Modern physics has achieved extraordinary mathematical success.The Standard Model predicts experimental results to unprecedentedprecision. Quantum field theory has proven to be one of the mostempirically successful frameworks in the history of science. Yetalongside these achievements, a methodological shift has occurred:the field has moved, gradually but substantially, away from Einstein’sdiscipline of physical mechanism and conceptual clarity toward aculture that increasingly privileges mathematical elegance andformal consistency. This analysis does not dispute the achievements.It examines what may have been lost in the transition, and askswhether the field’s current foundational difficulties — themeasurement problem, the incompatibility of general relativity andquantum mechanics, the proliferation of untestable theoretical