Reflections on the Fate of Spacetime

APR 01, 1996

String theory carries the seeds of a basic change in our ideas about spacetime and in other fundamental notions of physics.

DOI: 10.1063/1.881493

Edward Witten

Our basic ideas about physics went through several upheavals early this century. Quantum mechanics taught us that the classical notions of the position and velocity of a particle were only approximations of the truth. With general relativity, spacetime became a dynamical variable, curving in response to mass and energy. Contemporary developments in theoretical physics suggest that another revolution may be in progress, through which a new source of “fuzziness” may enter physics, and spacetime itself may be reinterpreted as an approximate, derived concept. (See figure 1.) In this article I survey some of these developments.

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References

1. J. H. Schwarz, ed., Superstrings: The First 15 Years of Superstring Theory,” vols. 1 and 2. World‐Scientific, Singapore (1985).
2. For instance, see M. B. Green, J. H. Schwarz, E. Witten, Superstring Theory, vol. 1, Cambridge U.P., Cambridge, UK (1987), chap. 1.
3. D. J. Gross, P. F. Mende, Nucl. Phys. B 303, 407 (1988).https://doi.org/NUPBBO

More about the Authors

Edward Witten. Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey.