The original note, as written at the time
What if, instead of looking into higher dimensions in pursuit of greater science, we look deeper into the smaller dimensions that we have, to unveil the mysteries they contain? That is the line and the point.
Ongoing development
What if, instead of looking into higher dimensions in pursuit of greater science, we look deeper into the smaller dimensions we already have, to unveil the mysteries they contain.
This is a strategic argument about where the next physics is, and it is unfashionable in a way that makes it worth taking seriously.
The case for higher dimensions is that unification is beautiful and the mathematics works out. The case against it is empirical: decades of effort, no confirmed prediction, and a cost per experiment that has grown past what any single nation will fund.
The case for going smaller is that the small scale keeps producing surprises that turn into instruments. The behaviour of matter at very small scales has given us semiconductors, superconductors, and the entire imaging toolkit of modern medicine. It has paid for itself repeatedly, which is a different kind of argument from elegance.
And there is a materials argument that a builder should appreciate. Everything in this collection that is speculative — the inverse material, the magnetic brick, the nanobot film — is limited by what we can make at small scales. The road to the very large runs through the very small.
The risk is that “go smaller” becomes a slogan that funds more of the same. It should mean specific things: better microscopes, better control of surfaces, better understanding of what happens at an interface.
Look where the instruments are. That is where the next century is.