AaS! 121: Is String Theory Worth It? (Part 7: A Correspondence from a Dear Friend)

Ask a Spaceman!

Paul M. Sutter

Astrophysics, Science, Cosmos, Holes, Black, Astronomy, Natural Sciences, Universe, Cosmology, Space, Physics

4.8 • 853 Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2020

⏱️ 30 minutes

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Summary

How did String Theory get started? What has made the idea so popular over the decades? Can we ever truly have a theory of quantum gravity? What is supersymmetry, the landscape, and the AdS/CFT Correspondence? What do holograms have to do with this? How many dimensions do we live in? Why does String Theory have such a hard time making predictions? How are we supposed to judge a theory that isn’t done yet? It’s a non-stop String Theory bonanza as I discuss these questions and more in today’s Ask a Spaceman!

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Hosted by Paul M. Sutter, astrophysicist and the one and only Agent to the Stars (http://www.pmsutter.com).

Transcript

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0:00.0	You might think, given the way I ended the previous episode in our string theory series, which we are now entering our fourth month.
0:18.6	And I swear this is going to be our last month. I shouldn't do that. I hope this is going to be our last month. I hope this is going to be our last month. And I swear this is going to be our last month.
0:21.2	I shouldn't do that.
0:22.2	I hope this is going to be our last month of our string theory exploration.
0:27.5	And you might think that given the way I ended the previous episode,
0:30.7	that this one will be the last episode where we finally evaluate string theory.
0:35.0	We put it on trial.
0:36.3	We decide if we should keep paying for it. But it's not,
0:41.9	because there's a major topic I need to talk about first. In some ways, this topic is considered
0:49.1	a detour from the main goal of string theory, which is trying to explain quantum gravity and develop a theory of everything.
0:59.8	And in other ways, this topic is considered one of the most fruitful avenues for modern string theory research.
1:08.5	Some people call it a waste of time.
1:10.7	Some people call it the third super string
1:13.4	revolution. But whatever it is, it has a horrible name. I mean, string theory has great branding.
1:21.6	It's all about strings. It's a theory. It sounds sexy and new and fresh.
1:28.2	What I'm going to talk about today is by far the most active branch of string theory research,
1:34.1	and it goes by the name of the ADS-CFT correspondence.
1:41.2	We're just going to have to accept the fact that I'll be saying that phrase a lot, so we might as well get used to it.
1:48.1	The ADS-CFT correspondence.
1:52.4	It sounds like some obscure accounting phrase, no offense to any accountants in the audience.
1:58.3	It sounds boring, and it deserves to be said boringly.
2:03.4	This correspondence isn't really string theory itself, but more like a wholly owned
	...

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