He's been around since at least the early 00's and was on just about every pop-sci show or documentary. Even ones that had nothing to do with physics (for example, see @Spike's comment about him perpetuating the myth about humans not evolving anymore). I'm not sure why he made the rounds more than any other pop-sci talking head, but I suspect because he was actually the worst available option when it came to explaining concepts because everything he said was just one cliched soundbite after another.
He was also vehemently anti-nuclear power during the last decade or so in which that could have made a difference in climate change, so I kind of low key resent him
No it didn't, it dominated theoretical high energy physics, but that's not even close where most theorical research went. Condensed matter theorists and biophysics theorists dominated theoretical physics realistically. Hell, that's probably the reason why the Higgs boson discovery was fundamentally based on existing theoretical work within condensed matter physics.
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I regret to inform you about the field of economics.
He's been around since at least the early 00's and was on just about every pop-sci show or documentary. Even ones that had nothing to do with physics (for example, see @Spike's comment about him perpetuating the myth about humans not evolving anymore). I'm not sure why he made the rounds more than any other pop-sci talking head, but I suspect because he was actually the worst available option when it came to explaining concepts because everything he said was just one cliched soundbite after another.
He was also vehemently anti-nuclear power during the last decade or so in which that could have made a difference in climate change, so I kind of low key resent him
Not since 1989 and the End of History. Everything stopped happening because the Good Guys Won.
String theory dominated theoretical physics research for a few decades before falling by the wayside.
No it didn't, it dominated theoretical high energy physics, but that's not even close where most theorical research went. Condensed matter theorists and biophysics theorists dominated theoretical physics realistically. Hell, that's probably the reason why the Higgs boson discovery was fundamentally based on existing theoretical work within condensed matter physics.
Sorry, I meant theoretical foundational physics research.