What are your thoughts on this recent preprint, 2610.16733? They seemed to show how Frontier AI agents tackled unpublished research-level theoretical physics problems, and suggest such problems might no longer be suitable as first projects for PhD students.

I'm especially curious how this will overall affect prospective grad students and early-career researchers in theoretical physics.

Also, recalling Dr. Schwartz (u/VibePhysics) saying in his Anthropic post Vibe Physics:

It is worth it, however, to consider the role of education going forward. In the deep future (~10 years), when AI is truly smarter than all of us and capable of outperforming us in every domain, what will be the role of higher education? I think some things will persist—those things that are essentially human. I can easily imagine theoretical physics becoming like music theory or French literature: an academic discipline appealing to people who just enjoy thinking through a certain lens. It's a bit ironic that the last 30 years have seen the growth of STEM fields, displacing the humanities, and in the end it may be the humanities are all that survive.

Do you agree with him on this specific thoughts? And what concerns or hopes do you have about where our fields in theoretical physics are heading?

okay so Im a 2nd year cse student and I'm passionate about physics. I initially saw the kavan gravity sim on youtube and wanted to recreate it.I started working on this 2 months back. I had to learn c++,opengl, make this in 2D (freespace and earths gravity) and a little bit of GR. Although low level programming is a pain in the ass, I had alot of fun making this.

working: The engine runs a dual-layer loop: a physics solver updates the 2D positions of the bodies gravitational forces while a vertex generation pass simultaneously warps the underlying 3D wireframe mesh downward along the Y-axis using the gravitational potential. This keeps the planets orbiting smoothly on a flat plane while the grid dynamically bends around them in real-time to simulate relativistic spacetime curvature.

future improvements: I would love to make this more accurate (physics wise) and add textures after i improve my opengl skills.maybe even make the central star a raytracer :)

Hey, I was wondering if anyone would be willing to chat one on one and help me with the dilemma I am having. I’m studying mechanical engineering technology at Algonquin college right now (Ottawa Canada) (first year) and I’m enjoying engineering, but I’ve had this dilemma in my head for the past year or two about if I should do engineering or physics? As of late I’ve been really thinking about it and it’s been nagging at me. When I think of the idea of physics/astronomy/astrophyiscs, it just gives me the excitement I can’t describe. I’ve been really thinking about it and really considering applying to a physics program in Canada (I was looking at queens university). I personally want to work in aerospace but I also want to research in physics.

This may sound weird but a younger friend mentioned that they might study physics next year and the second I heard that I got a feeling of i guess jealousy (not in a bad way, I mean like “man I should be doing that”).

It’s eating away at me because I don’t want to get far into my studies and then end up realizing I should’ve done physics.

I was hoping to chat with people who are in physics undergraduate’s, masters or phd’s. I’d like to learn more about studying itself and if people could help develop ideas so I could figure out a plan on what I should do. This has really been eating away at me and I feel like physics is what I should be doing, but I want to be sure. Can someone please help🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 (or if someone wanted to comment things I should look into (ie: career goals, courses, etc..) or anything that I should consider when making this decision, please let me know).

Here it is. Hope you like it :)

https://youtu.be/N86IOd6nYvo

I was recently doing contract work in a university physics lab and they had these on display. The folks in the office had no idea what they are. Can anyone here enlighten me?

As we all know dark matter is called as such because it doesn’t emit nor interact with any electromagnetic radiation, so is completly invisible to human eye.
But what would I experience if I had, for example, a 2 Kg ball of it on the palm of my hand ? Since it does interact with the gravitational field, I would surely feel its mass hence some kind of pressure, but what else ? Just an invisible weight ? Would my tactile receptors be activated or not ?

Thank you very much.

Hi, everyone! I had a great conversation with Geraint F. Lewis, a Welsh astrophysicist and Professor at the University of Sydney, about some of the biggest questions in cosmology and physics.

We explore what the Big Bang theory tells us about the beginning of the universe, and how neutrinos could reveal secrets about the cosmos — including why matter exists at all. He mentions the 2026 Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded to Francis Halzen for his work on the IceCube Neutrino Observatory.

Professor Lewis also talks about what sparked the Scientific Revolution, how modern science transformed our understanding of the world, and why Einstein challenged aspects of quantum mechanics.

His latest book, The Shortest History of Reality: From Plato’s Cave to the Mind-Bending Discoveries of Modern Physics — The Human Quest to Explain the World, traces humanity’s changing understanding of reality, from ancient philosophy to the discoveries of modern physics.

If you're interested in these subjects, you can check out our conversation, hope you find it insightful, he's a great communicator of these ideas: https://youtu.be/38rUHEeAVHw

Hello, everyone!

I'm 16, and I'm really interested in physics, especially quantum physics. I'd love to start learning the fundamentals before college.

What mathematics and physics topics should I study first? Also, could you recommend some beginner-friendly books for someone at my level?

Thanks in advance!

Hi everyone! I'm working on a packaging project for my logistics engineering course, and I'm looking for some advice.

I need to make packaging that can protect an egg from drops of different heights, while keeping it lightweight and cheap. Cardboard is one of the materials I'm considering, but I'm still figuring out how to approach the design.

I'd like to learn more about what makes packaging effective at absorbing impacts, what materials or structures are worth looking into, and what mistakes to avoid.

I'm not looking for a ready-made design, just some ideas and general advice to help me figure things out myself. Thanks!

For those of you who got As and Bs in physics and you’re not the age of 5 winning Nobel prizes how did you manage it? How did you manage to take the exams when they produce unfamiliar situations from the hours of homework provided to be able to solve them? I don’t know what my grade was for my first Physics 1 exam but man, I did all the homework, I generated quizzes, I taught fellow classmates, I went to office hours and the exam still hit me in the gut.

I get it, it’s normal. I’m sure the meme “First time here?” Applies well. But I really do want to get a good grade. Our teacher said that a better score on exam 2 will add points to exam one but honestly I don’t even know how to improve? The math isn’t even that difficult (yet) it’s setting up these damn systems in a way that makes sense. How to discern through the noise of a problem. It’s so disorienting

What’s the advice?

Hello, I am a black hole enthusiast high school student.

I have conducted research on calculating the eccentricity of the binary black hole inspiral phase using an N-body simulation Python library called REBOUNDx. However, upon completion of the research, I wanted to avoid relying on Python libraries to calculate the physics behind binary black holes. So I studied Newtonian physics and wrote code for the post-Newtonian corrections to make black hole inspiral simulations without the help of physics Python libraries. I have created a README that walks you through the physics behind the inspiral phase, and I hope to soon implement numerical relativity to simulate the merger phase of the binary black holes as well. I would greatly appreciate your feedback to improve my simulation! Specifically:

1. Are there any flaws in the physics behind my simulation?

2. Any tips for implementing numerical relativity for the merger phase?

Here is the repo: https://github.com/happyalex98/Binary-black-hole-inspiral-simulation-3.5PN-

Thank you all in advance!

I'm a science teacher and just got the Eisco motorized VDG. I didn't realize that the belt would be exposed, and I'd like to try to at least partially enclose it to lessen the effect of humidity on it, and also prevent kids from accidentally touching the belt.

I'm wondering what the best method for enclosing it would be: just plain plastic wrap? Tie a rubber sheet around it? Something else? I know I don't want to just tape up the sides and risk the sticky tape touching the belt.

I've included a photo of the belt apparatus for reference.

I'm a final-year undergrad at a large US university majoring in physics with an astrophysics concentration. I'm graduating in the spring, after which I will (ideally) be doing a short, coursework-based statistics master's, as I want to get a stronger background in that for many reasons. Scholarship money covers it all, yay.

Unfortunately, I am freaking out over what comes after that.

I've got a decent CV (institution research, one REU, 4.0, etc) but I know that PhD programs, especially in astronomy (the area I've done research in) are incredibly competitive, and that the life of a PhD student is uh...kinda miserable, from what I've gathered online, and that it doesn't really get better as you move on (grants, university funding, publish or perish, etc). I know I could also go into data science, what with my data-focused research experience and the stats master's, which would pay me a hell of a lot more than academia ever would, but data science jobs are hard to come by nowadays with AI and I have zero (0) work experience in that, so I certainly won't be an attractive candidate. My family's brought up maybe teaching at a high school level, which I could probably get the certs for in my home state with a bit of extra work, which would (in my home state) probably pay me enough to get by, but from what I've gathered online, being a teacher right now is kind of the worst decision you could possibly make and it will suck your soul out from your body. That seems unpleasant.

This is all compounded by the fact that my partner of 3 years who I am planning on staying with is a graphic design student. She's incredibly talented and is trying to get some personal work off the ground, but again, with image generating AI, the graphic design field is vanishing.

I guess my question is, if you guys were in my shoes, which risk would you take? It all seems like a crapshoot and that I'll never get a position no matter where I apply, and that I've wasted the past few years of my life getting a kind of useless degree.

Do you think fewer people are interested in pursuing physics nowadays because of the rise of AI and technology? It feels like a lot of people are more interested in computer science and AI, partly because of the career opportunities. I'm wondering if this could eventually lead to fewer people going into physics research, or if I'm just getting the wrong impression. What do you guys think?

Hello, I just started studying physics in my 1st year and I was curious just how intensive will my math classes be? I enjoy math as well and wanted to know how far will my physics degree training get me mathematically?

I am a PhD candidate at the University of New Mexico. A frequent topic of conversation among grad students here is just how bad the courses are, especially the non-elective courses. I was wondering if this is a universal experience or just UNM?

To be clear: by bad I don't mean they're really hard. Some non-elective classes are really hard; some are embarrassingly easy. What I am referring to is the fact that, in general, it is accepted that lectures will be poorly thought out and poorly delivered with many students seeing classes as a hurdle to overcome before you get to do research rather than something that prepares you to be a research scientist. I and others have found that usually students are best served just skipping lecture and learning the material on their own. As an example, I once skipped two months of lecture and just read a textbook and my grades and understanding of the material improved. The faculty seem vaguely aware of how rough the classes are, but don't really seem to care. This reaction from faculty makes me wonder just how common this is at other universities.

I am genuinely curious what other people's experiences are. I've been done with classes for a few semesters now, so this is not just a rant about a bad exam, and my grades in grad school have been very good, so it's not me trying to make excuses. Just a general question about the state of grad programs in the US or internationally.

How would you construct a good physics exam and what type of questions do you think are important to ask? Specifically thoughts on practice/application problems vs asking students to repeat a derivation. Traditionally I’ve seen professors who prefer testing with practice problems with applications and examples. I’ve also had professors who are weigh heavily on derivations and prefer asking students to derive formulas/equations on an exam and will weigh more on that. I want to know what value you see in both approaches and why you think either one is important and what your preferences are.

This thread is a dedicated thread for you to ask and answer questions about concepts in physics.

Homework problems or specific calculations may be removed by the moderators. We ask that you post these in /r/AskPhysics or /r/HomeworkHelp instead.

If you find your question isn't answered here, or cannot wait for the next thread, please also try /r/AskScience and /r/AskPhysics.