Thursday 31.10.2019 16:00 — 18:00
Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics

Lecture by Sabine Hossenfelder: Beautiful Theories

In the past 40 years physicists have come to rely on criteria of beauty like  "naturalness" and "elegance" to develop new theories of nature. In my talk, I will briefly explain what these criteria are, how they have become common use, and why they can be in the way of progress. I will then discuss why, despite these problems, physicists continue to use these arguments nevertheless.