Related papers: Quantum Background Independence In String Theory
A central aspect of the cosmological constant problem is to understand why vacuum energy does not gravitate. In order to account for this observation, while allowing for nontrivial dynamics of the quantum vacuum, we motivate a novel…
In quantum mechanics and quantum field theory perturbation theory generically requires the inclusion of extra contributions non-perturbative in the coupling, such as instantons, to reproduce exact results. We show how full non-perturbative…
We study quantum field theories in which the number of degrees of freedom changes discontinuously across the momentum space. This discontinuity which we call "Kronecker anomaly" leads to non-local effective actions and can be represented as…
The Planck scale is usually believed to be an unpassable wall. Putting a cutoff there and thinking of it as a quantized spacetime entity shows that. However, this is exactly the cause of many problems in quantum gravity. The cosmological…
At finite $N$ the ring of gauge invariant operators is not freely generated. For problems of interest in physics, these rings are Cohen--Macaulay and admit a Hironaka decomposition, in which the full invariant ring is a free module over a…
In the framework of special relativity, all particles are point-like or string-like. This nature of particles has caused the divergence difficulties in quantum field, string and superstring theories. In the framework of special relativity,…
We propose a definition for background (in)/dependence in dynamical theories of the evolution of configurations that have a continuous symmetry and test this definition on particle models and on gravity. Our definition draws from Barbour's…
Physical laws for elementary particles can be described by the quantum dynamics equation given a Hamiltonian. The solution are probability amplitudes in Hilbert space that evolve over time. A probability density function over position and…
In a recent note, Hance and Hossenfelder (arXiv:2211.01331) recall that "locally causal completions of quantum mechanics are possible, if they violate the assumption [called statistical independence or measurement independence] that the…
Remarkably we find that for a ring with linear boundary conditions such that the eigenvector and its derivative are continuous, there does not seem to be a way for the well-known de Broglie relation to be gauge invariant. Certain nonlinear…
Over the past five years, there has been significant progress on the problem of quantization of diffeomorphism covariant field theories with {\it local} degrees of freedom. The absence of a background space-time metric in these theories…
An eigenstate decoherence hypothesis states that each individual eigenstate of a large closed system is locally classical-like. We extend this hypothesis to account for a typically extremely short time scale of decoherence. The extension…
In this semi-technical review we discuss string theory (and all that goes by that name) as a framework for a quantum theory of gravity. This is a new paradigm in theoretical physics that goes beyond relativistic quantum field theory. We…
When the symmetry of a physical theory describing a finite system is deformed by replacing its Lie group by the corresponding quantum group, the operators and state function will lie in a new algebra describing new degrees of freedom. If…
We study a modified bosonic string theory that has a pressureless ``dust'' field on the string worldsheet. The dust is a real scalar field with unit gradient which breaks conformal invariance. Hamiltonian analysis reveals a time…
Isolated horizon conditions specialized to spherical symmetry can be imposed directly at the quantum level. This answers several questions concerning horizon degrees of freedom, which are seen to be related to orientation, and its…
Efficacious quantum information processing relies on extended coherence and precise control. Investigating the limitations surrounding quantum processors is vital for their advancement. In their operation, one challenge is inadvertent wave…
The identification of physical subsystems in quantum mechanics as compared to classical mechanics poses significant conceptual challenges, especially in the context of quantum gravity. Traditional approaches associate quantum systems with…
The mystery of the cosmological constant is probably the most pressing obstacle to significantly improving the models of elementary particle physics derived from string theory. The problem arises because in the standard framework of low…
We give a brief overview of the nature of spacetime emerging from string theory. This is radically different from the familiar spacetime of Einstein's relativity. At a perturbative level, the spacetime metric appears as ``coupling…