THE EXTRA DIMENSIONS MAY NOT BE CURLED UP!

Posted by Mike Marek on March 13, 19100 at 21:24:20:

In Reply to: CALABI-YAU SPACE posted by Clarence on January 30, 19100 at 12:56:35:

Clarence:

Apparently the only reason the extra spatial dimensions of superstring theory were postulated to be curled up was that we only observe three (plus time) in nature. However, recent theoretical research by Lisa Randall et al has shown that extra spatial dimensions of infinite extent may exist all around us, yet are surprisingly difficult (actually, practically impossible) to detect with any presently conceivable technology! Lisa Randall's theory states that our universe may be a 3-brane in one location within a higher dimensional universe. Only gravitons are free to pass through the extra dimensions, resulting in gravitation getting weaker as one recedes from our 3-brane unverse.

So, it seems to me that all of this frantic work involving C-Y orbifolds and whatnot over the past decade and a half or so will have turned out to have been one of those footnotes to the history of science, much like the concept of the luminiferous ether, or planetary epicycles, was. And chew on this: if the large-scale universe is expanding, why aren't the hypothetical curled up dimensions doing likewise???

Sincerely,

Mike Marek
11:22 p.m., CST
13 March 2000 (Mon.)
University of Minnesota, USA

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