E8 pattern - Surfer dude A. Garret Lisi claims ”An Exceptionally Simple Theory Of Everything” purportedly solves the mysteries of the universe, but it’s really hogwash.
While it is kind of cool to think that a part-time mathemetician and hip surfer dude could outdo Einstein, the actual E8 pattern paper is mostly conjecture, cobbling together “notions” of what Lisi thinks should be accepted as supporting theoretical principles without really providing a true theoretical framework for evaluating his “Theory Of Everything.”
First off, the 30-page paper describing how the E8 pattern theory is basically physics gibberish. It’s the functional equivalent of a first-grader’s drawing of a house being equated with an architect’s blueprint.
Second, the paper has already been downgraded from the theoretical physics category (High Energy Physics Theory or “hep-th”) to the general physics category (”gen-ph” aka crackpot theories).
The abstract (summary) of An Exceptional Theory Of Everything by Garrett Lisi:
All fields of the standard model and gravity are unified as an E8 principal bundle connection. A non-compact real form of the E8 Lie algebra has G2 and F4 subalgebras which break down to strong su(3), electroweak su(2) x u(1), gravitational so(3,1), the frame-Higgs, and three generations of fermions related by triality. The interactions and dynamics of these 1-form and Grassmann valued parts of an E8 superconnection are described by the curvature and action over a four dimensional base manifold.
Much as I’d love to believe that a 248-dimensional model ”totally like dude!” explains the underlying nature of the universe, the theoretical work expressed in the E8 Pattern here is “Etch-A-Sketch” physics.
Here’s what another physicist said about the E8 pattern and Garrett Lisi’s “An Exceptional Theory Of Everything”:
Needless to say, the visually intriguing and colorful paper is a huge joke. The first place where I exploded in laughter was the equation (1.1).
It says, using words, the following:
My connection of everything = connection for gravity + weak force + strong force + electromagnetism + electron + neutrino + up-quark + down-quark + other-generations
That’s pretty cute!
The author is not constrained by any old “conventions” and simply adds Grassmann fields together with ordinary numbers i.e. bosons with fermions, one-forms with spinors and scalars.
He is just so skillful that he can add up not only apples and oranges but also fields of all kinds you could ever think of. Every high school senior excited about physics should be able to see that the paper is just pure junk. I understood these things when I was 14.
If you want groove out on the whole “An Exceptionally Simple Theory Of Everything” idea anyway because it’s just so cosmic, forget the nonsense equations and just watch the E8 movie.
And that’s all you need to know about the Simple Theory Of Everything hogwash, aka the E8 pattern.
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November 19th, 2007 at 5:56 am
Your comments are a sweeping overreaction….seeming to get an ego boost from knocking down what is in fact work that does have some merit. Even if the theory was “completely” incorrect, “pure” junk and “huge” jokes aren’t usually found in these kinds of things anyway.
November 19th, 2007 at 2:29 pm
Relying on Lubos Motl’s critique of Garrett Lisi’s paper, as you have above, is much like relying on a Republican’s opinion of the Democrats’ platform. As Lisi himself admits, his theory may succeed or fail spectacularly, but rival string theorist Motl’s caustic knee-jerk reaction is, at this point, little more than…. a caustic knee-jerk reaction. There are much more positive reactions by much more respected physicists such as Lee Smolin and John Baez that you might mention to provide some semblance of balance.
November 24th, 2007 at 11:22 am
Interesting. Here is his bio.
Abstracted from his Bio Data: http://sifter.org/~aglisi/Physics/CV.html
9/91-5/99 University of California, San Diego 5/99 Ph.D. in Physics G.P.A. - 3.9 Honors Fellowships - UC Regents fellowship, ARCS Foundation fellowship.
9/86-6/91 University of California, Los Angeles 6/91 B.S. in Physics and B.S. in Mathematics G.P.A. - 3.9 (4.0 in Physics and 4.0 in Mathematics) Academic Honors - Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Pi Sigma, Golden Key. Graduation Honors - College Honors, Highest Honors in Physics, Highest Honors in Mathematics, Summa Cum Laude, Kinsey Prize for The Outstanding Graduating Senior in Physics.
So he may not be a scientist but must be have some intelligence.
The beauty of what he is proposing and what is getting some folks excited is that it is a simple theory. It unifies the gravity issue which has always been the biggest kink.
And the fact that Lubos doesn’t like it actually puts more merit in my eyes
November 24th, 2007 at 11:24 am
sorry for typos
June 25th, 2008 at 8:34 pm
hm-m-m-m…
it seems to me, without taking sides one way or the other as to the veracity of the theory being postulated, that if the reactionary remarks made by both the original poster/responder, and then by the scientist he references (without offering his/her identity) in objection to the e8 theory of everything by lisi are supposed to be examples of real scientific argument then i’m left out in the cold! if lisi is wrong, give me facts, not derisive sound-bites.
it sounds all too much like the scientists that used to argue so vehemently that rocks didn’t fall from the sky! their arguments were essentially circumscribed by ridicule… ridicule based on what was considered to be so self-evidently ‘obvious’.
hey, take out of any theory what you can/what works, and discard the rest. if it were to be found that there is nothing correct about his theory at all, but it is suggestive of other directions of thought/possibilities, then i say hooray! that’s advancement, and that’s TRUE science!
just my thoughts.