#doingscience

If you studied physics in high school, it's not as hard as it seems. If you studied physics at university, it's much harder than it seems.

Some people have stories about an inspiring teacher who introduced them to their life’s passion. My story is different: I became a physicist due to a famously bad teacher. My high school was, in general, a good place to learn science, but physics was the exception. The teacher at the time had a bad reputation, and while I don’t remember exactly why I do remember his students didn’t end up…

Particle physicists have a weird relationship to journals. We publish all our results for free on a website called the arXiv, and when we need to read a paper that’s the first place we look. But we still submit our work to journals, because we need some way to vouch that we’re doing good work. Explicit numbers (h-index, impact factor) are falling out of favor, but we still need to demonstrate…

Halloween is coming up, so let’s talk about the most prominent monster of the physics canon, the nightmare scenario. Not to be confused with the D&D Nightmare, which once was a convenient source of infinite consumable items for mid-level characters. Right now, thousands of physicists search for more information about particle physics beyond our current Standard Model. They look at data from the…

When biologists tell stories of their childhoods, they’re full of trails of ants and fireflies in jars. Lots of writers start young, telling stories on the playground and making skits with their friends. And the mere existence of “chemistry sets” tells you exactly how many chemists get started. Many fields have these “gateway hobbies”, like gateway drugs for careers, ways that children and…

The Winding Path of a Physics Conversation

In my line of work, I spend a lot of time explaining physics. I write posts here of course, and give the occasional public lecture. I also explain physics when I supervise Master’s students, and in a broader sense whenever I chat with my collaborators or write papers. I’ll explain physics even more when I start teaching. But of all the ways to explain physics, there’s one that has always been my…

Physical Intuition From Physics Experience

One of the most mysterious powers physicists claim is physical intuition. Let the mathematicians have their rigorous proofs and careful calculations. We just need to ask ourselves, “Does this make sense physically?” It’s tempting to chalk this up to bluster, or physicist arrogance. Sometimes, though, a physicist manages to figure out something that stumps the mathematicians. Edward Witten’s work…