Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game

The phrase "Can't anybody here play this game?" is famously attributed to Casey Stengel, the manager of the New York Mets baseball team in the early 1960s. Stengel uttered this line out of frustration during a particularly dismal game where his team was making numerous errors and playing poorly.

Casey Stengel as manager of the New York Mets

When people use this phrase, they typically mean that they are astonished or exasperated by the incompetence or lack of skill displayed by a group of individuals attempting to perform a task. It conveys a sense of disbelief or disappointment in the collective performance of a team or group.

On X

2017

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

"Can't anybody here play this game?"

-Casey Stengel (1890-1975)

4:26 AM · Feb 14, 2017

CNN

@CNN

JUST IN: Michael Flynn has resigned as President Trump's national security adviser, two sources tell CNN. http://snpy.tv/2lebEto

3:12 AM · Feb 14, 2017

2020

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Cards on the table: none of this makes sense to me.

Pence, Baron and Jared are on this? We have Omarosa figuring out just what this mRNA is, with Susan at YouTube making sure no one blames China? Are we endangering our doctors & nurses sufficiently by holding back enough PPE?

8:34 AM · Apr 22, 2020

BBC News (World)

@BBCWorld

World risks famines "of biblical proportions" caused by coronavirus pandemic, UN warns https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52373888

6:32 PM · Apr 21, 2020

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Have our senators made enough money shorting the market from security briefings? Does Nancy have enough premium chocolate ice cream and have we built the enclosed golf courses Trump will require?

Let’s make sure our journalists don’t ask any hard questions. Seemingly ever.

8:34 AM · Apr 22, 2020

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

We have insufficient tests so we can’t track, and we send people to go home and endanger their families? China has all our critical manufacturing? Biden is senile? Bernie is 80?

In the immortal words of Casey Stengel:

“Can’t ANYBODY here play this game??”

8:34 AM · Apr 22, 2020

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

I’m sorry. The bullshit. The pseudo facts. The septuagenarian and octogenarian gerontocracy. The absence of smart people or independent journalists. The inability to figure out anything that involves China.

It’s like an infinite piece of life & death immersive theater. #HuisClos

8:44 AM · Apr 22, 2020

2022

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

“Can’t anybody here play this game?” -Casey Stengel

I don’t know what to say. What does one say to this? Are there any toxically masculine men available? With…like…testicles?

Maybe this is it. We may need actual men. Manly, smelly, glory-seeking, rugged, individualistic men.

1:11 AM · May 27, 2022

Mediaite

@Mediaite

Texas Police Lieutenant Says Cops Were Reluctant to Engage Gunman Because ‘They Could’ve Been Shot’ https://www.mediaite.com/media/tv/texas-police-lieutenant-says-cops-were-reluctant-to-engage-gunman-because-they-couldve-been-shot/

11:36 PM · May 26, 2022

2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Discussion of the future of theoretical physics seems like a game of "Intellectual Keepaway."

Its the same group of mandarins who predicted LHC SuperSymmetry, Mini-Black holes, SU(5) Grand Unification, String Theory, Q-Gravity would work.

What do our *heretics* say instead?

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Aspen Center for Physics

@AspenPhysics

Past ACP President Michael Turner and Maria Spiropulu in conversation with @overbye of @nytimes discuss the future of Physics! #physics #particlephysics #spacetime #stringtheory #physicists

11:03 PM · Jan 24, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

For the moment, let me entertain a wild idea. Truly wild.

Here goes. What if the problem is our leadership. What if we asked

"Who believe String Theory wouldn't work?" "Who never claimed LHC SUSY was imminent?" "Who never said Proton Decay was going to be found?"

Etc.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Said differently, what if our leadership is brilliant but SPECIFICALLY untrustworthy in identifying the path forward. What if 1000 David Gross & Ed Wit1ten Keynotes setting the agenda are the problem? What if Lenny Susskind is not correct sbout non-string people wasting our time.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

What if we *excluded* people who are consistently wrong about the path forward and asked:

"Are there any OTHER ideas? Not Strings. Not Loops. Not Asymptotic Safety. Not Simple Compact GUTs. Not Quantum Computing. Not Black Hole Information. Not Technicolor. Not Amplitudes."

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Why is being older with a long track record of not making progress the way we select our leadership?

What if for 3 years we tried to ask: IS THERE ANYONE ELSE OUT HERE WITH OTHER IDEAS?

I know. It's stupid. It's crazy. It's self-serving. But it has been 49yrs+11Mos of this.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Look, we could just hold a conference: "Fundamental Physics: Can't *Anybody* Here Play This Game?"

David, Ed, Maria, Cumrun, Nati, Lenny, Juan, Lee etc. could be respondents giving constructive feedback. We would then at least learn why we are where we are. But this is nuts.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

So I will say it from outside the field. I think the problem is that we aren't actually doing fundamental physics and havevn't been for decades. I want a survey of ALL the OTHER paths. It would probably cost a few hundred thousand dollars to fix this field. But this is bizarre.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Let's survey the heretics who aren't even worth talking to...and then we can go right back to tiny progress when we're done, following Strings, Loops, SUSY, Standard GUTS & Asymptotic Safety all over again. At least we will know WHY we are stuck.

8:36 PM · Jan 25, 2023

Eric Weinstein

@EricRWeinstein

Wouldn't a scientist ask the question:

"What if it is the leadership?"

Wouldn't that be a logical scientific question? Wouldn't that be a testable hypothesis? Why can't we ask that question as scientists? Why is that hypothesis excluded after *50* yrs?

[End Of Heresy]

8:40 PM · Jan 25, 2023

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