概念分析来探讨科学理论的这种转变，重点关注1967年至2004年间理论物理学的五个事件：凝聚态物理中重整化群论的发展，粒子物理中隐藏对称性的探索，天体物理学中暗物质候选者的理论化，宇宙学中多元宇宙思想和人择推理的辩论，黑洞热力学和全息原理的表述。该项目将为三个活跃的学术研究领域做出贡献：现代物理学史，科学实践和理论的历史和社会研究，以及美国文化和政治经济史。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant provides supports a research project in history of science about the history of theoretical physics from 1967 to 2004. This project explores how theoretical physicists came to regard nature as enigmatic, in the sense of both demanding and resisting interpretation. For these physicists, it became possible to think of nature as shaped by laws that are only faintly or indirectly evidenced within it, and to conceive of the world of human perception as an imprint, artifact, or effect of some absent and yet-unknown ordering principles. This shift of perspective has had significant consequences for the character of scientific theory over the last fifty years; in particular, its effects can be seen in the proliferation of theoretical concepts that embed the observable world within some larger physical or mathematical space, often by appealing to unobserved or “hidden” entities. The broad goal of this research is to produce the first systematic historical account of this transformation in scientific thought, and in doing so to contribute to popular science programming and public outreach efforts, to produce publicly available oral history interviews with prominent living physicists, and to bring historical perspective to conversations among physicists and philosophers about the future of theoretical physics.This research explores this shift in scientific theory through archival research, oral history interviews, and conceptual analysis, focusing on five episodes in theoretical physics between 1967 and 2004: the development of renormalization group theory in condensed matter physics, the search for hidden symmetries in particle physics, the theorization of dark matter candidates in astrophysics, debates over multiverse ideas and anthropic reasoning in cosmology, and the formulation of black hole thermodynamics and the holographic principle. This project will contribute to three active areas of scholarly research: the history of modern physics, historical and social studies of scientific practice and theory, and the history of US culture and political economy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.