CN Yang
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I have a question about Physicists eating at me. Why is X more famous than Yang where X is not equal to Dirac, Einstein and a few others?
I find what CN Yang says about the mid-1970s so important that I keep a constant lookout for any tid-bit about the experiences of 1975-7.
I find this tale of a Chinese scientific journey of the ages passing through El Cerrito deeply moving: http://bit.ly/YangChern
"If you can sense vaguely, some of this beauty, do not let go. ... Mills and I ....we saw the beauty." - http://bit.ly/2l6i1q
1/ APRIL FOOLS' SCIENCE: Theory into Practice.
I was challenged by someone as to why I wasn't taking my own medicine referenced in the sub-tweet below this April 1st. Ok. Here goes.
What I believe about the universe that is quite different and why I don't talk about it much... https://t.co/RjqRGc5J9m
2/ When I was around 16-17, I learned of a story that fascinated me much more than it seemed to captivate any other mathematician or physicist. It was the story of the discovery of the "Wu-Yang" dictionary around 1975-6, involving 3 super-minds: Jim Simons, CN Yang & Is Singer.
3/ What was learned was that the Quantum of Planck, Bohr & Dirac was built on an internal Geometry, just as surely as General Relativity was built on an external geometry of space-time. Only the two geometries weren't the same! One was due to B Riemann; the other to C Ehresmann.
4/ Further the 2 geometries had different advantages. Riemann's geometry allowed you to compress the curvature & measure the 'torsion' while Ehresmann's encouraged "Gauge Rotation"... as long as you didn't do either of those two things. So I asked could the geometries be unified?
5/ This would be a change in physics' main question. Instead of asking if Einstein's gravity could fit within Bohr's quantum, we could ask "Could Einstein's structures peculiar to Riemann's geometry be unified & rotated within Ehresmann's?" The answer was almost a 'No!'
Almost.
6/ While physicists said the Universe was known to be chiral, I came to believe it was fundamentally symmetric. While we seemed to observe there being 3 or more generations of matter, I came to believe that there were but 2 true generations, plus an improbable "imposter." etc...
7/ In short a great many things had to be slightly off in our picture of the world in the 1980s to get the two geometric theories into a "Geometric Unity." Then in 1998, it was found that neutrinos weren't massless! This started to tip the scales towards the alterations I needed.
8/ In short the April 1st "trick" that is being played on me is that I see a *natural* theory where chirality would be emergent (not fundamental), the number of true generations would be 2 not 3, there would be 2^4 and not 15 Fermions in a generation, and the geometries unify.
9/ I spoke on this nearly 5 years ago; I have been slow to get back to it as I found the physics response bewildering. I have now decided to return to this work & to disposition it. So over the coming year, I'll begin pushing out "Geometric Unity" (as a non-physicist) to experts. https://t.co/ICSXdNs9D2
END/ I am sorry that this was a bit technical for lay folks and not technical enough for experts, but it's twitter. I may begin to say more in the weeks and months ahead that may be clarifying.
If you are interested, do stay tuned. Until then, I thank you for your time.
My personal & overly condensed view of mathematics and physics in the 20th century would be summarized like this.
Mathematics began as a stool on the three legs of Algebra, Calculus, and Geometry where the last appeared to many to be the weakest leg. It turned out otherwise.
Repeatedly we find that any important problem from math or physics which we consider to be outside geometry/topology has a hidden geometrical nature to it. And there are only so many times you fall for that before you start to see geometry absolutely everywhere.
As for Weinberg, he is one of three people I can make the case for as our âGreatest Living Physicistâ. Iâve met him. But he still has big bets which are undecided (e.g. asymptotic safety). Witten is somehow even smarter but less accomplished in standard predictive theory. But...
I would say the one who awes me most is...CN Yang. I donât understand why I never hear his name as candidate. He has at least 3 of the greatest achievements: chirality for the weak force (w/ Lee), non-Abelian maxwell theory (w/ Mills), and the bundle revolution (w/ Simons/Wu).
Dear @michaelshermer,
Thanks for this. Very sober. I myself also donât find the authenticated videos so far released compelling. But I do find your challenge of âno isolated discontinuous innovationâ quite interesting!
Might I propose a friendly debate among friendly skeptics?
Dear @EricRWeinstein Please see my argument for why UAPs cannot be foreign assets capable of physics & aerodynamics attributed to UAPs that if true would be decades or centuries ahead of us. History shows no nations/companies of comp development so lag. https://quillette.com/2021/06/03/understanding-the-unidentified/
First of all, I am concerned that the paradigm of being scientifically or technologically âcenturies aheadâ is all wrong. This came up in a phone call with our buddy @SamHarrisOrg.
Q: How many centuries ahead is 1952-3 from 1900? Iâd have guessed âmanyâ (not .5) and been wrong.
Next challenge: doesnât your line of reasoning prove that âRenaissance Technologiesâ is either a fraud or a front? Their Medallion Fund is otherwise a long term unbreached secret, discontinuous from any other know investment fund seemingly thousands of years ahead of competitors.
Now Iâve had the odd question about Renaissance (front not fraud) for just this reason. But either way, itâs either a counter example to your claims on discontinuous innovation if it is merely a fund or a counter-example to your secrecy claims if it is our secret physics program.
Next: there are really two metrics on innovations.
Metric I: How big the incremental jump in difficulty.
Metric II: How big the jump in what is unlocked.
The great fear is that a small jump measured by 1 leading to an ENORMOUS jump in as measured by II.
You are, to me, arguing powerfully that certain people canât exist: Rodney Mullen, Edward Van Halen, Bob Beamon, Dick Fosbury, Hiroji Satoh, Satoshi Nakamoto, etc.
They all exhibited the âa little unlocks a lotâ paradigm with Zero-Day exploits that were each decisive.
And that brings us to theoretical physics. Beginning around 1982 , the son of the worldâs top employed anti-gravity researcher(?!) of the 1950s turned in what may be the most impressive 15yr output in the history of the subject by my estimation. How can I begin to explain this?
Itâs not physics exactly. But Edward Witten w support from a small number of folks rewrote Quantum Field Theory as geometry. If Einstein geometrized gravity, then Witten geometrized Quantum Field theory (everything else).
Now, all that change has so far unlocked exactly nothing.
But itâs not that nothing happened in physics. While we were pretending that string theory was working, Witten & Co revolutionized our mathematical framework. Think of it as an enormous amount of unrealized gains. Pent up genius & power looking for its 1st application to the đ.
Now let me show you how I could get discontinuous innovation if I were China or Russia. I donât know those systems as well so Iâll use the US example.
We know most of the top minds. We pretend that there is a lot of subjectivity about this for social reasons but China wouldnât.
If I thought like CCP, Iâd create a lavish secret theoretical physics program modeled on the Russian Sharashka system. The key would be to get it to look like something else. A boring Tech company or some weird Chinese fund to disguise the reason for the secretive lavish campus.
[Digression: If the US were smarter, weâd do it by setting up a mythic secret $B hedge fund that employs top differential geometers, theoretical physicists & ML experts by a national lab & an off brand university w/ inexplicably strong geometry & physics. But enough crazy talk..]
If CCP could today repeat what Witten (& friends) did building off Geometric Quantum Field Thy, the US would have Zero clue what it unlocks. Even by your own incrementalist theory. It might unlock absolutely nothing. Or passage to the stars via additional degrees of freedom. đ¤ˇââď¸
One last point. I released such a theory. Could well be wrong.
But I can tell you I should have received a call from DOE. Because calls are cheap and relevant trained PhDs are *very* finite. The US should track every geometer, General Relativist, and Particle Theorist working.
You donât have to take a position on me or GU. You can ask Wolfram or Lisi or Barbour or Deutsche or anyone outside the system whether such calls are placed. They are not. No one *in* the system believes in wild discontinuous change from *outside* the system. As per your article.
Which is to say weâre not monitoring. Maybe we think thatâs a waste of taxpayer dollars. Maybe we think that a Grisha Perelman of physics is impossible.
How much does a phone call cost if a researcher is wrong vs not bothering if theyâre right? Price the Type I & II error. Nuts.
Discontinuous innovation is always unlikely. But never impossible.
We are both skeptics. But this UFO story is weird beyond belief Michael. I canât think of a single story to fit to these reports Iâm hearing about.
I welcome your thoughts. As always.
Warm regards,
Eric
There were three candidates for worldâs greatest living theoretical physicist as I saw it:
A) CN Yang
B) Steven Weinberg
C) Edward Witten
Weinberg was the favorite of many people I respect. I found his writing style to somehow be both clear and impenetrable at the same time.
But what we just lost is one of our few links back to fundamental physicists who didâŚ.words fail meâŚactual work on the physics of the đ we live within.
It is not much of an exaggeration to say that sometime in the last 20 years, we stopped even trying to do fundamental work.
I met Steven only once. It was an unremarkable interaction. My impression was that he was so smart that he knew to get out of High Energy Theory for the most part. He dutifully defended string theory at times but voted with his feet and his offbeat ideas like Asymptotic Safety.
I have a very strong emotional connection to Wittenâs work and Yangâs. Weinberg always struck me as immensely powerful, but I could never get the sense of âThatâs Weinbergianâ. That is stylistically rare.
A total genius. But one that I couldnât understand well enough. Alas. RIP
Pay attention to this. The CCP is watching us destroy our own technical infrastructure. If I were the PRC I would start shopping for top academics who are alienated from their own western Universities.
Yau is an extraordinary mind. Time to wake up.
It may begin with academicians of Chinese origin, but we are mistreating our research system & researchers so badly that it will not be too difficult for Yau to bring over non-Chinese with a promise of being left alone, well paid, fully funded and free from social engineering.
Yau is effectively an anchor tenant. The two comparable Chinese mathematicians/physicists have been SS Chern & CN Yang at this high level.
Mark these words: this is a big deal. If China knows how to play this properly, we are going to see our STEM edge frittered & lured away.
Do I blame China? Ha.
No. I envy them.
The only thing we have going for us at the moment is that they havenât moved more quickly and boldly with more resources. And itâs just a matter of time. We are being idiots.
One manâs opinion anyway.