"From Democritus to Einstein, we have assumed the world is made of tiny building blocks of matter. But the more we’ve looked for them, the more they’ve disappeared. Our best theory now proposes the world is better described by ‘fields’ that don’t have the familiar properties of physical bits, things, or particles. Yet physicists still refer to particles though few seem to agree on their nature. Some say they ‘approximately exist’ and others that they don’t exist at all. Stranger still, there are ‘quasiparticles’ that we can treat as particles and enable us to solve equations but which we know aren't real.
Will we give up thinking that the world is made of particles at all, and instead embrace a world of fields and relationships alone? Furthermore, will we abandon the idea that anything exists at a fundamental level? Or are things and particles necessary for us to have a viable account of the world at all?"
