The dangers of non-empirical confirmation
arXiv:1609.01966
Abstract
In the book "String Theory and the Scientific Method", Richard Dawid describes a few of the many non-empirical arguments that motivate theoretical physicists' confidence in a theory, taking string theory as case study. I argue that excessive reliance on non-empirical evidence compromises the reliability of science, and that precisely the case of string theory well illustrates this danger.
2 pages. Contribution to the meeting "Why Trust a Theory? Reconsidering Scientific Methodology in Light of Modern Physics," Munich, Dec. 7-9, 2015