No, these theories claim a lot but are far from the knowledge gathered in the standard model. Personally I doubt that there is a fundamental role for quantum gravity theories.

No, these theories claim a lot but are far from the knowledge gathered in the standard model. Personally I doubt that there is a fundamental role for quantum gravity theories.

@Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen. Thank you for your response. Can you kindly elucidate on your comments.

I agree with Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen .

@Matts. I am trying to understand, what is meant by "fundamental role." Is there anything in the standard model that is not a form of energy? And does not gravity exist between different forms of energy?

While charges are equal (up to a sign and factors 1/3 and 2/3 for quarks) masses are all different. They enter the standard model by taking the values from the experiment. For the Higgs particle there is even the so-called hierarchy problem because loop corrections to the mass may be large, so that some sort of fine tuning would be needed to get the observed "small" mass. Why the electron is light and neutrinos very light is completely unknown. I think there is a task here for future generations.

In nuclear and atomic physics masses are calculated dynamically from the underlying forces. For protons mass calculations are done using lattice gauge theory with reasonable success. However, the quark and lepton masses are fixed by experiment and not dynamically determined. This exceptional situation is due to the way self-interactions are handled in Quantum Field Theory (QFT), namely by summing infinite scattering diagrams in a clever way (renormalization), however without any predictive power. I have developed a self-consistent approach to dressing in QFT which is finite and purely dynamical and leads to a dressed quark with a finite radius of the order of 8 Planck lengths (arXiv:1208.5406). The mechanism leading to the finite radius is quite stunning and unique in physics. However, the energy of this system in QFT is negative and to make a sensible model one needs to include the effects of general relativity perturbatively and that of the vacuum energy at extremely small distances. This contributes a compensating contribution leading eventually to a positive mass of around 3.5 MeV. This suggests that our model describes the light quarks (the value is close to the "experimental" value). Hence, in this model gravity plays an essential role (however, as a repelling, rather than an attractive force). I have tried to describe the two other generations of quarks as excitations, however, the self-consistent nature of these calculations is extremely restrictive and I have not succeeded (yet).

Vikram:

I think I have developed math for which solutions correlate with all known elementary particles (the Standard Model particles), gravitons (quantum gravity), and some (other) possible yet-to-be-discovered particles. Assuming some of the 'other solutions' correlate with actual particles, I think I solve (or point to how to solve) approximately 10 well-known 'problems' (regarding sizes of CPT-related violations, why the rate of expansion of the universe changes over time, the nature of dark matter, the nature of dark energy, why the universe may be 'flat,' why fermions have 3 generations, …).

The math features isotropic quantum harmonic oscillators.

The attachments provides more detail. The first attachment and my book "Physics Math Reset" provide the math, provide the catalog of particles, and solve or point to possible solutions for the ~10 problems. The second attachment provides approximately half the book.

Vikram

All is not energy. The quantum numbers, the symmetries, the degrees of freedom are not.

And remember that gravitation is an exceedingly weak force, it does not play any role in the interactions of elementary particles.

Jan Greben

This is the answer of a cynical old professor.

Your preprint arXiv:1208.5406 which you referred to has never been quoted by anyone else than yourself. Your paper on the cosmological constant not either. This is the kind of work which should not enter ResearchGate.

Thank you all for your response. I read them with interest.

@Matts. No one has claimed gravitational attraction between quantum numbers or symmetries or degrees of freedom.

During my work on this subject I got a feeling that at very high energy levels (near Planck energy), A same particle can have different mass related to its different quantum states. In classical quantum theory when electorn jumps the orbit it emits the photon but the electron mass remains pretty much the same. At planck energy level, the particle emits such a large chunk of mass that its own mass gets altered. Secondly I noticed that the particles like Graviton can exist in my theory very late after the stars are formed. They cannot exist at high energy  levels. But the gravity existed right from the beginning of the universe. This would mean that the Graviton and gravitational waves have nothing to do with the gravitational attraction. Under the circumstances these gravitational waves should be replaced by the decay products of the particles. When the quantum state of the particle change it gives out a large chunk of mass, that itself should be considered the gravitational wave. As the Hubble parameter rolls down, the resulting gravitational waves keep changing their property drastically. This would mean that elementary particles themselves are the gravitational waves.

Vikram,

Near the Planck energy one can talk about the properties of the scalar instanton field, Later the GUT field. Under no circumstance there are particles.

@Matts. The field theory that does not have particles violates the fundamental principle of wave particle duality in quantum theory. The words "discrete quanta" imply a particle. Even Instantons are considered pseudo particles. Scalar instanton field theory has some applications with black holes etc. and further development has lead to supersymmetric gauge theories which are far from reliable quantum gravity theory. In periodic quantum gravity, at Planck energy exists the Saviton field which is massless kinetic energy from which the strong force has not separated yet. After the separation of strong force appears the GUT field.

I agree with Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen and M. Ross too.

But there is also the model of Bilson-Thompson which describes all fermions of the first generation (and the gauge bosons) by topological excitations (3-braids). It was later included in Loop quantum gravity by Smolin et.al. I know many things are unknown but it is possible way. Unfortunately, the mass was not explained or calculated, even the Higgs boson does not appear. But in my opinion, topology will play an important to explain the particle spectrum of the standard model (and explaining also the failure of QFT to determine all particles).

Maybe the mass is also a topological property.

@ Thorsten:

Topology will be needed, it sets how the fields decay. I do not believe that mass is a topological quantity, the values show hardly any pattern. Neither do I believe that the Planck scale and (loop) quantum gravity are relevant for their values.

Topological invariants are not only follow a regular pattern (see the stable homotopy groups of spheres, the number of differential structures on spheres or 2-torsion of cobordism groups and many more examples).

But I see your point. What did you think about the problem? Is a supersymmetric extension of the standard model the solution (but susy was not found at LHC)?

It's about time to forget about SUSY. But I realize that it is not so easy for those who spent 20 years doing SUSY research.

There is no theory of quantum gravity. Rovelli's review shows many bright ideas for finding such a theory but they have all stalled without producing any insights for a way forward, in spite of the expenditure of considerable mathematical manipulation on all of them. This indicates to me that the question we are asking is too big. We need to break the problem down into smaller questions which may be anserable.

The one I have been concentrating on is how quantisation of space can lead to curvature.

Clearly imposing the planck length as the separation between points can only lead to a rigid lattice without the ability to describe curvature. The answer I have come to involves a small change to the axioms of geometry and a conceptual framework. (my paper on my profile Quantum Euclidean Geometry) Within this framework it is possible to construct a space, looking like a straight line,  with intrinsic curvature, using only a straight edge and compass. This space I call a straight curve is qualitatively similar to general relativity.

This is not the space we need for for quantum gravity but is a demonstration of one of a class of objects which may contain the one we want, just as Newton's cetripedal force depending on the inverse duplicate ration of distance was only one of a class of such force laws he examined.

What I have at the moment is not very much but the alternative has a two and a half thousand year lead on me.

At least one theory which predicts the fermions and gauge fields of the SM starting with some more fundamental principles exists, and not in crank web sites but published in Foundations of Physics, vol. 39, nr. 1, p. 73 (2009), see http://arxiv.org/abs/0908.0591  It does not predict the masses, but the number of particles, the gauge group, and all the charges. Some ideas about qualitative predictions for the masses exist (strong force and EM fields massless, weak force massive, neutrions with small mass). 

This is not a quantum gravity theory, but conceptually compatible with a theory of gravity which can be easily quantized as an effective field theory.  Also published. see http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0205035 . 

Above theories are ignored by the mainstream because they are based on ether concepts - that means, the fields we observe are interpreted as different properties of some fundamental condensed matter. 

@Ilja Schmelzer, Some interesting geometry for particles but this theory contains more problems than the Aether. The prefered coordinates and breaking of general covariance make it incompatible with GR. It also prevents black hole collapse which would leave us without galaxies which is contrary to observation.

I recall some years ago the EU were sponsoring research into faster than light travel based on the continuity equation rather than Einstein's equations. I don't think analogies with condensed matter are going to take us very far. We have not got a warp drive yet.  It is a bit like using the Navier-Stokes equation to describe the whirling force in the Aether that moves the planets. I have no doubt it could be done but the Michealson-Morley experiment would have to be ignored and Newton rejected.

Kaluza-Klein theory on 12 dimensions surely do.

@Andy: "The prefered coordinates and breaking of general covariance make it incompatible with GR."  

It is, of course, a different theory than GR. But so what?  The Einstein Equivalence Principle is derived and holds exactly (but not the Strong EP), the Einstein equations of GR appear in a natural limit.  This makes it compatible with the observational support in favour of GR. 

"It also prevents black hole collapse which would leave us without galaxies which is contrary to observation."

From observational point of view what remains are frozen stars of size slightly greater than horizon size, so it is, from observational point of view, almost indistinguishable from a GR black hole.  There will be no difference at all regarding the general history of galaxies. 

And, of course, the theory is a metric theory of gravity, thus, there is no problem with Michelson Morley at all.  The EEP is derived from first principles of  the theory, not postulated.  Not only Newton, even the Einstein equations of GR are recovered. 

And the results regarding the standard model of particle physics are the best what is avaiable in this direction. There is no competitor which has anything similar in explanatory power. 

@ Ilja Schmelzer 

From observational point of view what remains are frozen stars of size slightly greater than horizon size, so it is, from observational point of view, almost indistinguishable from a GR black hole. There will be no difference at all regarding the general history of galaxies.

The observational difference between an event horizon and a larger object is the fact that light can escape from a larger object. The black hole at the centre of our galaxy is usually unobservable and only flares occasionally when some more gas falls in. A larger object would glow because it is heated from time to time by the infalling gas. The glow may be redshifted to the radio range but it would most certainly exhibit a black body spectrum.

As far as I am aware there has been no observed glow in any part of the spectrum.

Andy, you are completely correct here, see http://arxiv.org/abs/1003.1446 with similar conclusions.  

So the question is about the temperature of this black body radiation.  If it is too low, then the frozen star would be unobservable.  It should be noted here that the value of Y should be already extremely small for other reasons, so I feel quite safe here. 

Dear Alejandro.

Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen, Matts Roos, Torsten Asselmeyer-Maluga, Andy Biddulph, and "Deleted", all seem to hold a contrary view than yours. What is the source of your information?

Ilja I find your explanation of the lack of a blackbody spectrum from the supposed frozen star at Sagitarius A unconvincing. The heat involved in the gravitational collapse of an object of this mass is enourmous. We know that the matter in neutron stars is capable of supporting hot spots so has a finite thermal conductivity and heat capacity. If your object has similar properties then we may expect to see a hot spot from the recent infall of gas. Are you proposing and exotic and unexplained form of matter for your frozen star. If so we risk multiplying enterties.

You state that all the radiation would fail to escape your frozen star due to gravitational lensing. In which case all the intial heat would be retained and any infall of material would increase the temperature since energy is conserved. It would only be a matter of time before kT/(1+z) became sufficiently large to permit radiative losses.

"In principle the heating by infalling matter could provide sufficient energy to

reach such temperatures. To decide if this happens for a given z, we would need a hypothesis about the thermal capacity of the material of the frozen star at extremely large temperatures T ∼ z. To exclude a surface completely, we would need such a hypothesis even for T → ∞.1 We obviously cannot have reliable data in this limit."

The absence of a hypothesis about a hypothetical and undefined state of matter is not an argument that can be used as an existence theorem for a surface. If a surface is unobservable and has no effect on anything else, what is the point of introducing it into physics?

Andy, I do not introduce it into physics because of some personal preference for it, Insttead, it follows from a theory, which has been derived on the base of completely unrelated axioms. 

Ok, there has been some aim behind the development of this theory - namely the quantization of gravtiy, and the recognition that this is impossible without a preferred background, see http://arxiv.org/abs/0909.1408  To introduce this preferred background using the harmonic gauge is the most natural thing, and once we want to have a theory with Langrange formalism for the harmonic gauge too, we have  have to add a term which gives the harmonic equation for the preferred coordinates.  All this contains no wish to do something with black holes. 

The point that we see no hotspots from recent infalling matter is quite nicely explained by the small percentage of what can go outside from the surface. Additionally, if the infalling matter is much, then for the first parts of it the way back - the only way out - is closed by the infalling later parts. So, even an ideal mirror as the surface would not work as an ideal mirror for realistic infalling matter.  This part of the argument does not rely on any hypothesis about the matter of the frozen star itself, it relies only on what happens with outgoing radiation given a flow of infalling matter. 

Then, the point is what is the temperature given all the energy of the infalling matter. If this temperature is below the background radiation, we obviously will not see the star. Unfortunately we cannot make here certain predictions. Because background radiation temperature for the outside observer translates into an astronomical temperature for the local, extremally time-dilated observer.   And we can compute the energy content, using energy conservation, but not temperature, because we don't know thermal capacity at these high temperatures. 

I doubt that a purely mathematical approach to physics will ever provide a fully satisfactory description of nature. Nevertheless, I suspect string theory could accurately describe the standard model if aliens landed tomorrow and informed us which specific location to focus on in the vast string landscape.

Some may regard the flexibility inherent in string theory as a fatal weakness but I consider it a necessary characteristic of any realistic unified theory. My reasoning is simple. We know that the laws of physics are compatible with life and that this in itself is highly improbable. I think this is so obviously true that any quest for a final theory of physics capable of predicting all the natural constants should have been abandoned long ago.

Compounding this error, many physicists believe that all forms of cosmic fine-tuning can be explained by our existence, i.e. the anthropic principle. They cannot.

Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen previously said "why the electron is light and neutrinos very light is completely unknown - I think there is a task here for future generations". Why not the present generation? There is no time like the present (manana never comes). Is this civilisation incapable of doing physics without insisting that all participants first bury their heads in the proverbial sand?

The properties of electrons, protons and neutrons can be regarded as a straightforward consequence of life being reliant on complex biochemistry and the desirability of a lengthy and comprehensively populated periodic table.

As for the humble neutrinos, if they had no mass at all it would not have made a blind bit of difference to Earth's evolutionary history. Why the neutrino has a non-zero mass (contrary to the standard model's prediction) and why that mass is so small are much trickier questions. However, an answer has now been advanced. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it also has to do with the needs of life.

There may be no elixir of life but water has been dubbed the matrix of life. All known lifeforms of Earth rely on the presence of liquid water. Therefore, habitats for life should not be too cold. Boltzmann's constant allows us to translate temperatures to energies. Einstein told us that the speed of light squared can be used to translate energies into mass. We can therefore ask what mass corresponds to the temperature (Tw) of liquid water? No need for any fancy tensor calculus here, the answer is roughly kTw/c^2.

It is often said that there is a pronounced asymmetry in the universe between matter and antimatter. Well, it is a bit too soon to be saying this when all efforts to directly detect dark matter have failed miserably and dark energy makes up most of the universe.

The annihilation of matter with antimatter can convert mass to energy with an efficiency far higher than nuclear fusion. Excessive heat causes water to evaporate but we know of no gaseous lifeforms. Therefore, some kind of thermal regulation mechanism would be nice (and one has been identified). From this it is possible to obtain an approximate upper limit to the mass of the magic particle whose annihilation can keep water liquid. It turns out to be in the range predicted by experimental and cosmological constraints on the neutrino mass. From this little insight, and a bit of thought, many things fall nicely into place - including the nature of dark matter, the long-standing mystery of extraterrestrial silence and why the expansion of the universe is currently accelerating. Yep, you read that right. I doubt that particle colliders have much to teach us anymore and it seems to me there is much more to physics than mere mathematics. The time has come to consider the possibility that cosmology is a life science. However, unless we can get our act together given the various crises confronting us, our civilisation may not even have the luxury of doing physics much longer.

@Robin Spivey. Your concluding remarks says it all. Thanks for the response.

Robin, you write: "Th. M. Nieuwenhuizen previously said "why the electron is light and neutrinos very light is completely unknown - I think there is a task here for future generations". Why not the present generation? "

I agree. In http://arxiv.org/abs/0912.3892 I have proposed an idea which could be able to explain this difference in the context of my model.  It is known that there are different types of phonons, acoustic ones which are massless, and optical ones with a mass gap. The acoustic phonons are those associated with translations.  Similarly, in my model neutrinos are associated with translations. 

Ilja, thanks for the link. You clearly have an active mind and are doing some great work. However, in relation to the puzzling neutrino masses you say that your approach does not in itself "promise a great ability to compute the masses from first principles". The same can be said of other attempts, such as the seesaw mechanism.

Instead of regarding the fine-tuning coincidences as individual problems to be dismissed as unremarkable through (usually convoluted) mathematical arguments, I think they should be considered collectively. It is then much easier to appreciate that these coincidences are actually clues. What is needed is not a "first principles" explanation but a model that fits the physical data and explains why they cannot be coincidences. A possible model is that the universe has somehow been expressly configured for life. The theory of evolution by natural selection did not come about by reductionist first principles, but by a holistic synthesis of the available evidence. Eventually, it emerged that DNA molecules transport genetic information from one generation to the next, so that DNA sequencing can now quantitatively establish how closely related we are to other species.

I'd say this approach has been lagely absent in physics. The first step is searching for and recognising patterns. This worked when quarks were proposed but has not been applied more generally. All examples of fine-tuning benefit life, many of which manifestly do not fall under the umbrella of the anthropic principle. It is just a matter of filling in some of the remaining gaps. The weak interaction is the only one that was not strictly needed to explain life on Earth. Neutrinos play no biochemical role and they can only interact via the weak force. The obvous question is how might neutrinos interact so as to support future life? Hint: consider how they mutually annihilate to release energy.

Robin,

You asked how might neutrinos interact so as to support future life? Neutrinos have another role, too, in the formation of galaxies and in the time of formation which depends on when neutrinos begin free streaming. This is an extremely complex process: primordial density fluctuations grow until they locally collapse to the structures we observe, So we know the result, but we also have to understand the scenario.

Matts, I agree that modest changes to the properties of neutrinos might slightly hasten or delay structure formation but stellar lifetimes would not be affected (though the onset of star formation might shift a bit in time). Since the neutrinos produced by stars are ultrarelativitic, it makes virtually no difference to the proton-proton chain reaction or the CNO cycle if neutrinos are massless. In fact, it has been argued by Harnik, Kribs and Perez (Phys. Rev.D74:035006,2006) that the weak interaction could be switched off completely, disabling hydrogen fusion and neutrino production. Life-cultivating stars could then rely on helium fusion, which does not involve the weak interaction at all, rather than hydrogen fusion. Some adjustments would be needed to the initial conditions though (to elevate the primordial abundance of helium).

Distinct parallels exist between inflation and the current phase of accelerating cosmic expansion. The spatial energy densities are very different, however. Inflation supposedly terminated with the decay of the underlying energy field to matter. The decay of dark energy, in contrast, might be limited to much lower energy particles. If it decays predominantly to slow moving neutrinos (the lowest mass fermions) and does so a tad before the longest-lived life-cultivating (class K) stars have expired, then an extremely interesting scenario arises (fine-tuned, ues, but give me an example of something that isn't). Nonrelativistic neutrinos will condense gravitationally until supported by degeneracy pressure so long as a maximum mass is not exceeded. The resulting structures are easily large enough to engulf entire galaxies. We expect some red dwarves to keep shining for at least 10 trillion years but comfortable habitats for life could become extremely abundant a 'mere' 60 billion years from now.

When it comes to lethal infectious diseases for which we possess neither vaccines nor treatments, containment has historically been an important and effective defence. A theory of quantum gravity is not needed to appreciate that in addition to the physical isolation provided by deep space, the gravitational potentials of planets, stars or galaxies offer further measures capable of guarding against the spread of pathogenic lifeforms. We may have visited the Moon but we have yet to establish a base on (or even visit) a neighbouring planet. Thus, our ongoing survival cannot be assured in times of global emergency. Although the Milky Way hosts billions of habitable Earth-like planets, the majority of which are older than ours, no communication has ever been received from another technological civilisation. In an age of inexpensive road, rail and air transportation, control of untreatable epidemics would seem to necessitate temporary travel restrictions. Bizarrely, our governments think not. Could it be that these various facts are not unrelated? Might our (seemingly already quarantined) species be on the verge of being, in effect, outwitted by a virus? Have we been too quick to forget lessons from other pandemics and, furthemore, failed to pay much attention to the organisation of the universe - especially the way it handles biohazards (viz. red giants)? Even if we lack any robust defence against ebola, the universe is superbly well-defended against civilisations that are inept when it comes to forward planning.