Now many people consider String Theory to either be too complicated to deal with at all or the mess Kitties make playing with a ball of yarn. Like most theories since Schrödinger's cat this is both true and not true at the same time.
The math is hard, but the concepts are not. Mostly even non-Rocket Scientists who do not believe in Creationism (Young or Old Earth) and deny Anthroprogenic Climate Change (feel like a moran, good, you should) can easily grasp the Special Theory of Relativity which among other things states there is a specific relationship between energy and mass (e=mc2). What most don't understand is that this theory is necessary because sometimes things (for instance atomic and sub-atomic entities like atoms and protons and neutrons and electrons) behave like waves (energy) and sometimes they behave like particles (mass).
Now the problem is on an even more detailed level (bosons and fermions, fractional parts of protons and neutrons and electrons) the components of what we commonly recognize as matter on a macro scale (kitties, stars, galaxies) exhibit measurable characteristics that are not observable on a scale of kitties and stars.
This is a puzzle.
Among the theories advanced is String Theory which posits that these entities are not just abstract points but one-dimensional strings that pass through a multi-dimentional environment. The current favored candidate is 11 dimensional M-Theory.
And it is also why Stephen Hawking has recently recanted (or not) on the concept of Black Holes as point gravitational singularities with a closely defined event horizon in favor of a big dent in Space-Time from which information eventually escapes (preservation of information, like conservation of energy being one of those Second Law of Thermodynamics kind of rules in Quantum Physics).
Do I have to explain everything to you? This is why we have Michio Kaku who's specialty is String Theory and is a well known popularizer of science on Jon tonight, though I expect he'll want to talk about his new book The Future of the Mind and String Theory is more the kind of thing Stephen gets into anyway.
Who is wasting his time with another musical act I might add, St. Vincent who will be pitching her eponymous new album.
Last chance for a lucky Star Wars and Ice Dancing fan. If you leave it to me it will be all prequel trivia all the time-
The Daily Show
* Wednesday 2/26: Liam Neeson
* Thursday 2/27: Kevin Roose
The Colbert Report
* Wednesday 2/26: Meryl Davis & Charlie White
* Thursday 2/27: Jeff Goldblum
It's not that hard, I make it look that way to earn people's respect.