http://www.nature.com/news/2004/041004/full/041004-17.html
Apparently a computer program has shown that 4-D triangles about 10^-35 metres in size could be responsible for our universe. Is this proof of the ‘theory of everything’ physicists have been looking for or is it just another theory? Does the computer program ‘prove’ in any way that its true or just make it a more likely hypothesis.
There’s no such thing as proof in physics. The theory of relativity has held up for the past 99 years not because it’s been proven true, but rather because it has not been shown to be false.
Well yeah, but I think that holds true for all scientific discoveries. However the more circumstantial evidence you can get that shows one theory is true over another the more likely that theory is to be how things work. Since this theory seems to work when a computer program is run on it that shows there is some substance to it.
This thread is better suited for GQ. I’ll move it for you.
Cajun Man
for the SDMB
No, a theory of everything is a set of equations that would do a large number of things: reconcile quantum mechanics and general relativity (or, better, describe the deeper theory that these separately fall out of); explain the way the universe has developed; explain where mass comes from and how it congeals into the particles we see; explain dark energy and dark matter; give a mathematical picture of the structure of space and time; and much more.
A computer model is interesting, but accomplishes exactly none of these things. There have been other computer models based on other premises that also show our universe. Even so, these are basically simplified stick-figures of one possible reality. They may indicate where the theorists might explore, but don’t drive theory at all.
The usual way that the subfield Loll and her colleagues are working in is regarded - in the lingo, they’re trying to quantise Regge calculus - is that it might provide one ingredient in the recipe of whatever makes a TOE. At the very least, it’d probably have to be combined with lots of other ideas. But, since clues to the recipe are few and far between, even progress on one such possible ingredient can be interesting - and hence worth mentioning in Nature.
After a quick glance at the paper, it seems to me that this is what physicists would call a “toy model” — something that’s looked at because it’s easier to handle than the full theory, but is still missing important details and isn’t expected to resemble the real world. I could be wrong, though — it looks like an interesting paper, and I’ll probably end up looking more closely at it.