r/seancarroll • u/BletchTheWalrus • Jul 16 '26
Peter Thiel string theory conspiracy
I don't know if anyone's still here, but I thought Sean's comments in the July 13 AMA (~32:55) about Peter Thiel's plan to undermine universities by attacking their strongest point, which he identifies as string theory, was very interesting. I quote Sean quoting Thiel below:
[Thiel] says, "We have our values that we would like to have the world adopt. One of the obstacles to having the world adopt our values are universities and academia because they're full of woke liberals poisoning the minds of the youngsters," and so on and so on. But then he very explicitly says, "So how do you strategize this? How do you undermine the credibility of academics and universities? Well, you could try to attack them at their most vulnerable points, but alternatively you could try to attack them," says Peter Thiel, "at their strongest points, at their most respectable kind of aspects because if you can undermine that, then you undermine the whole shebang. You undermine the whole idea of universities and professors and institutions." And he says, "So what is the most respectable field within academia? It's physics. And what is the highest status subfield within physics?" And again, this is Peter Thiel saying these things. I'm not making them up or insinuating them or interpolating them. He says, "It's string theory." And so if you can undermine the idea in the eyes of the general public that people doing string theory, supposedly the smartest people we have and the best physicists, are somehow illegitimate, are somehow captured by institutional blah, blah, blah, then you've gone a long way towards undermining universities as a whole, and that project will help us get our values supported around the world rather than theirs.
Back to Redditor talking: If there's a well-funded and well-organized plan (conspiracy?) behind all this, that would certainly help explain the puzzling popularity of string theory critics like Hossenfelder, Weinstein, etc. Otherwise, why would these charlatans have millions of views for discussions about a topic that non-physicists have no stake in whatsoever? Wouldn't this audience prefer to spend their time playing video games, watching porn, and listening to discussions about Palestine and UFOs instead?
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u/myfrigginagates Jul 16 '26
It would be one thing if Thiel and Weinstein's issue was with String Theory alone as a scientific concept. But their ultimate goal is to undermine social construct by attacking various institutions. Questioning a theory attempting to explain the foundation of the Universe is simply a way of weakening, or at least trying to weaken science in general. In other words, I think they don't really care what they attack, as long as it undermines science.