6 ms·

Something is wrong in the state of QED - history of physics

13 points by eln1 4y ago

outsomnia 4y ago
The PDF is interesting and comprehensible to mortals, has historical quotes from Feynman, Dirac etc agreeing with its thesis.
- eln1 4y ago
  Indeed, e.g. of Dirac: “I must say that I am very dissatisfied with the situation because this so-called ’good theory’ does involve neglecting infinities which appear in its equations, ignoring them in an arbitrary way. This is just not sensible mathematics. Sensible mathematics involves disregarding a quantity when it is small – not neglecting it just because it is infinitely great and you do not want it!. ” and Feynman: "The shell game that we play is technically called ’renormalization’. But no matter how clever the word, it is still what I would call a dippy process! Having to resort to such hocus-pocus has prevented us from proving that the theory of quantum electrodynamics is mathematically self-consistent. It’s surprising that the theory still hasn’t been proved self-consistent one way or the other by now; I suspect that renormalization is not mathematically legitimate.”
  - spekcular 4y ago
    This is an outdated, pre-1970s view of renomralization. Thanks to work of Wilson (1982 Nobel prize) and others on the renormalization group, we have a much better understanding. One good article that explains this shift (in the context of a debate in the philosophy of physics) is here: http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/8890/ http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/8890/.
    - eln1 4y ago
      Thanks, I will read, but generally beside e.g. the gravity problem, with increased accuracy there appear inaccuracies all over the standard model, so maybe it is worth revisiting QED? Are you saying the g-factor inaccuracies are not a problem? https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-broken-expert.html https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-brok...
      - spekcular 4y ago
        The discrepancy in the article you linked is completely unrelated to how well we conceptually understand renormalization (which is broadly applicable to many quantum field theories, not just the standard model). It could be the case that the standard model is wrong, but my claim would still stand.
WalterGR 4y ago
Some back and forth with the author on /r/BrilliantLightPower: https://old.reddit.com/r/BrilliantLightPower/comments/ffnnxw/something_rotten_in_the_state_of_qed/ https://old.reddit.com/r/BrilliantLightPower/comments/ffnnxw...
spekcular 4y ago
This paper came up previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31217791 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31217791 I stand by my comment from before: The person who wrote that paper doesn't understand the basics of the field that he's talking about. For example (quote from the other thread): "Consa gives an analogy wherein Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan has claimed that the sum of all positive integers is not infinite, but is instead -1/12. It’s wrong, it’s absurd, but renormalization has now been accepted, and is even sold as a virtue." One when performs zeta function regularization, one gets -1/12. This isn't some mystery; it's a perfectly reasonable thing to do. Analytic continuation has been understood since the 1800s. Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_function_regularization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_function_regularization Also, the claim that Karplus and Kroll committed "fraud" is basically libel, as can be seen by reading the complete account. The worst one can say is that people didn't publish full details of calculations due to page limitations or laziness, but this is hardly a special feature of QED. For instance, Onsager famously solved the 2-d Ising model exactly in 1944 but never provided details in print, just the final solution.
- semi-extrinsic 4y ago
  I agree, this paper smells strongly of someone who has not actually spent the time required to read and understand the current state of the art on QFT, and is just reading papers from 50 years ago to find things they didn't understand correctly then. And he is completely missing one of the biggest drivers in modern physics: you have basically an army of researchers trying desperately to find something, anything that is provably wrong with QFT. Because we know it's not the final theory, something is missing, and finding concrete errors might very well show us the way to a better theory. If, as the author claims, some original Feynmann diagram calculations are "kept secret" and actually wrong, all it takes is one postdoc somewhere to actually redo the calculations and show the error for all the world. That's a career defining paper right there, something that would make you famous in the community. If people thought there was even a 0.01% chance that was the case, they would be chasing it hard.
- CJefferson 4y ago
  yes, I agree there paper is nonsense. the author sends obsessed with the fact sooner people didn't shows their work, meaning everything collapses -- but people since then have got the same result but different calculations. everyone in the field knows QED is full of weird Martha's, and isn't the " answer to everything", but no one has a better answer, and it does produce results which line up with reality.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
nabla9 4y ago
I flagged this. It's a crank paper.
- JPLeRouzic 4y ago
  Please could you provide some explanations why it is a crank paper?
  - eln1 4y ago
    Mainstream censors non-mainstream, hence for half a century we are staying in place e.g. quantum gravity, there are appearing new problems ... https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-broken-expert.html https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-brok... The paper claims there are problems already with g-factor, could anybody explain why its objections are not valid?
    - nabla9 4y ago
      Crank science is easy to separate from non-mainstream approaches. Crank science is "everybody is selling nobody is buying" business. There are no physicists inside *or* outside mainstream who buy Consa's crank theories. (I explained why the narrative is not valid in another comment).
      - eln1 4y ago
        One can get grants in physics nearly only if being mainstream ... Consa brings concrete arguments regarding g-factor, I still haven't seen any concrete explanation, only saying that it is fringe science because of criticism of mainstream ... but he quotes mainstream papers.
  - nabla9 4y ago
    The argument is based on theory of historical fraud that is somehow become a mainstream and goes unnoticed. g-factor has been measured again and again. The problems with renormalization have been known. Initial theories have been refined and reformulated to be better, criticizing outdated formulations does not change physics. It's a conspiracy theory with sparkle of equations.

13 points by eln1 4y ago

The PDF is interesting and comprehensible to mortals, has historical quotes from Feynman, Dirac etc agreeing with its thesis.

eln1 4y ago
Indeed, e.g. of Dirac: “I must say that I am very dissatisfied with the situation because this so-called ’good theory’ does involve neglecting infinities which appear in its equations, ignoring them in an arbitrary way. This is just not sensible mathematics. Sensible mathematics involves disregarding a quantity when it is small – not neglecting it just because it is infinitely great and you do not want it!. ” and Feynman: "The shell game that we play is technically called ’renormalization’. But no matter how clever the word, it is still what I would call a dippy process! Having to resort to such hocus-pocus has prevented us from proving that the theory of quantum electrodynamics is mathematically self-consistent. It’s surprising that the theory still hasn’t been proved self-consistent one way or the other by now; I suspect that renormalization is not mathematically legitimate.”
- spekcular 4y ago
  This is an outdated, pre-1970s view of renomralization. Thanks to work of Wilson (1982 Nobel prize) and others on the renormalization group, we have a much better understanding. One good article that explains this shift (in the context of a debate in the philosophy of physics) is here: http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/8890/ http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/8890/.
  - eln1 4y ago
    Thanks, I will read, but generally beside e.g. the gravity problem, with increased accuracy there appear inaccuracies all over the standard model, so maybe it is worth revisiting QED? Are you saying the g-factor inaccuracies are not a problem? https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-broken-expert.html https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-brok...
    - spekcular 4y ago
      The discrepancy in the article you linked is completely unrelated to how well we conceptually understand renormalization (which is broadly applicable to many quantum field theories, not just the standard model). It could be the case that the standard model is wrong, but my claim would still stand.

WalterGR 4y ago

Some back and forth with the author on /r/BrilliantLightPower: https://old.reddit.com/r/BrilliantLightPower/comments/ffnnxw/something_rotten_in_the_state_of_qed/ https://old.reddit.com/r/BrilliantLightPower/comments/ffnnxw...

spekcular 4y ago

This paper came up previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31217791 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31217791 I stand by my comment from before: The person who wrote that paper doesn't understand the basics of the field that he's talking about. For example (quote from the other thread): "Consa gives an analogy wherein Indian mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan has claimed that the sum of all positive integers is not infinite, but is instead -1/12. It’s wrong, it’s absurd, but renormalization has now been accepted, and is even sold as a virtue." One when performs zeta function regularization, one gets -1/12. This isn't some mystery; it's a perfectly reasonable thing to do. Analytic continuation has been understood since the 1800s. Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_function_regularization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeta_function_regularization Also, the claim that Karplus and Kroll committed "fraud" is basically libel, as can be seen by reading the complete account. The worst one can say is that people didn't publish full details of calculations due to page limitations or laziness, but this is hardly a special feature of QED. For instance, Onsager famously solved the 2-d Ising model exactly in 1944 but never provided details in print, just the final solution.

semi-extrinsic 4y ago
I agree, this paper smells strongly of someone who has not actually spent the time required to read and understand the current state of the art on QFT, and is just reading papers from 50 years ago to find things they didn't understand correctly then. And he is completely missing one of the biggest drivers in modern physics: you have basically an army of researchers trying desperately to find something, anything that is provably wrong with QFT. Because we know it's not the final theory, something is missing, and finding concrete errors might very well show us the way to a better theory. If, as the author claims, some original Feynmann diagram calculations are "kept secret" and actually wrong, all it takes is one postdoc somewhere to actually redo the calculations and show the error for all the world. That's a career defining paper right there, something that would make you famous in the community. If people thought there was even a 0.01% chance that was the case, they would be chasing it hard.
CJefferson 4y ago
yes, I agree there paper is nonsense. the author sends obsessed with the fact sooner people didn't shows their work, meaning everything collapses -- but people since then have got the same result but different calculations. everyone in the field knows QED is full of weird Martha's, and isn't the " answer to everything", but no one has a better answer, and it does produce results which line up with reality.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

nabla9 4y ago

I flagged this. It's a crank paper.

JPLeRouzic 4y ago
Please could you provide some explanations why it is a crank paper?
- eln1 4y ago
  Mainstream censors non-mainstream, hence for half a century we are staying in place e.g. quantum gravity, there are appearing new problems ... https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-broken-expert.html https://phys.org/news/2022-05-standard-particle-physics-brok... The paper claims there are problems already with g-factor, could anybody explain why its objections are not valid?
  - nabla9 4y ago
    Crank science is easy to separate from non-mainstream approaches. Crank science is "everybody is selling nobody is buying" business. There are no physicists inside *or* outside mainstream who buy Consa's crank theories. (I explained why the narrative is not valid in another comment).
    - eln1 4y ago
      One can get grants in physics nearly only if being mainstream ... Consa brings concrete arguments regarding g-factor, I still haven't seen any concrete explanation, only saying that it is fringe science because of criticism of mainstream ... but he quotes mainstream papers.
- nabla9 4y ago
  The argument is based on theory of historical fraud that is somehow become a mainstream and goes unnoticed. g-factor has been measured again and again. The problems with renormalization have been known. Initial theories have been refined and reformulated to be better, criticizing outdated formulations does not change physics. It's a conspiracy theory with sparkle of equations.