"Shut up and calculate" is the mentality that produced nearly all the XX century advances on the quantum physics theories.

It's not that everybody subscribed to it - I don't think anybody ever fully subscribed to it - but that advances insisted on only coming on those times people were thinking this way. That's why people teach it today.

But at the relativity side, it seems that "shut up and calculate" never gave good results.

Everyone calculates. In my mind, "shut up and calculate" refers to a very strong emphasis on calculation and symbolic manipulation to the near or total exclusion of conceptual analysis expressed in words and pictures.

In particular the "losers" at the 1927 Solvay Congress -- Schrodinger, Einstein, and de Broglie -- seem to be the antithesis of "shut up and calculate" and all contributed very critical elements of quantum theory.

Schrodinger found the Schrodinger equation, the differential equation that describes so much correctly, through his approach. This is significant because the operator methodology of Heisenberg and Gottingen either did not work, despite the claims it is equivalent to the Schrodinger equation, or was essentially impossible to use to make predictive calculations. Schrodinger's publication of the Schrodinger equation provided an easy way to calculate results in QM that proved correct using well-know differential equations/calculus methods.

For whatever reason, perhaps to keep their research program afloat, the "winners" at the Solvay Congress jettisoned the conceptual underpinnings of Schrodinger's approach and married it to the operator formalism leading to quantum field theory with its intractable infinities and other problems that remain to this day.

I'd say it is strong emphasis on models predictive power, to the exclusion of judging if it improves our understanding of the world. The "shut up" part is more key than the "calculate".

I am not sure if we disagree here or not.

Predictive power has not always trumped understanding as a goal. The original Copernican theory did not work as well as the Ptolemaic model used by astronomers. The Ptolemaic model as it had evolved in the 16th century was extremely complex with many fit parameters and predicted planetary motions relatively well.

All of the models shared the incorrect assumption of uniform circular motion and epicycles, both the Copernican, Tyco Brahe's hybrid system, and the traditional Ptolemaic model which by virtue of the thousands of years of effort invested in it -- it arguably dates back to ancient Sumeria -- actually predicted the motions of Mars and other planets best.

It was only the addition of elliptical orbits with non-uniform motion by Kepler that resulted in the new model surpassing the Ptolemaic model.

In the case of planetary motions, understanding ultimately proved critical. We can predict planetary motions to about 1 in 100,000 accuracy versus about 1 in 100 with the Ptolemaic model of the 16th century.

Understanding always trumps simple accuracy, because it defines new mental models which can tested experimentally.

I don't think it's about low-hanging fruit so much as the difference between analytical understanding/talent and deep creative insight.

Science-as-career has become institutionalised and conservative, and slanted more towards the semi-industrialised production of regular publishable refinements and less towards deep insights.

It's correspondingly less likely that a mind like Einstein's would be able to make equivalent contributions today.

I think Kepler was the epitome of "shut up and calculate". Measure the motion of the planets, come up with detailed formulas describing them. Newton transcended that by identifying simple relations and invariants that unfolded to exactly those equations. I'd argue Newton and Einstein are the only two who have transcended "shut up and calculate". In the latter case we otherwise would have patched in Lorentz transforms and stated "just because" like Kepler. In quantum mechanics, I feel like it's still something on a Kepler level, equations "just because", waiting for a more fundamental understanding.

I would say certainly not. In Nova Astronomia in which Kepler lays out his discovery, one finds chapters and chapters (originally in Latin) of verbal analysis of what is going on. He did not just find a formula that worked blindly. Rather he envisioned an influence -- either magnetism or something similar to magnetism -- which he calls specie (a Latin term used in magic and mysticism) extending out from the Sun guiding the motions of the planets. This was a clear precursor to the concept of a gravitational field.

Reading your post again, I think we agree.

I'd just point that, even tough Schrodinger and de Broglie were pretty much focused on understanding, their contribution to quantum theory was very prediction-based, and not so much understanding based. As I said up there, it's not that they believed that, it is that they only got results when working this way. I took Einstein away from your list, there are always exceptions.

What I think is most interesting is that the XX century got an example of each of those "ways of doing science" working. There was probably a "right tool for the job" effect there, as people certainly weren't trying to create a predictive-only theory.

<"Shut up and calculate" is the mentality that produced nearly all the XX century advances on the quantum physics theories.>

I tend to agree with the gist of this comment but there is an important wider context. The Copenhagen interpretation was not a win for one side versus the other but a truce. That truce has degenerated into the dogma of "shut up and calculate" which is now used to shutdown any questioning of the philosophic premises and implications of QM/SR/GR which was never the intent. Here is a comment I posted to another thread;

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I agree but I think there are important philosophic[1] questions raised by quantum mechanics and, to a lesser extent, special relativity. One hundred years ago the founders of the new physics had the same questions but could not resolve them to everyone's satisfaction. One of the founders of modern physics (I forget who) said (I am paraphrasing) that all the different views on the "meaning" of the new physics amounted to where you want to hide the contradictions. The Copenhagen "interpretation" was not a definitive win but a truce.

These brilliant men argued for a decade and could not resolve it so they decided to bury the questions. It was not unreasonable in that context to accept that they did not know the answers but the theories work so let's use it and see where it leads. I am sure the hope was that the answers to the philosophic questions would become clear as our understanding of the new physics grew. There was a lot of work to do aside from the philosophic questions. Fast forward 100 years and here we are, the philosophic questions are still unanswered, and the Copenhagen interpretation has hardened into dogma banning any discussion of fundamental questions in physics. I have respect for Smolin for at least trying to re-raise these important questions.

[1] I am of the view that philosophy is distinct from physics in that it studies the nature of reality and knowledge, thus it applies to ALL fields not just physics. WHAT do we know and HOW we know is the more (or the most) fundamental science. The physicists are throwing out the baby with the bath water when they reject philosophy en masse instead of rejecting bad philosophy.

    The ubiquitous lack of secure longer term jobs like Einstein's civil service job at the patent office -- he was not a post-doc -- make deeper conceptual analysis of the outstanding problems in physics today difficult, probably impossible.

This seems completely wrong. Why would more secure longer term jobs help with the advancement of physics? Gone are the days where the "low-hanging fruit" of physics still existed such that a patent clerk could have the time and resources to tackle an open problem. Furthermore, we have a whole system where people are literally paid to think about physics all day. Why would anything else be better for the advancement of physics?

I truly don't think Einstein's work at the patent office was "low hanging fruit." -- quite the opposite. Most major scientific breakthroughs have required at least five years of work, usually frustrating trial and error, failures, blind alleys etc. A post-doc with a two year appointment, which is typical, simply does not have the time. He or she needs to publish something "impressive" in that two years. Einstein was in the enviable position of not having to worry about his next post-doc or whatever from 1903 onwards. In addition his patent work involved electrical and electromagnetic inventions that dovetailed well with his interests and background.

Modern physics has very few long term secure jobs to think about actual physics. Tenured faculty spend most of their time writing grant applications and fund raising -- not the same thing.

this depends on the faculty...a theorist with little experimental costs would spend less time applying for grants.

Perhaps. Theory costs less but there is a lot less money available for theory. For example, in 2014, the total High Energy Physics (HEP) budget of the US Department of Energy (DOE) was about 750 million dollars, nearly all of it experimental, with only about 6-7 percent (63 million dollars) for theory.

http://science.energy.gov/~/media/hep/hepap/pdf/201403/Rolli...

The DOE HEP Theory budget has supposedly been dropping since 2014 -- actually 2012:

http://www.math.columbia.edu/~woit/wordpress/?p=8998

I suspect the amount of time spent on writing grants and informal fund raising is related to the level of competition, how many theorists are pursuing how little money rather than the absolute amount of money available.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has many billions, but the probability of getting a grant is very low due to the huge overproduction of biology Ph.D.'s consequently researchers and would be researchers spend enormous amounts of time writing grant proposals, most of which are turned down.

https://nexus.od.nih.gov/all/2015/06/29/what-are-the-chances...

The success/award rates in the above article (about 18 percent) actually seem high. I have seen numbers as low as 9 percent in some articles.