Cumrun Vafa | String Theory and Quantum Mechanics
99Cumrun Vafa explains what string theory is, how it fits within contemporary physics, and sets out his vision for its future.
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String theory is the only candidate that we have which combines Einstein's theory with quantum mechanics in a consistent framework. And this all-encompassing theory isn't limited to the observable universe; string theorists can use it to think about unobserved universes too.
This burgeoning theory is compatible with general relativity because one of the modes these vibrating strings have has the same properties as mediating gravitational force, but no one knows why or how this works. Should we trust in a theory we have no explanation for, nor even experimentational verification to support it?
#quantum #stringtheory #physics
Cumrun Vafa is a string theorist, and a professor of physics at Harvard University. Vafa's research is focused on the nature of quantum gravity and the relation between geometry and quantum field theories. He is known for his co-discovery with Andrew Strominger that the Bekenstein-Hawking entropy of a black hole can be accounted for by solitonic states of superstring theory, and for expounding the relation between geometry and field theories that arise through string dualities (culminating in the Gopakumar–Vafa conjecture). This topic has been known as geometric engineering of quantum field theories.
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