I think, we are getting a peak at the politics of the practice of science when you look at the article and comments, like this ones parent.
A bunch of this is about the unobserved. The theoretical rather than then experimentally observed (think scientific method).
Whose theories get the funding to be looked into? Whose ideas are published and talked about in the popular places?
A post of Sabine's talked about how she thinks the crisis in physics isn't about physics [1]. Is it instead about the politics of the money and popularity? Is it about the psychology of being wrong? I mean, different physicists contradict each other and the truth isn't what's popular it is what's observed, right? If people contradict each other they can't all be right.
What's most interesting, to me, is how this isn't about what's been observed but all those human system qualities that people bring to the table.
[1] https://backreaction.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-crisis-in-phys...
But instead, the way it works is a consensus is built. Researcher Bob - "We see that A=Foo." Researcher Sally -"Well, I see that A=Bar." Researcher Timmy - "Well, I see that A=Far." Researcher Kimmy - "Well, I see it as A=Fbar." Community over time - "Now the community has seen that A=Fbar is consistently correct and can be relied upon and used." 20 years pass... Researcher Jeff - "Well, I see that Ab=Fbar actually." Community - "That's bullshit." Researcher Betty - "Well, actually I see that too. But I see Ab=FbarC". etc etc
Since we don't know what we don't know, it isn't really a "We're done!" situation for someone to get 100% correct, it's a process of evolution in knowledge.
I think part of this is that scientists don't "see" as in observe these things. Instead they "think that" something is the case. And, they have math and ideas to back that up.
If we had repeatable observation of the things it would be much harder to make disagreeing arguments.
If you see a shimmer in a desert, does that mean there's an oasis?
A good book (or two) for this is Isabel Stenger's Cosmopolitics 1 and 2.
She goes into a lot of physics debates from the 20th century, along with a lot of the political debates
To add to your point, scientists have been chasing inconsistencies exactly like Sabine said. They’re chasing dark matter, dark energy, quantum gravity, early universe cosmology, naturalness (arguable; more of a theoretical inconsistency), and quantum foundations (smaller effort).
So I don’t see the point of vague allusions to the philosophy of science. If anyone has a concrete proposal---inspired from philosophy or whatever else, doesn’t matter---the proposal will typically be treated on its merits. Modulo caveats about humans being humans and all that.
Experimentally, people continue to hammer away at the Standard Model (and gravity, my specialty), and the paradigm continues to hold. With few exceptions, most ideas from 40 years ago have been put to significant tests and turned out not to be how Nature operates.
From a theory standpoint, without new guidance from us, theorists are forced to attempt to out-think Nature, which is extremely hard to do. Smolin may be bummed, but theorists can take solace in the fact that the problem is extremely difficult.
In the particular case of quantum-mechanics, the day that theorists divine a compelling way that one interpretation of QM makes a prediction that differs from that of another interpretation is the day that an experimentalist starts building a test to find out which one is true.
In a way it is a meta-science because you need to find a methodology to evaluate which theory, when proven or disproven has the most impact.
I would imagine that the current working method would be to look at how often theoretical physicists cite a specific theoretical result/paper and hence "popularity" is the prioritization mechanism.
If a large cadre of highly educated people find a particular theoretical mechanism sufficiently compelling to dedicate their careers and time to it, then surely that's a good basis on which to develop experiments to try and confirm whether it's right? Because the benefit of proving it wrong means they'll reallocate their resources.
Presumably the economical cost of the experiments are higher at this point then the resource-allocation of that cadre of highly educated people.
It's worth thinking about, but not sure if there is a viable alternative methodology to be found
Thirty spokes, there is a hub. When it is free, it is used for cars. I think it is a device, when it is free, it is used for devices. Profit, useless.
Proof of mine: https://i.imgur.com/hb428NI.png
[1] DECEARING EGG comes to mind. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-rfBsWmo0M
Edit: As someone else has now mentioned, it's the difference between leaving the quotes(「 and 」) on the ends or not. So it is just the translate AI being weird as usual.
Thirty spokes share the wheel's hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.
Tao Te Ching - Lao Tzu - chapter 11
"Thirty spokes, there is a hub. When it is free, it is used for cars. I think it is a device, when it is free, it is used for devices. Profit, useless. "
I feel this answer is a bit of a self justifying cop-out. A lot of the value of physics from the perspective of society has been generating understanding about the world that actually translates into manipulating the world.
Reaching the moon, superfast internet, gps, microwaves, etc... etc..
You are not wrong of course, but knowledge for the sake of knowledge is not always useful, and also not always worth funding imo.
We have been looking really hard for answers to persistent questions. While we have not found affirmative answers, physicists have systematically ruled out option after option after option. We have not yet discovered a unified-theory-of-everything, but we know a whole lot more about what that theory is not.
Furthermore, the past 40 years have seen the emergence of precision cosmology (and the dark-matter/energy paradigm that it entails), the observation and confirmation of neutrino oscillation, the detection of gravitational waves (and the nuclear physics revolution that has begun with GW170817), SN1987A, and so much more.
The coming decades are poised to learn so much more, a lot of it from the stars. GAIA, LISA, updated terrestrial GW detectors, LSST/Rubin, TMT, SKA, and more are all poised to tell us much more about things we don't understand. Particle physics will move forward too, though it is uncertain how quickly. The right breakthrough in wakefield accelerators, though, could be transformative.
Thirty spokes share the wheel's hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.
Tao Te Ching - Lao Tzu - chapter 11