In a thoughtful article in Nature, Aix–Marseille University physicist Carlo Rovelli critiques the constant buzz we hear about how new theories in physics are poised to overturn everything we think we know.

You know the sort of thing: “New findings hint that we may be living in a multiverse” or “Physicist: String theory confirmation just a matter of time” or “New study suggests that there are a million Earths, mathematician says”… They are probably all papers somewhere.

Rovelli is not having it:

Much theoretical research in fundamental physics during this time has focused on the search ‘beyond’ our best theories: beyond the standard model of particle physics, beyond the general theory of relativity, beyond quantum theory. But an epochal sequence of experimental results has proved many such speculations unfounded, and confirmed physics that I learnt at school half a century ago.

“Is bad philosophy holding back physics?,” May 15, 2025

So What’s Really Happening?

He offers, as an example, the celebrated 2012 discovery of the particle known as the Higgs boson. It did not revolutionize the Standard Model of the physics of the universe but rather confirmed it: “Meanwhile, the apparent absence of evidence for ‘supersymmetric’ particles in LHC data has disappointed a generation of theoretical physicists who had bet on such particles existing, motivated by speculative theories, including string theory.”

It’s the same with the first direct detection of gravitational waves and the observation of the fusion of two neutron stars in 2015: “In one fell swoop, this excluded a huge domain of theories beyond general relativity.” The 2020 Nobel for Physics went to work showing that “black holes were in complete agreement with general relativity.” And the 2022 Nobel for Physics went to work that “ verified phenomena such as quantum entanglement over great distances.”

These discoveries, as Rovelli says, while treated as groundbreaking advances in physics, mainly confirm what we already knew. There is nothing wrong with that. Science advances as much when current theories are honestly confirmed as honestly disconfirmed. But the breathless headlines misrepresent the picture.

Why Is There Such a Big Demand?

Rovelli thinks that bad philosophy lies behind the demand for new theories that overturn old ones. He points to misinterpretations of the work of science philosophers Thomas Kuhn (1922–1996) and Karl Popper (1902–1994):

Superficial readings of Popper and Kuhn, I think, have encouraged several assumptions that have misled a good deal of research: one, that past knowledge is not a good guide for the future and that new theories must be fished from the sky; and two, that all theories that have not yet been falsified should be considered equally plausible and in equal need of being tested.

“Holding back physics?”

He stresses that few if any major advances in physics spring from arbitrary hypotheses; they come from observations of new data or inconsistencies in current data:

‘Revolutions’ in the history of fundamental physics are thus more conservative than they are often depicted. Kuhn’s emphasis on discontinuity has led many scientists to devalue the relevance of past knowledge in making sense of what we do not yet know. Popper’s emphasis on falsifiability, meanwhile, originally intended only as a criterion for demarcating a scientific theory, has been misinterpreted as legitimizing the idea that all speculation is equally plausible.

“Holding back physics?”

True Challenges for Physics

Rovelli is not saying that fundamental physics faces no challenges. He cites the unknown nature of dark matter and what happens when quantum gravity cannot be ignored: “ … these two open issues are based not on speculations about possibilities beyond what we know, but on actual phenomena we do not understand.”

But he thinks that they may be resolvable in terms of known physics, rather than “guessing new physics.”

In short, he is asking for a more “conservative” approach than the breathless headlines produce:

It has at times been fashionable to say in theoretical physics that there is a lack of sufficiently wild, completely new ideas. But perhaps the problem is physicists running too much after wild new ideas. New knowledge will come when new data are shown truly not to fit with what we know; or by reflecting in depth on what established theories, such as general relativity and quantum theory, imply when taken together.

“Holding back physics?”

Another Explanation for the Hype?

Far be it from a news hack like me to contradict a physicist/philosopher but I would like to add something. 

Many thinkers are troubled by the massive evidence for fine-tuning of our universe. They want to believe that a multiverse — an infinite number of universes — just popped into existence out there and many of them randomly appear fine-tuned. They want to believe it so badly that they are overjoyed by any new physics that appears to point in that direction.

Besides that, they want time travel, advanced extraterrestrial civilizations, and the like… They will never give up on the quest and will interpret any new finding in terms of whether or not it advances that goal. That won’t change and the best solution is probably to treat most claims they air — because they raise such hopes — with a helping of salt.

At least in principle, a cosmos fine-tuned by an intelligent designer might feature a multiverse, advanced aliens, or even, under some circumstances, time travel. But the people who follow up every suggestion that the Standard Model will be overturned probably don’t want any of that if they have to accept the intelligent designer. For them, it’s just no good if it doesn’t happen randomly. So we will continue to hear much from the fans of “beyond physics,” which is always just around the corner, just out of sight.

Cross-posted at Mind Matters News.