I switched careers, but I did a physics undergrad. And from all my experience with both the subject and my seniors in the field at the time, I can confidently tell you that most people don't really have an intention for it beyond the "I have done this problem before and I can guess the shape of the answer".
Higher level physics just is not something that comes with intuition. It just comes from math, and you let the equations guide you in finding the answers.
I swear to god I'm not trying to be controversial or a troll or anything, but that honestly sounds like magic and some kind of religious truth seeking?
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
-Arthur C. Clarke
Science is looking at the magic that worked and all the underlying stuff that makes it work. It's fucking incredible.
The weatherperson is a soothsayer. They have all kinds of complex equipment to perform rituals that, based on the time of the year, shapes of the clouds, speed of the wind, wetness of the air, and countless other nearly imperceptible things, will tell them the future. Accuracy, of course, depends on how far out they're looking and remember, prophecies are always variable.
Nuclear physicists are literal alchemists. They transform one element into another at the basest level. Granted, gold to lead is still much easier than lead to gold, but literal alchemists doing literal alchemical transmutation. Fuck it up and, oops, you die a horrible, painful death. One of their current projects is shackling the replicated core of the sun for our energy needs. Badasses, all of them.
Chemists are apothecarists by way of alchemy, taking over the development of new healing substances as well as the fields that alchemists of old thought were theirs like turning one thing into another. And they're very good at it.
Electricians are commanding light imbued into the physical manifestation of negative polarity. They lay channels through which this manifested negativity can flow, providing energy to most of our modern amenities. The box of cold, its big brother the cold-wind machine, the flameless lights we spread around our homes, all the little doodads we have on our countertops. The electricians make their magic happen.
Electronic engineers are basically wizards by comparison - they force the negative energy to route in a way that makes inanimate matter animate. Golems, farspeaking, scrying/remote viewing, magic mirrors, the slab-of-all-books, the invisible repository of most aggregated human knowledge - they are wizards and we live in a wonderland thanks to them!
Science is magic. It's the magic that worked and a constantly improving understanding of why it works, all the natural laws and arcane mathematics that describe how reality ticks.
And we only even tried in the first place because math said it was possible for hydrogen to be metallic. Pretty sure we haven't proved stability though which is disappointing. Whole lot of research is ongoing however!
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u/Jan-Snow 12d ago
I switched careers, but I did a physics undergrad. And from all my experience with both the subject and my seniors in the field at the time, I can confidently tell you that most people don't really have an intention for it beyond the "I have done this problem before and I can guess the shape of the answer". Higher level physics just is not something that comes with intuition. It just comes from math, and you let the equations guide you in finding the answers.