I think a lot of subatomic physics involves theory that can’t be verified without pouring ever-increasing amounts of energy into experiments. Some theoretical physicist does the math and figures out that there is going to be a undiscovered particle with a certain mass and other properties, then some engineers build an even more sensitive detector, then maybe a 50-ton magnet gets shipped from Long Island to Illinois, then they run the machine for a year and a half, then they crunch the data for 10 years.
It’s super interesting to me, but it does seem like a strange way to do science.
