partly right, but not even wrong

"In the face of silence...,we are left with theories."
-St. Cathleen Falsani / The Dude Abides


Peter Woit's working conclusion about string theory is hugely helpful to church/culture shift.
No surprise, as God has been speaking to us in ekklesia about ekklesia, from the parellel and dovetail discipline of physics (see

"Christianity as a branch of physics").

The whole modern-postmodern pregnant parenthesis wer are in is basically the same story as the relativity>quantum; Newtonian>postNewtonian morph.

The conclusion is basically that string theory is inevitably partly right (that is if it exists)...
but, as in his title, "not even wrong."

From the back cover (emphasis mine):

Peter Woit shows that what many physicists call "superstring theory" is not a theory at all, but an unrealized hope that a theory exists. In his view, superstring theory has departed the realm of testable hypothesis and now resembles something like speculation, even theology--it makes no predictions, even wrong ones.

I also love the New Scientist review of the book from (emphasis mine):

"A call to arms for physicists to pursue multiple paths in search of truth, not funding."

If we only realized that Emergent/emerging, emergissional, or whatever we are and tend to trust in is not the Final Answer; the coveted Theory of Everything (see Mike's rude toejam here)...
...at least in its perfect form).
It may not even be a theory yet..if ever.
They/We may not even be predicting predictions.

Yet we intuit we are partly right in this wineskin; as any means of mixing/mashing small and large worlds/groups/networks is a Kingdom thing. Just as Sexy String Theory as currently defined seems to be the best model we have for making sense of small/micro (quantum) and large/macro ), so the creative forms and norms many are testing these days (cell and celebration; house church and city church, etc) are good places to be.

Maybe we don't need an emerging string theory; we just need a Spirited "whack on the side of the head."

Woit even addresses

the set of units sometimes revered to 'God-given' units, or 'natural' units...(which) are chosen to take advantage of basic features of special relativity and quantum mechanics, getting rid as much as possible constraints..(5-6)

All I want to do is take holy and wholly advantage of all things "naturally" or literally "God-given." Eschewing a reductionist version of Hegelian synthesis; or an old school mainline
line of skubala ("The millenium/heaven-on earth has arrived, and we have created it."). We might even have enough to work from if all we have is Jesus...and a sur-theoretical/pre-theorectical predilection for praxis and liminality.

If only we really did pursue multiple paths in search of truth, not funding. Mammon (and his twin Aphrodite) may be the only false god we ultimately wrestle with. Hmm, money and sex. Isn't that prostitution?
Ask Eugene Peterson sometime about pastors "whoring after other gods."