hanu | needless to say, we're needles in hay

Surfer dude stuns physicists with theory of everything

From: http://www.telegraph.co.uk

Nov 14, 2007

An impoverished surfer has drawn up a new theory of the universe, seen by some as the Holy Grail of physics, which has received rave reviews from scientists.

Garrett Lisi, 39, has a doctorate but no university affiliation and spends most of the year surfing in Hawaii, where he has also been a hiking guide and bridge builder (when he slept in a jungle yurt).

In winter, he heads to the mountains near Lake Tahoe, Nevada, where he snowboards. "Being poor sucks," Lisi says. "It's hard to figure out the secrets of the universe when you're trying to figure out where you and your girlfriend are going to sleep next month."

Despite this unusual career path, his proposal is remarkable because, by the arcane standards of particle physics, it does not require highly complex mathematics.

Even better, it does not require more than one dimension of time and three of space, when some rival theories need ten or even more spatial dimensions and other bizarre concepts. And it may even be possible to test his theory, which predicts a host of new particles, perhaps even using the new Large Hadron Collider atom smasher that will go into action near Geneva next year.

Although the work of 39 year old Garrett Lisi still has a way to go to convince the establishment, let alone match the achievements of Albert Einstein, the two do have one thing in common: Einstein also began his great adventure in theoretical physics while outside the mainstream scientific establishment, working as a patent officer, though failed to achieve the Holy Grail, an overarching explanation to unite all the particles and forces of the cosmos.

Now Lisi, currently in Nevada, has come up with a proposal to do this. Lee Smolin at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, describes Lisi's work as "fabulous". "It is one of the most compelling unification models I've seen in many, many years," he says.

"Although he cultivates a bit of a surfer-guy image its clear he has put enormous effort and time into working the complexities of this structure out over several years," Prof Smolin tells The Telegraph.

"Some incredibly beautiful stuff falls out of Lisi's theory," adds David Ritz Finkelstein at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta. "This must be more than coincidence and he really is touching on something profound."

The new theory reported today in New Scientist has been laid out in an online paper entitled "An Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything" by Lisi, who completed his doctorate in theoretical physics in 1999 at the University of California, San Diego.

He has high hopes that his new theory could provide what he says is a "radical new explanation" for the three decade old Standard Model, which weaves together three of the four fundamental forces of nature: the electromagnetic force; the strong force, which binds quarks together in atomic nuclei; and the weak force, which controls radioactive decay.

The reason for the excitement is that Lisi's model also takes account of gravity, a force that has only successfully been included by a rival and highly fashionable idea called string theory, one that proposes particles are made up of minute strings, which is highly complex and elegant but has lacked predictions by which to do experiments to see if it works.

But some are taking a cooler view. Prof Marcus du Sautoy, of Oxford University and author of Finding Moonshine, told the Telegraph: "The proposal in this paper looks a long shot and there seem to be a lot things still to fill in."

And a colleague Eric Weinstein in America added: "Lisi seems like a hell of a guy. I'd love to meet him. But my friend Lee Smolin is betting on a very very long shot."

Lisi's inspiration lies in the most elegant and intricate shape known to mathematics, called E8 - a complex, eight-dimensional mathematical pattern with 248 points first found in 1887, but only fully understood by mathematicians this year after workings, that, if written out in tiny print, would cover an area the size of Manhattan.

Höstlovet är till ända. Imorgon bär det av till Kil igen. I sju veckor. Sedan är det jullov. Om 37 dagar kommer Alicia hem. Det är inte så mycket. Ju färre dagar det är kvar, ju närmare känns hon. Idag mötte jag Alicias föräldrar, de höll med.

Julklappshandlandet är redan långt gången. Jag har hittils köpt sex julklappar. En till pappa och fyra-fem till Alicia. Och mer ska det bli, jag är på inget sätt färdig. Jag vet inte vad jag ska köpa till mormor, morfar, farmor, farfar och mamma. Till Alicias föräldrar har jag några idéer, och Rickard får lite pengar insatt på sitt konto lagom till jul. Jag tror att jag kommer att hitta bra julklappar till allihop. De svåraste är morfar och farfar. Dessa gamla män, de skyltar inte så vidare värst med uppslag till julklappar. Och om jag skulle fråga morfar t.ex. så skulle han komma med de mest billiga förslag han kan komma på, som en öl. Men jag ska allt komma på något.

Nu sitter Rickard på ett flygplan mot Malaysia tillsammans med Fredrik och Philip. Resan går under namnet "The undispleasant Journey of perpetual summer". Det blir konstigt att han inte är här i ett helt år. Men det blir säkert roligt för honom. Om man önskar följa deras resa kan man söka upp Ricci på resedagboken.se eller kanske titta in här. Får se vart det dyker upp lite bild och text först.


Jag avslutar med ett blogginlägg från en rolig basketspelare vid namn Gilbert Arenas. Basket är hans yrke, men knappast det enda han sysslar med. Hans blogg är väldigt läsvärd. Här kommer en historia som gjorde mig glad.

Reminds Me of a Story

This is kind of a feel-good story, in a sense. I had a friend in high school, named Eddie. We called him 'chicken wing' because he was skinnier than Tayshaun Prince before he came into the NBA.

There was five of us and we had our own little team when we were 14-years old. Well Eddie used to always say that he could dunk. Every time we'd show up to the park and he'd already be there he'd be like, 'Oh man, I dunked it today! I dunked it today!' And we were like, 'Yeahhhh, rigggghhhht.'

This used to go on for years. It started when we were 14 but then we were sophomores, juniors, seniors and none of those years he could dunk the ball.

So when I went off to college and the summer before my freshman year, I got a phone call. My friend was on the other line and he's like, 'Yo, Eddie passed away.' And I was like, 'What?! What happened?'

And he started laughing.

So I was like, 'What the hell are you laughing for?'

He goes, 'It's funny, but it's not funny ''

'OK, can you explain why the hell you're laughing?!'

He was like, 'Well we were playing five-on-five ''

'All right ''

'And Eddie went up and dunked it and he got so excited that he collapsed.'

And you know what? I totally forgot about him dying and I was like, 'Eddie dunked?! You got to be kidding me. He really dunked it?!'

They said he really dunked it and he got so happy he finally dunked in front of his friends that he passed away. He died right there on the court we grew up on.

For a kid who plays basketball, if I had to pass away, that would be the way I would want to pass away -- like if I won the championship and I was so happy that I passed out right there.

That's a memory that I can always live with.

He didn't pass away from a gun shot or this or that. He passed away doing something he loved. It wasn't a feel bad story when I first heard. I was so excited that he finally proved us wrong and he dunked, and he was so happy that he finally proved us wrong and he dunked that he passed away from it.

His favorite player was Allen Iverson so we buried him with an Allen Iverson jersey and No. 3 was actually going to be my number going into college, but it was already taken so I had to go with zero.