Normal science expands knowledge by theories based on assumed axioms but sometimes scientific revolutions called paradigm shifts alter those axioms (Kuhn, 1970). The history of science then consists of long periods of normal science punctuated by occasional paradigm shifts that change its foundations.
For example, Euclid’s axiom that parallel lines can’t converge was accepted for two thousand years until it was realized that on curved surfaces like the earth, parallel longitudes do converge at the poles. Changing that axiom allowed hyper-geometries that work on curved surfaces, so Euclid’s geometry was just the special case of a flat surface. Einstein’s relativity was another paradigm shift that made Newtonian mechanics a special case. Science then sometimes advances by improving its axioms.
What then are good axioms? They are those that predict more than one fact (Chaitin, 2006) to let theories based on a few axioms predict many facts. Ignoring this criterion by adding a new axiom for every new fact increases size not success, just as putting a shack on every new plot of land gives a shanty town not a city. Theories that produce a lot of knowledge using a few axioms are like towers that produce a lot of value on a small plot of land. A paradigm shift is then needed when theory isn’t increasing knowledge, and particle physics today is in this category, as:
“One experiment after another is returning null results: No new particles, no new dimensions, no new symmetries.” (Hossenfelder, 2018).
As new facts were discovered, new particles were invented to explain them, so particles increased but not their predictions. Gravitons were invented to explain gravity but they predicted nothing new. Massive field particles were invented to explain neutron decay but again predicted nothing new, and a Higgs particle was needed to explain their mass, but it also led nowhere. Particle physics became more complex but hasn’t made a breakthrough in decades, which suggests a paradigm shift is needed.
The shift proposed is to base physics on quantum waves not the particles of physicalism. This change seems radical but disruptive innovations are often the price of progress (Sandström, 2010). Yet the disruption isn’t great, as Schrödinger’s equation for example still works but just describes what exists not what doesn’t. The benefit is that physics can advance, just as astronomy did when it stopped making the earth the center of the universe, but both cases require us to stop believing that we already know.