Standard Model: Difference between revisions

 
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{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1667195003914035200
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=@skdh I acknowledge my desires as you see from what I wrote. But a stagnant community always wants outcomes. It wants SUSY. Or [[String Theory|Strings]]. Or some g-2 muon anomaly. Etc.
 
I want too. But what I want is mostly just a desire to get the BS out of physics so we can get back to succeeding.
|thread=
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441014981033984
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=Now I feel completely alone.
 
I want our wanting out of this story. I have a huge dog in this fight. I spend every day fighting my own human desire for GU to be proven correct.
 
I believe this is how [[String Theory|String Theorists]] stopped being scientists.
 
I just want our data & the physics.
{{Tweet
|image=skdh-profile.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/skdh/status/1666303048631590914
|name=Sabine Hossenfelder
|usernameurl=https://x.com/skdh
|username=skdh
|content=I want this to be real.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/06/whistleblower-ufo-alien-tech-spacecraft
|media1=skdh-X-post-1666303048631590914.jpg
|timestamp=4:36 AM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441031158730752
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=If biological aliens were here from others star systems in crafts that defy the current physics of the standard model and, more importantly, general relativity, I would be one of the few people who would have a guess on day one as to how they must have gotten here. It’s tempting.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441034140725251
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=I don’t think biological interstellar alien visitors using GR and the SM make much sense. So I try to have a war *inside* my own mind as to what is true. I have a genuine “Need to Know” as to whether this is BS NatSec space opera disinformation theater. Because to me, it is data.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441040314748928
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=What just happened isn’t data. It’s that a sober individual just pushed one of the many longstanding highly conserved NHI narratives collected from *many* diverse sober NatSec informants over the sworn testimony line. And it gets a LOT crazier from here. But it’s not science yet.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441043347374080
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=As I‘ve been saying, there is so much deliberate NatSec BS out here that our own scientists are being propagandized. We’re drilling holes in our own scientists’ lifeboat. Last time we saw this it was virologists/immunologists/epidemiologists being gaslit. Now it’s physicists.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441045926891520
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=Let me be very careful in what I am about to say. We have at least the appearance and optics of scientific self-sabotage. And wanting things to be true is how science dies.
 
I fight like hell to promote my theory. But I’d sign on to another to know the truth if I was wrong.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441048753836033
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=We may be looking at the birth of a new UFO religion. Or a moment of contact. Or a long running Disinformation campaign. Etc.
 
To go beyond GR, let’s be scientists & get NatSec out of our data first. Where is our data pruned of space opera disinformation and cultic religiosity?
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441052369158145
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=What I want to know:
 
Why was the [[Mansfield Amendment (1969)|Mansfield Amendment]] passed?
 
Why did [[National Science Foundation (NSF)|NSF]] fake a [[Labor Shortages|labor shortage]] in our MARKET economy destroying American STEM labor markets?
 
What stopped the [[General Relativity|Golden Age Of General Relativity]]?
 
Why was the SSC really cancelled?
 
[[String Theory|StringTheory]] & STAGNATION: WTF?
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441055531663362
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=What the hell was the [[The Secret History of Anti-Gravity and Quantum Gravity Research|1957 Behnson funded UNC Chapel Hill conference]] actually about?
 
Why are we not stopping to QUESTION [[Quantum Gravity|quantum gravity]] after 70 years of public *FAILURE* inspired by Babson-Behnson patronage of RIAS, the Institute of Field Physics and the precursor to Lockheed?
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441058442674176
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=This is the 50th year of stagnation in the [[Standard Model|Standard Model Lagrangian]]. It is AS IF we are deliberately trying to forget how to do actual physics. Everyone who has succeeded in Particle Theory in standard terms is now over 70. This is insane. In 25 years there will be no one left.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441060976062464
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=Why are we not admitting that quantum gravity is killing physics and is the public respectable face of  1950s anti-gravity mania that lives on to murder all new theories in their cradle?
 
[[Quantum Gravity]] is fake and works to stop actual physics.
 
There. I said it. Now let’s talk.
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1666441063752671232
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=If you want to know whether there are biological interstellar visitors here observing us, the short answer is “Almost *certainly* not if they are using our current stagnant non-progressing  theories of physics.”
 
Let’s finally get serious about this whacky subject? Thanks. 🙏
|timestamp=1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023
}}
{{Tweet
|image=skdh-profile.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/skdh/status/1667085711617540096
|name=Sabine Hossenfelder
|usernameurl=https://x.com/skdh
|username=skdh
|content=I swear I didn't write my tweet to make you feel alone and I'm genuinely sorry if that was the result. That said, I think it's better to acknowledge one's hopes and desires than to pretend they don't exist and thereby overestimate one's own rationality.
|timestamp=8:26 AM ¡ Jun 9, 2023
}}
|timestamp=3:40 PM ¡ Jun 9, 2023
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=== 2024 ===
=== 2024 ===


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|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1773060797847208382
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=[Note for Curt: This is the whole point of [[Theory of Geometric Unity|Geometric Unity]]. They are three geometries. Which are all one geometry, and that is only possible in the rarest of circumstances. Which we are in oddly.
 
Metric Geometry: [[General Relativity|General Relativity GR]]
[[Bundles|Fiber Geometry]]:  [[Standard Model|Standard Model SM]]
Symplectic Geometry: Hamiltonian Quantization of the SM. ]
|thread=
{{Tweet
|image=TOEwithCurt-profile.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/TOEwithCurt/status/1773057150199238985
|name=Curt Jaimungal
|usernameurl=https://x.com/TOEwithCurt
|username=TOEwithCurt
|content=I'm confused. This lecture doesn't negate the geometric foundations of GR. Einstein differentiates between how gravity and electromagnetism relate to the structure of space, all the while pointing to his ultimate goal of unification. As for the rest of the original article linked, I'm unsure how the quotes from Einstein support the author's title. GR is indeed a geometric theory; however, Einstein's viewpoint was that its geometric nature doesn't singularly distinguish it from the broader domain of physics, where geometry has always played a fundamental role. If anything, Einstein is saying not to confuse the map with the territory.
|timestamp=6:39 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1773060553411641673
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=He is correctly anticipating the Simons-Yang discovery of the [[Wu-Yang Dictionary|“Wu Yang dictionary”]].
 
Maxwell became Yang Mills</br>
Yang Mills became Simons Yang.</br>
Simons Yang became the Wu Yang Dictionary.</br>
[[Wu-Yang Dictionary|Wu Yang]] was (except for one entry) was [[Bundles|Ehressmann fiber bundle geometry]].
 
Think of metric geometry, fiber geometry and symplectic geometry as the geometry of symmetric metric 2-tensors, [[Bundles|fiber bundle connections]] and anti-symmetric 2 tensors respectively.
|timestamp=6:52 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024
}}
|timestamp=6:53 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024
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{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1827761781261103246
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=NOTE: I was addressing these questions directly to my friend @skdh as a reponse  to the OP when I posted. That said, many people are interpreting this as a general request and I am delighted to hear their takes as well.
|thread=
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1827740131799011345
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=Interesting. If that’s what’s wrong, what would physics done right be?
 
Q1: What are the 3 most promising general lines of attack on fundamental physics?
 
Q2: Who are 5 theorists, in your opinion, closest to pursuing a breakthrough beyond the Standard Model/General Relativity?
🙏
|quote=
{{Tweet
|image=skdh-profile.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/skdh/status/1827724986427281497
|name=Sabine Hossenfelder
|usernameurl=https://x.com/skdh
|username=skdh
|content=all that's wrong with theoretical physics in one simple graph
|media1=skdh-X-post-1827724986427281497-GV1iMAkXwAAOBNM.jpg
|timestamp=4:09 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024
}}
|timestamp=4:09 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1827741517571887579
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=Yet another cut would be:
 
If the caption were instead reversed to read “All that is right with theoretical physics in one simple graph.”, what would that look like visually?
 
I’m genuinely super curious to learn about what you’re most excited, as I realized I don’t really know!
|timestamp=4:15 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024
}}
|timestamp=5:35 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024
}}
 
 
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1834702103211917754
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=For some reasons that have never been explained or justified leaders in physics started making the claim that [[General Relativity|GR]] *was* also a gauge theory. This was done by claiming that general coordinate invariance in the form of the diffeomorphism group is a kind of Gauge Transformation. Which it clearly is not.
 
This is absurd. Gauge transformations move the fibers and are defined not to move space time where as diffeomorphisms move space time directly.
 
So: why claim that GR is a kind of gauge theory? The only payoff I see is that this allows us to pretend that the [[Standard Model|SM]] vs [[General Relativity|GR]] incompatibility is classical vs quantum where it is staring us in the face that it is instead contraction-based ([[General Relativity|GR]]) vs Gauge Transformed ([[Standard Model|SM]]).
 
The only reason this is at all controversial is that the people saying it were thought to be the leaders 40 years ago.
 
That didn’t work out. We have 40 years lost as a result.
 
But the truth is anyone can see the incompatibility between gravity and [[Gauge Theory|gauge theory]] if they are not being told that gravity is a special kind of [[Gauge Theory|gauge theory]]. Which it absolutely is not as formulated by Grossman, Einstein and Hilbert.
 
[[Morals|Moral]]: The problem holding us back from a Theory of everything is **Classical**, and not Quantum. The quantum comes as desert after classical compatibility. It’s not the main issue. A red hearing that throws us off following the scent. It’s a distraction that should have fooled almost no one who was thinking for his or her self.
|thread=
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1834698277356527999
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=This is what is blocking progress in my opinion for physics to go beyond [[Albert Einstein|Einstein]] and [[General Relativity]].
 
40 years ago, the leaders of physics started claiming that gravity had to be quantized to be compatible with the [[Standard Model]].
 
But the incompatibility is *not* Quantum vs Classical field theory. The *classical* field theory of the [[Standard Model]] is already not compatible with classical [[General Relativity]].
 
[[General Relativity]], at least as it is now, simply cannot be gauged so as to make it a true gauge theory, because Gauge transformation does *not* commute with the Ricci Contractions used in the field equations, and within the Einstein Hilbert action.
|quote=
{{Tweet
|image=postquantum-profile-CoJxMwrT.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/postquantum/status/1834184677860491584
|name=Jonathan Oppenheim
|usernameurl=https://x.com/postquantum
|username=postquantum
|content=I wish I deserved the heretic moniker, but isn’t asking whether spacetime is quantum or classical just common sense? After all, general relativity (GR) - our theory of gravity and spacetime - is special. It isn’t a gauge theory, and gravity isn’t a force. 1/
|timestamp=10:57 AM ¡ Sep 12, 2024
}}
|timestamp=8:58 PM ¡ Sep 13, 2024
}}
|timestamp=9:14 PM ¡ Sep 13, 2024
}}


=== 2025 ===
=== 2025 ===
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1983887154989429188
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=“The top priority is that the [[Standard Model]] has Internal Symmetry while [[General Relativity]] does not.”
“The top priority is that the [[Standard Model]] is a full [[Gauge Theory]] while [[General Relativity]] has no gauge invariance.”
“The top priority is that [[General Relativity|GR]] allows contraction across the tensor product of bundles while the [[Standard Model]] does not.”
“The top priority is that [[General Relativity|GR]] has well defined Contorsion tensors while the [[Standard Model]] does not.”
Those are all possibile research programs within A. Not within B.
|thread=
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1983883269314855156
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=There is a tell when listening to physics folks as to whether they’re captured by the [[Quantum Gravity|1984 Quantum Gravity virus]].
They either say:
A) “[[General Relativity]] has to be reconciled with the [[Standard Model]].”
or
B) “[[General Relativity]] has to be reconciled with Quantum Theory.”
|timestamp=1:06 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025
}}
{{Tweet
|image=Eric profile picture.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein/status/1983883272808727001
|name=Eric Weinstein
|usernameurl=https://x.com/EricRWeinstein
|username=EricRWeinstein
|content=So, what is the difference?
In the latter case of B), the diagnosis has already been definitively made. The problem is thus at the level of frameworks, not the level of theoretical models of the actual world. The issue has been made into “*THE* problem is that the classical theory of Gravity must be quantized.” That is, the classical framework of gravity must be dragged into our general quantum framework as the top priority. Seen this way, it is more of a technical math problem rather than something hyperspecific about our two theories of our physical world.
OPINION: There is absolutely no basis for this B) being an absolute whatsoever. This is a madness which started appearing as a [[String Theory]] mantra around 1984 and has led to a crisis.
In the case of A) that definitive diagnosis has *not* been made.  The case is still
Open. The issue is thus that “We have two specific physical theories that don’t quite fit together for multiple reasons. We need to figure out a physical framework to accommodate them both. That may be a third framework that harmonizes them rather than forcing one into the framework of the other. We need to consider all clues before reaching a definitive diagnosis.”
OPINION: It made absolutely no sense to have closed the case in 1984…and after 40 years of continuous failure, the issue is the leadership of the field. Opening the case and saying “[[General Relativity|GR]] and the [[Standard Model|SM]] have multiple issues. Not just quantization. Why are we not considering that the strong leadership forced THE WRONG DIAGNOSIS on the entire community??”
This is like saying “Maybe COVID came from NIAID/NIH/DTRA/EcoHealth/Daszak/Fauci/Collins/Baric…can we consider that??”
And the answer is “No”.
But that is why we are stuck in my opinion. We are stuck because we can’t question physics leadership without being thrown out of the community.
The dogmatic zealous leadership of physics totally failed. That is what happened. That cost us 41 years.
We can’t get to COVID origins for the same reason we can’t get to [[String Theory]] origins as [[The Only Game in Town (TOGIT)|“the only game in town.”]]
The imposed absolutist central narrative is simply a lie.
One man’s opinion.
|timestamp=1:06 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025
}}
{{Tweet
|image=TheMattSeaton-profile-VDx5fLf6.jpg
|nameurl=https://x.com/TheMattSeaton/status/1983885048450281554
|name=Matt Seaton
|usernameurl=https://x.com/TheMattSeaton
|username=TheMattSeaton
|content=I don't see the difference.  Seems to me one could interpret B the same way you are interpreting A.
|timestamp=1:13 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025
}}
|timestamp=1:22 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025
}}


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Latest revision as of 07:16, 2 January 2026

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2009Edit

2017Edit

2018Edit

1/ "Theories of Everything": A Taxonomy.

It is often said that "Theories-of-Everything are a dime a dozen" or that "All theoretical physicists worth their salt have several in a drawer." So far as I can tell, this is simply untrue. We've barely ever, if at all, seen candidates.

ERW-X-post-958021546718633984-DUuQCV3UMAAmV4G.jpg
4:58 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

2/ The Escher Lithograph used in the first tweet points to the core of why TOEs are rare. A candidate TOE has to have some quality of "a fire that lights itself", which is difficult to think about beyond the equations that would instantiate it. Hence very few such theories exist.

5:02 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

3/ I'm going to lean on the following dictionary of analogies:

Physical Paper = Void Pictured Canvas = Manifold and/or Einsteinian Spacetime Ink=Matter & non-gravitational force fields Pencils = Pre-Conscious Lego (e.g. amino acids) Hands = Consciousness Paradox = Self-awareness

5:17 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

4/ In my taxonomy, Type I TOEs are our least ambitious but they best match our state of the world. They are distinguished by two *separate* sources of origin: one for the Canvas (General Relativity or Witten's point i) ) & one for the Ink (Standard Model or Witten's point ii) ).

ERW-X-post-928296366853328896-DOE8P81U8AA MBe.jpg
5:24 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

5 Type II TOE's are more ambitious & seek to derive the Ink from the choice of a mathematically distinguished Canvas that is anything but blank. My arch-nemesis @garrettlisi's theory is Type II. E8 is his 248 dimensional canvas. The intricacy is there, but doesn't quite match up.

ERW-X-post-958032334346862592-DUucltrVoAAvF2u.jpg ERW-X-post-958032334346862592-DUucnc5VAAAtoC1.jpg
5:41 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

6/ In Type III TOEs the ink is to be derived from canvas, but the canvas is essentially blank; it simply permits mathematics to happen (e.g. calculus and linear algebra). In such theories the ink has to be bootstrapped into existence. My lectures on Geometric Unity were Type III.

ERW-X-post-958034414167982080-DUufH-dVAAAD8jD.jpg
5:49 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

7/ Type IV TOE's try to change the question from Einstein's "Unified Field Theory." In String Thy, "Quantizing Gravity" became substituted for "Unified Field." For this crowd, many are now betting that the canvas & ink are both *emergent* from some deeper fundamental quantum thy.

ERW-X-post-958037099457871872-DUuhS VVMAA3FyW.jpg ERW-X-post-958037099457871872-DUuhXHwUQAAEICu.jpg
6:00 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

8/ Type V TOEs are of a type I've never been able to fully contemplate; they are without boundaries or origins. There is no "Why is there something rather than nothing" within them. That which is not forbidden is compelled into existence. Void creates canvas & canvas begets void.

6:08 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

9/ Type VI TOEs begin with the hands. Religions are of this type. I pass over this in silence as they aren't scientific.

I will leave open higher types, but I've really only seen attempts at I-IV & I wouldn't call String-Thy/M-Thy a full TOE try since events of the last 15 yrs.

6:19 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

10/ I believe fundamental physics is stalled out because we are finally at the doorstep of a TOE and we haven't really bothered to think about what that would actually mean because we've never been here before. A final step need not look like any previous one. In fact, it cannot.

6:26 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

END/ My bet is on Type III for a reason:

Type I is not unified.
Type II is possible, but appears to be unworkable in details.
Type IV appears to lack sufficient guidance from Quantum theory to actually 'ship' despite consuming resources for yrs.
Types V & VI lack any progress.

6:32 PM ¡ Jan 29, 2018

2019Edit

2020Edit

2021Edit

2022Edit


It really depends. Being totally honest:

“String Theory” has done a *tremendous* amount of good while “String Maximalism” has done even more harm.

If the String Theorists who led the movement were to undo some of the damage by admitting what happened, it’d be a major positive.

https://x.com/JMarkMcEntire/status/1562089447189086209

4:22 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

Here is where I respectfully disagree with my colleague @skdh. You can’t ‘get rid of string theory’. String-like objects are natural and have an unbelievably rich and beautiful interlocking mathematics. The beguiling beauty isn’t the problem in my opinion. Beauty is the excuse.

4:25 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

The problem is that string theory on its own has taken the last 40years to PROVE it doesn’t work as a stand alone path by gobbling up mind share, students, resources and (to be fair) most of the most brilliant brains. So much that no one dares say the full extent of the disaster.

4:29 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

During that time String Theory diverted the entire field into a magical never-land of “toy physics”. Models that aren’t in any way real. You now have “particle physicists” at the end of their careers who have never worked with anything like a particle and can’t remember them.

4:34 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

So, here’s my analysis. In a world where David Gross, Ed Witten, Lenny Susskind, Cumrun Vafa, Michio Kaku had a public Come To Jesus moment where they admitted the disaster in front of the community faithful, I’d be up for having ST as a major theory. But without that I’m unsure.

4:43 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

The damage to the culture of High Energy Physics is more severe than the damage done by Geoffery Chew in a different era. And here I support @skdh, Peter Woit, Lee Smolin etc. These are brave people who paid with abuse to communicate that physics was diverting into pure fantasy.

4:43 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

So to sum up:

String Theory deserves to be a major branch. But it has already mostly given up on the ‘80s promises/lies it told us to gobble up all the resources of the community (brains, mind share, $$$). That was a crime which may prove fatal to our being able to do physics.

4:52 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

But it is also so thoroughly investigated and badly behaved relative to scientific norms that it deserved to be shrunk. And that happened to a large extent already. The most important thing to realize is that physics is still about the physical world. Not Calabi Yau. Not AdS/CFT.

4:54 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

And we need our brilliant failed string theorists to admit the disaster within a scientific paradigm.

Science is a culture. Perhaps the most fragile one. It won’t survive this suspension of collegiality, decency and self-critical behavior. We need to go back to real physics. 🙏

4:57 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

@martinmbauer String theory was a giant percentage of a tiny priesthood. That was the same tiny priesthood that brought us Thermo Nuclear devices. And if you want to pay for me to research the numbers I’m willing to hire somebody to put together the data after 1984. It’s not usually contested.

5:06 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

@DontsitDJ @martinmbauer I wasn’t aware of it like that. I think he disagrees with me and has a bit of an edge. But maybe I missed a tweet or two. I haven’t seen much interaction and he has written some things I liked.

5:10 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

@DontsitDJ @martinmbauer I love a good critique. It’s hard to find. Most people out here develop a side hustle in interpersonal drama. I try not to.

5:12 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

@martinmbauer I don’t know which version of “The Field” you mean.

Physics in total? Is a large field.

Beyond the standard model theory? Is a small field. Tiny. But hugely consequential. And the percentage and effect wasn’t small. Do you really dispute this??? Look at the IAS professors.

5:38 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

@martinmbauer Seiberg/Witten/Dijkgraaf/Maldacena

All string folks.

Maybe get a string theorist to admit this to you. Brian Greene likely wouldn’t disagree with me.

5:40 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022


Physics in 1980: “I’m trying to grasp why nature has 3 generations of chiral fermions with SU(3)xSU(2)xU(1) internal symmetry.”

Physics Today: “Remind me again what the internal quantum numbers are? I do quantum gravity so it’s not something I’ve worked with since my QFT class.”

3:24 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

What has string theory done to become the poster child of failed physics? It hasn’t even failed.

4:56 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022

A) High energy physics of real particles became the no-energy physics of toy models.

B) Quantizing Gravity was substituted for unification or extension of the Standard model.

C) Other research programs were obliterated because ST claimed it had it all rapped up.

D) Hype won.

3:34 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

E) Focus shifted to mathematical structure of abstract field/String/M theory. Not our particular world’s choice of thy.

F) Standards of scientific progress were rewritten to disguise failure.

G) Differential application of standards became the norm.

It ended physics culture

3:34 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

String Theory isn’t the problem. String culture is poisonous to science.

String theory, like love, means never having to say your sorry. Or mistaken.

It’s the January 6 problem…but in science. But where the physics versions of Mike Pence often got fired for not going along. 🙏

3:41 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

*you’re

3:44 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

P.S. “It hasn’t even failed” because it can’t fail. So far as I can see, it can never fail. In the minds of the faithful, It’s unable to fail because it *has* to be the way forward. It’s hard to explain what’s wrong with that to the enlightened who see its infinite power & glory.

3:50 PM ¡ Aug 24, 2022

What has string theory done to become the poster child of failed physics? It hasn’t even failed.

4:56 PM ¡ Aug 23, 2022


@DrBrianKeating I am not aware that the standard model and GR “work fine”: CKM, PNMS, Strong CP, Mass Hierarchy issues, CC origin, origins of internal symmetry, initial singularity and black hole singularity, Miniboone, etc. all require explanation.

If that’s what she means, I say it’s wrong.

8:22 PM ¡ Sep 14, 2022


One of the questions about UFOs that needs to be asked, and that I don’t hear much about, is: “Has the US government built fake UFOs?”

UFO people are so focused on whether there are real UFOs that they don’t push hard enough on this question.

Allow me to share a thought or two.

ERW-X-post-1590739362454843396-FhNxBNvVUAMH8ns.jpg
4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

When I first realized I was totally wrong about UFO/UAP, I was shocked by how many folks have very similar stories about recovered crashes of very similar advanced vehicles.

It was mind blowing in 2 ways.

A) We have real crashed vehicles. And/Or B) We built fake alien vehicles.

ERW-X-post-1590739368503046145-FhNxBicVUAA69V9.jpg
4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

At this point I’m reasonably sure there are things that look like cool alien vehicle in some hangers. But I also grew up near Hollywood and remember super cool looking fake space cars visible off the Hollywood freeway.

So: does anyone have stories of building fake UFOs for USG?

ERW-X-post-1590739374559617025-FhNxB4iVUAg6Ff.jpg
4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

As you likely guessed, all the photos in this thread are fake military equipment. The airbase is totally fake. The dummy tanks are often inflated on the battlefield. The fake tank pieces are bolted on to real cars.

Q: Did we build fake UFOs in places like Wright-Patterson AFB?

ERW-X-post-1590739382201307140-FhNxCXaVUAA7vrd.jpg
4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

After studying this issue for 2yrs, I’m pretty convinced that there ARE wild looking vehicles in secret high security locations. But I also find NO SIGN OF OUR TOP PHYSICISTS. That is a huge red flag. If you had fake UFOs, you would have a puzzle for physics: What is the science?

4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

A true recovered interstellar craft would be like LHC or LIGO data: potential scientific data for physics beyond the Standard Model and General Relativity.

But if the crafts are fake, you would be crazy to let the A-team physicists near them. It would blow up in your face.

4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

So my ignorant question is this: are there stories of building fake UFOs for sites in Nevada? Ohio? Are there fake retrieval teams? To what extent does faking military equipment spill into faking a UFOgasm for decades?

Because there are too many very similar craft stories.

ERW-X-post-1590739390351159297-FhNxC3 VUAEUmwE.jpg
4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

So, at this point, the stories of craft kept at secret locations is most likely to be true in my opinion. But it is also true that all the top physics talent that was working only semi-covertly on suspicious gravity projects left by the early 1970s. So any craft may be faked.

4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

Either way, it’s a big deal. Everything changed in the early 70s. It’s impossible to say how much. The moment the Mansfield amendment came in, physics began to stagnate. And “Quantum Gravity” destroyed our culture of science. We don’t even whisper about its “Anti-Gravity” origin.

4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

So to sum up: there do *appear* to be craft. But advanced armies all build dummy weapons.

Q1: Do we have any Fakes?
Q2: Do we have only Fakes?
Q3: Why do we talk almost *exclusively* about Technology and not new Post-GR/SM science if there are *any* real interstellar craft?

🙏

4:13 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

Note Added: many readers are making wild inferences about me talking about flying fakes. I was very clear that this was about apparent crafts on the ground and in Hangars in Nevada, Ohio & elsewhere.

Wild or bad inference patterns will get you blocked. I don’t have time. Thx.

5:16 PM ¡ Nov 10, 2022

2023Edit


Now I feel completely alone.

I want our wanting out of this story. I have a huge dog in this fight. I spend every day fighting my own human desire for GU to be proven correct.

I believe this is how String Theorists stopped being scientists.

I just want our data & the physics.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

If biological aliens were here from others star systems in crafts that defy the current physics of the standard model and, more importantly, general relativity, I would be one of the few people who would have a guess on day one as to how they must have gotten here. It’s tempting.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

I don’t think biological interstellar alien visitors using GR and the SM make much sense. So I try to have a war *inside* my own mind as to what is true. I have a genuine “Need to Know” as to whether this is BS NatSec space opera disinformation theater. Because to me, it is data.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

What just happened isn’t data. It’s that a sober individual just pushed one of the many longstanding highly conserved NHI narratives collected from *many* diverse sober NatSec informants over the sworn testimony line. And it gets a LOT crazier from here. But it’s not science yet.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

As I‘ve been saying, there is so much deliberate NatSec BS out here that our own scientists are being propagandized. We’re drilling holes in our own scientists’ lifeboat. Last time we saw this it was virologists/immunologists/epidemiologists being gaslit. Now it’s physicists.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

Let me be very careful in what I am about to say. We have at least the appearance and optics of scientific self-sabotage. And wanting things to be true is how science dies.

I fight like hell to promote my theory. But I’d sign on to another to know the truth if I was wrong.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

We may be looking at the birth of a new UFO religion. Or a moment of contact. Or a long running Disinformation campaign. Etc.

To go beyond GR, let’s be scientists & get NatSec out of our data first. Where is our data pruned of space opera disinformation and cultic religiosity?

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

What I want to know:

Why was the Mansfield Amendment passed?

Why did NSF fake a labor shortage in our MARKET economy destroying American STEM labor markets?

What stopped the Golden Age Of General Relativity?

Why was the SSC really cancelled?

StringTheory & STAGNATION: WTF?

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

What the hell was the 1957 Behnson funded UNC Chapel Hill conference actually about?

Why are we not stopping to QUESTION quantum gravity after 70 years of public *FAILURE* inspired by Babson-Behnson patronage of RIAS, the Institute of Field Physics and the precursor to Lockheed?

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

This is the 50th year of stagnation in the Standard Model Lagrangian. It is AS IF we are deliberately trying to forget how to do actual physics. Everyone who has succeeded in Particle Theory in standard terms is now over 70. This is insane. In 25 years there will be no one left.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

Why are we not admitting that quantum gravity is killing physics and is the public respectable face of 1950s anti-gravity mania that lives on to murder all new theories in their cradle?

Quantum Gravity is fake and works to stop actual physics.

There. I said it. Now let’s talk.

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

If you want to know whether there are biological interstellar visitors here observing us, the short answer is “Almost *certainly* not if they are using our current stagnant non-progressing theories of physics.”

Let’s finally get serious about this whacky subject? Thanks. 🙏

1:44 PM ¡ Jun 7, 2023

I swear I didn't write my tweet to make you feel alone and I'm genuinely sorry if that was the result. That said, I think it's better to acknowledge one's hopes and desires than to pretend they don't exist and thereby overestimate one's own rationality.

8:26 AM ¡ Jun 9, 2023

@skdh I acknowledge my desires as you see from what I wrote. But a stagnant community always wants outcomes. It wants SUSY. Or Strings. Or some g-2 muon anomaly. Etc.

I want too. But what I want is mostly just a desire to get the BS out of physics so we can get back to succeeding.

3:40 PM ¡ Jun 9, 2023


2024Edit

I'm confused. This lecture doesn't negate the geometric foundations of GR. Einstein differentiates between how gravity and electromagnetism relate to the structure of space, all the while pointing to his ultimate goal of unification. As for the rest of the original article linked, I'm unsure how the quotes from Einstein support the author's title. GR is indeed a geometric theory; however, Einstein's viewpoint was that its geometric nature doesn't singularly distinguish it from the broader domain of physics, where geometry has always played a fundamental role. If anything, Einstein is saying not to confuse the map with the territory.

6:39 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024

He is correctly anticipating the Simons-Yang discovery of the “Wu Yang dictionary”.

Maxwell became Yang Mills
Yang Mills became Simons Yang.
Simons Yang became the Wu Yang Dictionary.
Wu Yang was (except for one entry) was Ehressmann fiber bundle geometry.

Think of metric geometry, fiber geometry and symplectic geometry as the geometry of symmetric metric 2-tensors, fiber bundle connections and anti-symmetric 2 tensors respectively.

6:52 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024

[Note for Curt: This is the whole point of Geometric Unity. They are three geometries. Which are all one geometry, and that is only possible in the rarest of circumstances. Which we are in oddly.

Metric Geometry: General Relativity GR Fiber Geometry: Standard Model SM Symplectic Geometry: Hamiltonian Quantization of the SM. ]

6:53 PM ¡ Mar 27, 2024


Interesting. If that’s what’s wrong, what would physics done right be?

Q1: What are the 3 most promising general lines of attack on fundamental physics?

Q2: Who are 5 theorists, in your opinion, closest to pursuing a breakthrough beyond the Standard Model/General Relativity? 🙏

4:09 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024

all that's wrong with theoretical physics in one simple graph

Skdh-X-post-1827724986427281497-GV1iMAkXwAAOBNM.jpg
4:09 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024

Yet another cut would be:

If the caption were instead reversed to read “All that is right with theoretical physics in one simple graph.”, what would that look like visually?

I’m genuinely super curious to learn about what you’re most excited, as I realized I don’t really know!

4:15 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024

NOTE: I was addressing these questions directly to my friend @skdh as a reponse to the OP when I posted. That said, many people are interpreting this as a general request and I am delighted to hear their takes as well.

5:35 PM ¡ Aug 25, 2024


This is what is blocking progress in my opinion for physics to go beyond Einstein and General Relativity.

40 years ago, the leaders of physics started claiming that gravity had to be quantized to be compatible with the Standard Model.

But the incompatibility is *not* Quantum vs Classical field theory. The *classical* field theory of the Standard Model is already not compatible with classical General Relativity.

General Relativity, at least as it is now, simply cannot be gauged so as to make it a true gauge theory, because Gauge transformation does *not* commute with the Ricci Contractions used in the field equations, and within the Einstein Hilbert action.

8:58 PM ¡ Sep 13, 2024

I wish I deserved the heretic moniker, but isn’t asking whether spacetime is quantum or classical just common sense? After all, general relativity (GR) - our theory of gravity and spacetime - is special. It isn’t a gauge theory, and gravity isn’t a force. 1/

10:57 AM ¡ Sep 12, 2024

For some reasons that have never been explained or justified leaders in physics started making the claim that GR *was* also a gauge theory. This was done by claiming that general coordinate invariance in the form of the diffeomorphism group is a kind of Gauge Transformation. Which it clearly is not.

This is absurd. Gauge transformations move the fibers and are defined not to move space time where as diffeomorphisms move space time directly.

So: why claim that GR is a kind of gauge theory? The only payoff I see is that this allows us to pretend that the SM vs GR incompatibility is classical vs quantum where it is staring us in the face that it is instead contraction-based (GR) vs Gauge Transformed (SM).

The only reason this is at all controversial is that the people saying it were thought to be the leaders 40 years ago.

That didn’t work out. We have 40 years lost as a result.

But the truth is anyone can see the incompatibility between gravity and gauge theory if they are not being told that gravity is a special kind of gauge theory. Which it absolutely is not as formulated by Grossman, Einstein and Hilbert.

Moral: The problem holding us back from a Theory of everything is **Classical**, and not Quantum. The quantum comes as desert after classical compatibility. It’s not the main issue. A red hearing that throws us off following the scent. It’s a distraction that should have fooled almost no one who was thinking for his or her self.

9:14 PM ¡ Sep 13, 2024

2025Edit

There is a tell when listening to physics folks as to whether they’re captured by the 1984 Quantum Gravity virus.

They either say:

A) “General Relativity has to be reconciled with the Standard Model.”

or

B) “General Relativity has to be reconciled with Quantum Theory.”

1:06 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025

So, what is the difference?

In the latter case of B), the diagnosis has already been definitively made. The problem is thus at the level of frameworks, not the level of theoretical models of the actual world. The issue has been made into “*THE* problem is that the classical theory of Gravity must be quantized.” That is, the classical framework of gravity must be dragged into our general quantum framework as the top priority. Seen this way, it is more of a technical math problem rather than something hyperspecific about our two theories of our physical world.

OPINION: There is absolutely no basis for this B) being an absolute whatsoever. This is a madness which started appearing as a String Theory mantra around 1984 and has led to a crisis.

In the case of A) that definitive diagnosis has *not* been made. The case is still Open. The issue is thus that “We have two specific physical theories that don’t quite fit together for multiple reasons. We need to figure out a physical framework to accommodate them both. That may be a third framework that harmonizes them rather than forcing one into the framework of the other. We need to consider all clues before reaching a definitive diagnosis.”

OPINION: It made absolutely no sense to have closed the case in 1984…and after 40 years of continuous failure, the issue is the leadership of the field. Opening the case and saying “GR and the SM have multiple issues. Not just quantization. Why are we not considering that the strong leadership forced THE WRONG DIAGNOSIS on the entire community??”

This is like saying “Maybe COVID came from NIAID/NIH/DTRA/EcoHealth/Daszak/Fauci/Collins/Baric…can we consider that??”

And the answer is “No”.

But that is why we are stuck in my opinion. We are stuck because we can’t question physics leadership without being thrown out of the community.

The dogmatic zealous leadership of physics totally failed. That is what happened. That cost us 41 years.

We can’t get to COVID origins for the same reason we can’t get to String Theory origins as “the only game in town.”

The imposed absolutist central narrative is simply a lie.

One man’s opinion.

1:06 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025

I don't see the difference. Seems to me one could interpret B the same way you are interpreting A.

1:13 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025

“The top priority is that the Standard Model has Internal Symmetry while General Relativity does not.”

“The top priority is that the Standard Model is a full Gauge Theory while General Relativity has no gauge invariance.”

“The top priority is that GR allows contraction across the tensor product of bundles while the Standard Model does not.”

“The top priority is that GR has well defined Contorsion tensors while the Standard Model does not.”

Those are all possibile research programs within A. Not within B.

1:22 PM ¡ Oct 30, 2025


Let’s try a science post to show you the problem with the hijacking of science:

CLAIM: Quantum Gravity has been a 41 year disaster for physics. EVERYONE knows the String Theory leadership told us exactly what they were about to do, and then FAILED physics.

A mitigated disaster:

ERW-X-post-1998618647418622032-G7yFENxaEAAJ94x.jpg
4:59 AM ¡ Dec 10, 2025

Everyone who has followed fundamental physics closely since ‘84 knows this is true.

If science were healthy we would discuss that. But we can’t, because we have unwanted leaders. Those leaders are refereeing their OWN games. And, they win all games that they both play & referee.

4:59 AM ¡ Dec 10, 2025

So has physics failed you? No! Fundamental Physics is fine. But it got hijacked by a crew. That crew created a cult called “The Only Game In Town” or TOGIT. Literally. That is what they called it. Pure hubris and murder.

TOGIT failed you. And TOGIT hijacked fundamental physics for 41 years. But science didn’t.

Fundamental physics is sitting right where it was overpowered, mugged, robbed, and tied up by String Theory and Quantum Gravity and left for dead in 1984.

It’s fine. The Standard Model is amazing. As is general relativity. In fact: it’s totally spectacular. We could get back to work tomorrow if we could get out from under the cult and get our own resources back.

But we can’t yet run De-Stringification schools, undo Quantum Gravity Indoctrination and get back to actual science. We are still run by zombie ideologies refereeing fundamental physics. Or what is left of it. And that is why I post like this. It’s a fight to get you to grasp what happened.

Similarly for COVID Zoonotic origin theory. Or Economic Theory and Neo-Classical theory. Or Neo-Darwinism. Etc. Etc. You got hijacked. We all did.

One and all. And I am suggesting we take OUR cockpits back.

5:26 AM ¡ Dec 10, 2025

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