/sci/ - Science & Math » Thread #12837365

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Is there really any meaningful difference between mathematical, and theoretical physics?

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 18:54:11 2021 No.12837365 View Reply Original Report

Quoted By: >>12838036 >>12838092 >>12838689 >>12839752

I look at guys like Penorse and Witten and I dont really get what differentiates themselves from regular theoretical physicists

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 18:55:52 No.12837380 Report

Quoted By: >>12837692 >>12838068

Physicists will NEVER be mathematicians.
most mathematicians could trivially be physicists as a pass time.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 19:57:37 No.12837692 Report

Quoted By: >>12838044 >>12838076

>>12837380
>most mathematicians could trivially be physicists as a pass time.
breh, the mutilation physicists commit regularly to mathematics make me want to avoid the field like the plague

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 21:15:32 No.12838036 Report

Quoted By: >>12838695

>>12837365

Most of what theoretical physicists do has nothing to do with physics.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 21:17:31 No.12838044 Report

Quoted By:

>>12837692
It would honestly be a waste of a good mathematician's time.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 21:25:40 No.12838068 Report

Quoted By: >>12838772

>>12837380
First year math undergrads in my university share a newtonian mechanics course with us and regularly fail, about 80% of them. They also have the chance to take GR or QM with us as an elective course, and fail even more spectacularly, in the 90+% range. Being able to manipulate equations and quickly understand the maths is not a replacement for true physical intuition and a way to relate maths in physics with the physical reality it describes.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 21:27:16 No.12838076 Report

Quoted By: >>12838687

>>12837692
cope, mathfag

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 21:30:39 No.12838092 Report

Quoted By: >>12838648

>>12837365
Ignore all the retards above. Theoretical physicists are more concerned with looking at physical models and deriving testable predictions from those models. Mathematical physicists are more interested in the underlying mathematical structure of such models. For instance a theoretical physicist would be using Hilbert operators to come up with explanations of some phenomena in quantum mechanics, whereas a mathematical physicist would be interested in Hilbert operators as mathematical objects on their own. The latter is more "meta" if you will. It is true that the line is a bit blurred, but the truth is, if you call yourself a theoretical physicist and don't know math, you're like a poet who doesn't know the language he writes poems in. So all these distinctions are artificial at the end of the day.

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 23:46:56 No.12838648 Report

Quoted By: >>12838708

>>12838092
no, this cant be the case. There must be something more to it than that. Otherwise, what would be the point of having the distinction?

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 23:56:24 No.12838687 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838076

Did you get that from this paper? https://vixra.org/abs/2102.0169

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 23:57:00 No.12838689 Report

Quoted By:

>>12837365
imo mathematical physics is a subdivision of theoretical physics. i see it as mathematical physics study theories just to see what they can do with it (eg: studying thousands of variations of random QFTs), with little regard to physical implications. as opposed to phenomenology where you take a theory and extract predictions.
however, you hardly find a physics paper without a predictions section nor a paper without any maths, it's a spectrum and the more autstic you are the more abstract you get
(hep btw)

Anonymous

Anonymous Mon 15 Mar 2021 23:57:51 No.12838695 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838036
show me jimmy, where did the stringy bois touch you?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:00:52 No.12838708 Report

Quoted By: >>12838740

>>12838648
There is no point. Have you ever heard someone complain about them being called a theoretical physicist instead of a mathematical physicist and correct people? These semi-formal titles are not as important as you think. What matter is the research that scholar publishes, not some tag he embellishes on himself.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:08:25 No.12838740 Report

Quoted By: >>12838781 >>12838787 >>12838821

>>12838708
I've seen a mathematical physicist insist he be considered both a mathematician and a physicist, so yes, I have seen exactly that.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:13:43 No.12838772 Report

Quoted By: >>12838862

>>12838068
So physics really is harder than pure math since pure math is just math and physics requires more intuition?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:14:46 No.12838781 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838740
Keyed

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:15:47 No.12838787 Report

Quoted By: >>12839126

>>12838740
Kek, that guys sounds like a fag

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:22:53 No.12838821 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838740
Well would a biophysicist be considered a biologist or a physicist, or both? Or would a mathematical biologist be a considered mathematician or a biologist or both?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:34:45 No.12838862 Report

Quoted By: >>12838878 >>12838926

>>12838772
No. They're two different activities. Pure math is hard. Theoretical physics is hard. They're somewhat comparable but not really unless we're talking mathematical physics vs theoretical, which is literally just two sides of the same coin

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:40:06 No.12838878 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838862
Can you compare the difficulty between other fields? Like between physics and biology? Or physics and sociology?

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 00:51:01 No.12838926 Report

Quoted By: >>12839951

>>12838862
Che’s is harder than either of them at the highest level

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 01:51:54 No.12839126 Report

Quoted By:

>>12838787
he was a chill old Russian dude
it wasn't like he made a big deal of it, but someone asked and he said he considered himself both since he gets published in physics and math journals.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 05:23:22 No.12839752 Report

Quoted By:

>>12837365
Mathematical physicists are the ones who do the actual math in physics and theoretical physicists are the ones who are concerned with the models and are usually the ones who actually write the journal articles. A usual journal article will be have been contributed by both a mathematical physicist and a theoretical physicist.

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 06:35:09 No.12839951 Report

Quoted By: >>12841794

>>12838926

El Arcón

El Arcón Tue 16 Mar 2021 06:56:17 No.12839991 Report

Quoted By: >>12841785

Mathematical physics uses rigor. Theoretical physics just uses math.

Anonymous

Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 17:42:53 No.12841785 Report

Quoted By:

>>12839991
its actually the other way around

Anonymous

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Anonymous Tue 16 Mar 2021 17:43:56 No.12841794 Report

Quoted By:

>>12839951

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