Incidently, the idea that “a theory of everything” will come along and “end physics” is a complete myth: the human imagination will always find something new to explore within physics and mathematics, some new aspect, consequence, interpretation or application.

So many scientists are earning a living and having fun trying to advance our theories of the universe. If someone comes along and publishes a (manifestly) correct theory of everything, then bang, game over. Time for a career change.

Of course, if the correct theory of everything has useful practical applications, then we might be poorer for not knowing it right now… but I very much doubt that.

Ah yes, but this hypothetical Indonesian also happens to be a traditionalist Muslim with very strong views on the place of women, see. ;^) Let’s throw in badly broken English and plentiful spellling errors for good measure. Imagine somebody like the early Srinivasa Ramanujan, just… more so; I have this notion that the next great towering figure in physics is likely to be from the “third” world, to use an obsolete and un-PC term (on purely statistical grounds if nothing else, but I also have cultural factors in mind) and that he (or she, though statistics favour it being a “he”) is most definitely likely to be an outsider, like his predecessors. Would somebody fitting this description really stand a reasonable chance of getting his work published in the current system? If not, and I’m afraid the answer indeed is not, we have a problem.

If, on the other hand, there is anyone out there who thinks they are the next Einstein, but really they are just a crackpot, don’t bother; I get things like that all the time. Sadly, the real next-Einsteins only come along once per century, whereas the crackpots are far too common.

p.s. Risa and JoAnne are also nice people, even if they are of a different gender.

I wonder. Maybe the way it used to work in the past, but after the introduction of the current endorsement system,

http://arxiv.org/help/endorsement

would he even have been able to get his papers uploaded? Who would he have asked, and who would have agreed to endorse him? Approaching people he didn’t know personally, he would have had to show them his work first – and run the obvious risk of it being stolen. It would have been the word of a professor against that of a total unknown.

Turn it around: suppose there is some new Einstein out there, right now, with the Ultime Unified Theory all LaTeX-ed up and ready to publish. Alas, he is not in academia; he works at the Indoesian Patent Office. What should he do?

Sean, suppose he came across this site and got the idea that you, or Mark, or Clifford seem like nice people whom he could ask for endorsement on the arxiv. So he takes a chance and sends you a mail asking for endorsement. What would you do?

He would have loved it while he was deep in umbrage at having his paper rejected. But then he wouldn’t have had the chance to correct his reasoning before publication, and his error would have been common knowledge. It might have been a short-lived affair.

I strongly feel that peer review should be rigorous but fair. Ideally, papers should be judged without bias as regards to the sex, race, country or home institution of the authors. In this regard, I think referees should get just a manuscript with no name or affiliation so that it is judged purely on the contents, i.e double-blind reviewing. I also feel there is a danger that if peer review is too conservative and rigid that important new ideas will get strangled at birth. Often very important new ideas can emerge in an incomplete or confused form, with a deeper and clearer understanding coming later, and allowances must be made for that. I think the arxiv serves a very important function in this respect though.

I talk about what I think peer review should look like in the last part of math.HO/0210144.

The Convergence of Digital-Libraries and the Peer-Review Process
cs.DL/0504084

In any case, I’d love to see ten pages in a referee report, nowadays.