OK, that is relevant context, because the quotes that people are saying he plagiarized wouldn't make sense to count as plagiarism in a physics thesis. I was scratching my head, thinking of how he could have plagiarized Camus in a physics thesis that isn't just some turn of phrase.

That would be good but the same principle applies. A huge part of a thesis in any field is just summarizing existing work, and if represented as such along with referencing names, may technically be plagiarism but most academics do not see it as the "bad kind" of plagiarism.