Abstract
The world view of modern physics is based on two fundamental theories: quantum field theory and general relativity. One describes the atomic and subatomic world of the microcosm, the other the macrocosm of galaxies and the universe as a whole. There is apparently no overlap between these theories of the extremely large and the extremely small. Both theories lose their validity or applicability as soon as they approach the scale appropriate to their counterpart.
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Notes
- 1.
K. Ford, J.-A. Wheler, Geons, Black Holes, and Quantum Foam: A Life in Physics, New York, (2000), p. 235.
- 2.
It does not necessarily take a global fourth dimension to describe the curvature. There are embedded (4 + 1) and non-embedded (3 + 1) theories of general relativity.
- 3.
Although the gluons and W-bosons in the other quantum field theories of the Standard Model do interact with each other (gluons via their colour charge, W-bosons via their charge), this is not an unsurmountable problem for renormalization. Gluons cannot exist freely because of confinement, and W bosons are very heavy so the weak nuclear force is very short-ranged. The graviton, in contrast, would have to be massless like the photon.
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Jaeger, L. (2018). Einstein Does Not Fit: The Fundamental Problem in Physics Today. In: The Second Quantum Revolution. Copernicus, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98824-5_14
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98824-5_14
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Publisher Name: Copernicus, Cham
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