# Relativistic warp = Quantum wave?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [September 4, 2002, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909 "2002-09-04T03:03:49Z")
**Posts on this page:** 5
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)
#### Post date: [September 4, 2002, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909/1 "2002-09-04T03:03:49Z")
4D spacetime, distorted by mass creates a warp we know as Gravity.
In Quantum Mechanics, there is the particle/wave duality.
Electromagnetism can be described by general relativity extended to five dimensions…Kaluza/Klein theory…so that EM is thought to be a 1 dimensional phenomena.
Can the laws describing a 1D wave be adjusted to describe a 4D warp?
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### Author:  [@gouda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gouda)
#### Post date: [September 4, 2002, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909/2 "2002-09-04T04:56:32Z")
Say again? And in english, please?!
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### Author:  [@JS\_Princeton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JS_Princeton)
#### Post date: [September 4, 2002, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909/3 "2002-09-04T05:03:13Z")
EM isn’t a one dimensional phenomena… in Kaluza-Klein theory it works based on five dimensions. The other four dimensions are necessary for propagation of the waves.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [September 4, 2002, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909/4 "2002-09-04T22:06:22Z")
And E&M can’t really be described by Kaluza-Klein theory, either. _Classical_ E&M can be described by Kaluza-Klein, but unlike gravity, quantum mechanical effects have most certainly been observed in E&M, and quantum effects are not (currently) predicted by GR or Kaluza-Klein. E&M is, however, accurately described by something called Quantum Electrodynamics, at both the classical and quantum level.
And what does particle/wave duality have to do with any of this?
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### Author:  [@Enola\_Straight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enola_Straight)
#### Post date: [September 5, 2002, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/relativistic-warp-quantum-wave/126909/5 "2002-09-05T02:40:23Z")
I merely thought that 5D KK - 4D GR = 1D EM.
Furthermore, I thought that a wave was like a ray: a one dimensional line.
I figured, If you took the rules for describing a wave, multiply it by four to describe the GR warp, then translate the warp/wave into a particle with the rules of particle/wave duality, you would describe a graviton, and thus discovering a quantum theory of gravity and/or unifying GR and QM.