Volevo sottoporvi questo interessante estratto da un recente articolo, in
cui vengono confrontate le differenze culturali tra due categorie di
scienziati i fisici delle alte energie e gli astrofisici.
The two cultures
Astrophysics and high-energy physics have a number of common features.
Neither has any direct application to everyday life, even if their
instrumental and computational needs sometimes lead to significant
technological spin-offs.
Both deal with phenomena on scales which differ vastly from those of normal
human experience. Both require very expensive equipment. Despite this, the
research communities in the two fields differ notably in their attitudes,
in their motivations, in their modi operandi, and in the value systems by
which they judge their work.
Astrophysics aims to understand the structure and behaviour of inherently
complex systems and as a result is interdisciplinary and synthetic in
character. An intuitive feeling for the interplay between phenomena from
many areas of physics is needed, for example, to model the formation of a
galaxy. High-energy physics, in contrast, is reductionist, aiming to
break phenomena down into ever more fundamental and more abstract entities,
discarding along the way complexities which may mask the underlying Truth.
Thus astrophysicists tend to be generalists, prizing breadth of knowledge,
while high-energy physicists tend to be specialists, prizing the depth to
which they probe the underlying structure of matter.
In experimental work astrophysicists seek many truths associated with many
phenomena, and the best forefront research is characterised by diversity
and opportunism. In particle physics the quest for the fundamental Truth
has led to a focus on a much smaller number of `important' questions (the
origin of mass, the unification of quantum mechanics and general
relativity...) and to the organisation of industrial-strength teams to
address them. New insights in astrophysical research appeal on many levels,
intellectual, emotional and aesthetic, but they rarely display the quasi-
mathematical rigour of major advances in particle physics such as the
understanding of asymptotic freedom or of the Higgs mechanism.
Astrophysicists are universalists, democratic in perceiving interest in all
aspects of the cosmos, while highenergy physicists are fundamentalists,
cleaving to the pursuit of the single Truth.
Saluti,
Aleph
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Received on Tue Feb 17 2009 - 12:33:49 CET