For many years, written on the blackboard of the eminent American physicist Richard Feynman was his ' most fundamental question ' - ' why does the muon weigh? ', the question still stands unsolved and it is further complicated by the discovery of a plethora of what seem to be other fundamental particles of nature. A few years ago. three types of quarks seemed sufficient to account for the known behaviour of nuclear matter - now the quarks have proliferated and there may be as many as 18. So what is ' fundamental ' and how can physicists continue to probe matter in a search for finer and finer structures?
John Maddox discusses with Professors Sheldon Glashow and Richard Wilson of Harvard University the intellectual issues that confront both theoretical and experimental physicists today.
Producer david patekson