Failed and Incomplete Theories

Abstract The standard model and general relativity explain many experiments and observations, but they don’t explain everything. Because of this, scientists try to figure out additional connections between seemingly unrelated phenomena. The goal of this is to find a single theory which explains everything. Over the last century, scientists have used patterns they’ve observed to help work out unappreciated laws. These patterns led to the creation of the standard model in the 1960s. Similar approaches have been followed in the last half-century, hoping to extend the theory, but these attempts have failed. In addition, researchers have proposed the theories of superstrings and quantum gravity as candidate future theories. No theory proposed so far has succeeded in explaining everything, but this chapter explains the effort. It concludes with a metaphor that shows why hopes of a quick development of a theory of everything are likely to fail.