"It doesn't mean that one is a test of the other." "The fact that the same mathematical structure appears in a quantum mechanical problem and some model of black holes isn't even slightly surprising," he said. Even if the math is the same, he says, testing the quantum entangled system would only tell you how well you understand the math. "Honestly, I think this is completely outrageous," he said. Mathematician Peter Woit of Columbia University, author of the blog Not Even Wrong, thinks even claiming that the new paper is a test of quantum entanglement is going too far. A chorus of supporters and critics, including Nobel laureate and string theory skeptic Sheldon Glashow and string theorists John Schwarz of Caltech, James Gates of the University of Maryland, and Juan Maldacena and Edward Witten of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton agree that Duff's argument is "not a way to test string theory" and has nothing to do with a theory of everything. "Already I can imagine enemies sharpening their knives," Duff said.Īnd they are.
The battle over string theory as a theory of everything rages on. There's no in between."ĭuff emphasized that this is only a test of string theory as it relates to quantum entanglement, not as a description of the fundamental physics of the universe. The good news is, we're making a very exact statement which is either right or wrong. "The bad news is, we're not describing the theory of everything. "So in a way, there's bad news and good news in our paper," he said. What's more, these statements are precise and experimentally provable, unlike previous suggestions for ways to test string theory, Duff says. When he looked into it, the mathematical formulation of three entangled qubits turned out to be exactly the same as the description of a certain class of black holes. "As I listened to his talk, I realized the kind of math he was using to describe qubit entanglement was very similar to mathematics I had been using some years before to describe black holes in string theory," Duff said. When two qubits are entangled, changing one's state influences the state of the other, even when they're physically far apart.
Two or more qubits can sometimes be intimately connected in a quantum state called entanglement. Qubits form the backbone of quantum information theory, which could lead to things like ultrafast computers and absolutely secure communication. But although string theorists can't test the big idea, they can use this vision of the world to describe natural phenomena like black holes.įour years ago, while listening to a talk at a conference in Tasmania, Duff realized the mathematical description string theorists use for black holes was identical to the mathematical description of certain quantum systems, called quantum bits or qubits. Unfortunately, there's no way to know if this picture is real.