Essay Abstract

It has been suggested that reality works like a quantum computer, but such claims are just words if they are not backed up by sound mathematics. In pursuit of the fundamental equations I look to string theory where physicists led by Mike Duff have noticed useful connections between the quantum gravity of black holes and quantum information theory. By building on my earlier work on universal symmetry in string theory and using links between elliptic curves and hyperdeterminants, I find intriguing clues that these connections may be deep as well as useful. Ultimately any theory of the foundations of physics must explain why there are four forces and three generations of fermions. In string theory this would be a consequence of the choice of vacua. If a consistent formulation of string theory constructed from quantum bits can be found, it may be possible to understand the vast landscape of possibilities better and reverse engineer the program that codes our universe.

Author Bio

Philip Gibbs has a PhD from the University of Glasgow in 1985. Since then he has worked independent publishing papers on physics and number theory.

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  • [deleted]

Hi Phil,

Let me congratulate you then. Good luck!

Huping

    • [deleted]

    Thanks Huping

    • [deleted]

    Quantum gravity is in our hearts and Quantum information processing happens in our brains. There is a gateway between our brain and heart (worm hole) through which we are in contact with the universe. We are the universe our selves. We can understand the universe in our heart, thats how we started this journey on this planet with our first heart beat.

    • [deleted]

    Dear Sir,

    Your article is based on "sound mathematics" and "string theory".

    Regarding mathematics, the concepts and conventions of physicists and mathematicians differ. The validity of a mathematical statement is judged from its logical consistency. The validity of a physical statement is judged from its correspondence to reality. Most of the mathematics of modern physicists are not mathematical by the above yard stick. How do you define "sound mathematics"?

    String theory, which was developed with a view to harmonize General Relativity with Quantum theory, is said to be a high order theory where other models, such as supergravity and quantum gravity appear as approximations. String theory comes in five different formulations, each of which covers a restricted range of situations. A network of mathematical connections links the different string theories into one overarching system, enigmatically called M-theory. Unlike super-gravity, string theory is said to be a consistent and well-defined theory of quantum gravity, and therefore calculating the value of the cosmological constant from it should, at least in principle, be possible. On the other hand, the number of vacuum states associated with it seems to be quite large, and none of these features three large spatial dimensions, broken super-symmetry, and a small cosmological constant. The features of string theory which are at least potentially testable - such as the existence of super-symmetry and cosmic strings - are not specific to string theory. In addition, the features that are specific to string theory - the existence of strings - either do not lead to precise predictions or lead to predictions that are impossible to test with current levels of technology. With its talk of D-branes, 10 or 11 dimensional universes and a myriad of possible solutions: 10500 at the last count - string theory looks more like an arcane branch of mathematics than tangible physics. It has not told us anything new about the real world, despite almost 40 years of trying.

    There are many unexplained questions relating to the strings. For example, given the measurement problem of quantum mechanics, what happens when a string is measured? Does the uncertainty principle apply to the whole string? Or does it apply only to some section of the string being measured? Does string theory modify the uncertainty principle? If we measure its position, do we get only the average position of the string? If the position of a string is measured with arbitrarily high accuracy, what happens to the momentum of the string? Does the momentum become undefined as opposed to simply unknown? What about the location of an end-point? If the measurement returns an end-point, then which end-point? Does the measurement return the position of some point along the string? (The string is said to be a Two dimensional object extended in space. Hence its position cannot be described by a finite set of numbers and thus, cannot be described by a finite set of measurements.) How do the Bell's inequalities apply to string theory? We must get answers to these questions first before we probe more and spend (waste!) more money in such research. These questions should not be put under the carpet as inconvenient or on the ground that some day we will find the answers. That someday has been a very long period indeed!

    The LHC experiment that was designed to verify the validity of the Standard Model has failed to prove the existence of Higgs boson. This means the Standard Model remains a postulate only. Now there is a proposal to upgrade the facility and run it for one more year. How long a few people make merry at public expenses on false premises?

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    basudeba, thank you for so many good questions. I will try to answer them in several different posts

    "How do you define "sound mathematics"?"

    A physicist needs a consistent formalism for calculating physical quantities such as scattering amplitudes or particle masses. It has always been in the nature of quantum field theory that not everything is as well defined as mathematicians would like them to be. The "Mass Gap Problem" is an attempt to encourage mathematicians to make the subject more rigorous. In string theory all the same problems of mathematical rigour remain. String theory is not any different from quantum field theory in this respect.

    Despite this there is some sound mathematics in string theory. An example which demonstrates this is the application of string theory to the moonshine conjectures by Borcherds. There are other rigorous applications of string theory to mathematical problems, so I'd say that the maths is sound.

    It remains a fundamental problem to find a complete non-perturbative formulation of string theory. Given what has been achieved it would be very surprising if such a formulation does not exist, but it is very hard to find. Mathematics needs to catch up with what physicists are doing and I think this is part of the reason why it is taking so long for string theory to flourish into a complete theory for quantum gravity.

      • [deleted]

      Hi all,

      Dear Basudeba,

      It's relevant your words, indeed the maths must be harmonized with the biggest rationality when they want explain correctly our foundamental and physical laws.It exists constants, irreversibilities, and irreducibilities.Fortunally for our evolution.

      The strings are falses in the whole simply.

      A string is divisible, a sphere no ......when we see the equilibrium of forces.

      Regards

      Steve

      • [deleted]

      basudeba says

      "[string theory] has not told us anything new about the real world, despite almost 40 years of trying."

      Your summary of string theory is quite accurate and it is true that it has not yet told us anything new about physics. Yet there has been much progress and your outlook is too pessimistic. 40 years ago (1970) string theory was regarded as a tentative theory for the strong force. It developed into a theory of quantum gravity in the 1980's. In the 1990's string theorists discovered M-theory which appears to unify the different string theories. More recently we have seen developments such as AdS/CFT and many smaller steps.

      I think it is true that progress has been slow, but work has always been ongoing. Some people might compare it with the development of relativity or quantum theory which progressed in steps over similar time periods. The main difference is that string theory has developed without any new experimental input beyond what was known when it started.

      I don't think that this is a failure of string theory as some people claim. The reasons why string theory has not been able to predict low energy physics are well known and as you describe them. String theory is a theory of quantum gravity that is applicable to energies well beyond anything we can test directly at present. The fact that it has many vacua means that we cannot use it to predict physics at lower energy. Some people don't like that but the history of discovery in the laws of physics has demonstrated many times over that the universe does not care much for our philosophical prejudices. A lot of people did not like the theory of relativity, and even more don't like the indeterminacy of quantum theory, but they agree very well with experiment.

      Personally I am quite comfortable with the idea that our universe is described by some random vacuum of string theory which may be selected on anthropic grounds. I did not want it to be that way, but if physics tells us that the universe works like that then I can learn to appreciate it. This does not mean that string theory will never make a prediction. When we know more about physics beyond the standard model we may be able to figure out the details of the selected vacuum. Even if we can't we may be able to put some testable constraints on it. Even if we cant do that we may be able to find some other testable prediction from string theory such as a signature from the big bang. Even if we cant do that it does not mean that string theory is wrong, just that it is terribly difficult to relate to observation.

      The way we have understood string theory over the 40 years has changed dramatically every ten years or so. We still don't have the ideal formulation that string theorists seek so we may see it very differently in 10 years time. I don't think it has a sell by date after which it has failed. It will fail only if it is shown to be inconsistent with observation or if another theory is found to work better. At this time many of the best theoretical physicists still think string theory is the best approach to quantum gravity. I tend to agree. It may take a few more years for the mathematics to develop sufficiently for us to really understand it well enough to see why it is right. Then it will tell us something about the real world. In the meantime, physicists are free to explore any alternatives they can think of, but none have come as near to a theory of quantum gravity as string theory.

        • [deleted]

        basudeba says

        "There are many unexplained questions relating to the strings. For example, given the measurement problem of quantum mechanics, what happens when a string is measured?"

        The questions you ask there are not ones that I think are especially troubling for string theorists. There are plenty of people who worry about measurement problems in general but personally I don't think this will be resolved by a theory of quantum gravity, only a few people do. The EPR "paradox" has been shown by experiment to be a feature of the laws of physics. I think people just have to reconcile it with their philosophical views. That is something I did for myself many years ago.

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          basudeba says

          "The LHC experiment that was designed to verify the validity of the Standard Model has failed to prove the existence of Higgs boson. This means the Standard Model remains a postulate only."

          The real hope is that the LHC will tell us what lies beyond the standard model. So far it has just collected a small amount of data as a by-product of the commissioning process that took place this year. Next year it will do much more physics and may provide some new positive results. At some point in the next few years it will resolve the Higgs Sector and however it turns out that will be a successful achievement.

          If anything, the standard model has been too successful and physicists are keen to find something that shows it is not perfect. For the last 40 years almost every experimental result has just served to confirm that it works very well. The next few years of the LHC could finally lead to something new.

            • [deleted]

            The standard model just needs an improvement of optimization due to evolution.

            Our laws, proportionalities rest in a relativistic rationality.

            The strings are lost in an ocean of confusions.

            Furthermore it doesn't exist equations interpreting the physics with strings.

            It's a kind of fashion which disappears in fact.Logic because they aren't foundamentals these strings simply.

            So many hours utilized for nothing in fact.

            Cheers.

            Steve

              • [deleted]

              The standard model requires more than just some evolutionary optimisation. The final outcome must include gravity, but gravity is built into physics in a way that is very different from the forces unified in the standard model. To include gravity you need a revolutionary development. String theory is the best indication that we are intellectually capable of bringing it about.

              • [deleted]

              Your paper is remarkably similar to mine. I work out some of the Q-bit theory along the lines of Duff et al.. I work on duality with AdS spacetimes, similar to the case of a BTZ black hole in an AdS_3. The event horizon contains the same holographic information as does the AdS boundary. So the entanglement types ~ black hole types by the Kostant-Sekiguchi correspondence holds for the AdS spacetime, and Dp-branes.

              From G_abcdψ^aψ^bψ^c = 0 and for M^{ab} = G^{abcd} ψ^bψ^c the elliptic curve is defined from the hyperdeterminant

              y^2 = det(M)

              This will be modular of course due to the A. Wiles proof of the Tanayama-Shimira conjecture. An explicit realization of this modularity comes from the equivalency with the AdS_n, and in particular with the near horizon condition AdS_{n+2} - -> AdS_2xS^n, which is conformal QM SL(2,R). This is the modular group, or its discrete subgroup SL(2,Z) defines the braid group.

              Certain orbits of modular functions are identified with the Riemann ζ-function. My paper makes connections with discrete path integrals, and it is my suspicion that this may connect with general ζ-function realizations.

              Cheers LC

                • [deleted]

                String theory is not without a few indicators. In solid state physics aspects of string theory and even AdS~CFT have been detected and found. Dp-branes are analogous to Fermi surfaces and in condensed matter some stringy analogues have been discovered. Also the matter of extra-large dimensions indicates that BPS-type black holes at low energy may exist if Calabi-Yau compactification scales in a T-dual manner with momentum. So we may get some experimental signatures of this physics in the next 10-15 years.

                The anthropic principle, or weak AP, has been around for a long time. Bethe employed it to explore the nuclear force as a source of solar energy. The AP indicated the world or Earth had been around for 100's of millions of years by geology and evolution. So physics had to accommodate that. We have a more subtle form of this with landscape issues. There really is not that surprising about this. I tend to think there is a more general extremization of local complexity principle. The foundations of physics must be configured in some way as to give rise to a maximal complexity in a local region and with a given scale. We happen to be in such a location.

                The AP also has a ying-yang element to it as well. We humans are also 7 billion ground apes exponentially rampaging out of control, consuming everything and making garbage.

                Cheers LC

                • [deleted]

                Sounds Good. Have you posted it yet?

                • [deleted]

                Never!

                The strings are garbages and just a fashion of some universities.A pure joke.

                The standard model I insist is foundamental and the gravity is explained with the spinning entanglement and its pure finite number.the sense of rot and the volumes of entanglement.

                If strings are the best way, thus of course me I am the queen of england.

                The strings aren't foundamental, and its extrapolations are just winds in the whole.

                The gravity is the same than all and is the coded system and thus it's the sense of rotation which becomes the key.Thus and it's very important, the codes is intrinsic in these mass(EVOLVING)

                Where are the strings in all our proportionalities?answer anywhere.

                The standard model respects a precise road.It is like improving the foundamentals towards the Planck scale.But for all that a real form , balanced is necessary.if not it's a joke for our proportionalities and constants.

                In fact frankly I don't understand why people focus on these strings.

                And don't say me that higgs exist please, these external causes of mass.The gravity possesses the codes of evolution and the rotation imply the specificities.Where are these strings in our proportionalities even our fields and the entropy at this scale.

                Regards

                Steve

                • [deleted]

                No I have not posted it yet. I might send it to you first and see initially what you think. I intend to post it early next week.

                The thought occurred to me that the quantum computer technology might get its start through quantum gravity and SUGRA string theory. I must confess I question whether I would want to live in an age where quantum computers are ubiquitous. Things are pretty fast paced already, and a quantum computer world would make the pace of life now look like a Sunday afternoon nap.

                Cheers LC

                • [deleted]

                Phil, it's not String Theory! Your appreciation of hyperdeterminants is wonderful, and quite relevant to M Theory, but you have to give up the idea that traditional stringy physics is correct.

                  • [deleted]

                  Phil, I enjoyed reading your very lucid essay, although the technical bits about String Theory were beyond me. Your relating a possible basic structure of nature to Information Theory and to qubits was inspiring. The Fermi photon findings are new to me and I will have to study why it is believed they disprove a basic granularity in space-time if I understand the argument correctly. Could that be (to use your words) "a product of years of education which brainwashes us" about something basic which turns out not to be so basic? In any case, don't qubits need to be embodied in an 'it' ? This recalls the well-worn arguments about how e/m waves need an ether to propagate in! String Theorists as a group have been criticized as being close-minded, but I found your approach the opposite, as you thoughtfully examined in turn various topics related to the theme of this essay .

                    • [deleted]

                    It is better to say that spacetime is embedded in the Qubits. A quantum wave function exists in configuration space. Configuration space is the standard position coordinate space. So a wave function with many eigenstates has many copies of this configuration space. The configuration space has a cotangent bundle T*M which consists of the coordinates and their conjugate momentum. This then defines a symplectic structure. Every cotangent bundle is a symplectic space, but not every symplectic space is a T*M. So symplectic structure is more fundamental than coordinates or momentum.

                    So the entanglement structure corresponding to a black hole type contains many copies of the configuration space. In fact this has to be, for the correspondence is a real to complex valued relationship. So the wave function, or equivalently quantum bits, is what construct spacetime.

                    LC