Re: The Quantum Gravity Problem
Date: Sun, 17 Oct 2004 17:24:46 -0500
Message-ID: <ckurfn$8tl$1_at_news.netins.net>
"Kenneth Downs" <firstinit.lastname_at_lastnameplusfam.net> wrote in message
news:5d1qkc.m52.ln_at_mercury.downsfam.net...
> Dawn M. Wolthuis wrote:
>
> > "Kenneth Downs" <firstinit.lastname_at_lastnameplusfam.net> wrote in
message
> > news:n72pkc.f8h.ln_at_mercury.downsfam.net...
> >> Here is a little its-been-a-good-week Friday musing.
> >>
> >> I wonder if database theory is suffering from a version of what is
going
> > on
> >> in Physics. In Physics for the past few decades they have had to
> >> struggle with the fact that the two fundamental theories of the
twentieth
> >> century
> > do
> >> not play nice together. Relativity describes gravity well, but it is
not
> > a
> >> quantum theory. Quantum theory is considered the most successful
theory
> >> in history, but does not describe gravity. Since most physicists
believe
> >> that the underlying truths are quantum in nature, everyone is searching
> > for
> >> a quantum theory of gravity, instead of searching for the relativistic
> >> theory of E & M and nuclear forces.
> >>
> >> So can we draw any useful analogy here, with perhaps the RDM being
> >> quantum
> >> and Hierarchies being Relativity? This choice is not arbitrary, it
> > implies
> >> that we can find a way to add hierarchies to the RDM before we will get
> > RDM
> >> into a hierarchical form.
> >
> > Yes, yes -- I have used this analogy before. The fun thing about it is
> > that the answer to how to combine the disperate theories is the same for
> > both (physics theory of everything and database theory) -- one word:
> > Strings. (OK, I know that is simplistic in both cases, but it could be
> > more true than some might think on the database side).
>
> Strings, very cool, I'm guessing some kind of network? I'd like to
> understand this, but could you help me connect the dots? (get it?
> connect-the-dots, graphs? asking for help? ooh, ha ha ha.) Do I start at
> the wikipedia on di-graph? How do I get from 3Nf TO branes?