The Space Case
"A generation lost in space"
— Don McLean, "American Pie"
Last night's post discussed Jim Dodge's fictional vision of a "spherical diamond" related to physics.
For some background, see Poetry and Physics (April 25, 2011).
That post quotes a July 2008 New Yorker article —
By Benjamin Wallace-Wells, contributing editor at Rolling Stone
and sometime writer on space—
“There’s a dream that underlying the physical universe is some beautiful mathematical structure, and that the job of physics is to discover that,” Smolin told me later. “The dream is in bad shape,” he added. “And it’s a dream that most of us are like recovering alcoholics from.” Lisi’s talk, he said, “was like being offered a drink.”
Or a toke.
"Now John at the bar is a friend of mine
He gets me my drinks for free
And he's quick with a joke or to light up your smoke
But there's someplace that he'd rather be"
— Billy Joel, "Piano Man"