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Michael Dine just posted this
"Is There a String Theory Landscape: Some Cautionary Notes"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0402101
as a sample, here are the concluding remarks:
"Mention of the anthropic principle brings out strong reactions from most physicists, who ask what can be the role of science in such a situation. But the lesson of the KKLT proposal is not so pessimistic. First, the existence of a landscape within string theory is a question we should be able to decide. If we decide that there is such a discretuum, we will probably be forced to contemplate the anthropic principle; if not, we can dismiss it.
But even if we do adopt the anthropic principle, it will at best explain only a few quantities: either we will falsify string theory, or we will uncover principles which explain most of the features of the Standard Model. We will likely make additional predictions for accelerators and cosmology as well. So surrender to the anthropic principle will not be necessary or possible; we won’t have to give up."
Probably the paper should be seen in the context of papers that came out last year by Leonard Susskind, Michael Douglas, and Tom Banks.
L. Susskind, "The Anthropic Landscape of String Theory"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0302219
T. Banks, M. Dine, E. Gorbatov, "Is There a String Theory Landscape?"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0309170
M. R. Douglas, "The statistics of string/M theory vacua"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0303194
For additional context, shedding light on Leonard Susskind's contribution, is the December 15 2003 Edge interview involving Leonard Susskind, Paul Steinhardt, and Lee Smolin.
http://www.edge.org/discourse/landscape.html
The links are provided in case anyone wishes to comment on this nexus of string issues
"Is There a String Theory Landscape: Some Cautionary Notes"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0402101
as a sample, here are the concluding remarks:
"Mention of the anthropic principle brings out strong reactions from most physicists, who ask what can be the role of science in such a situation. But the lesson of the KKLT proposal is not so pessimistic. First, the existence of a landscape within string theory is a question we should be able to decide. If we decide that there is such a discretuum, we will probably be forced to contemplate the anthropic principle; if not, we can dismiss it.
But even if we do adopt the anthropic principle, it will at best explain only a few quantities: either we will falsify string theory, or we will uncover principles which explain most of the features of the Standard Model. We will likely make additional predictions for accelerators and cosmology as well. So surrender to the anthropic principle will not be necessary or possible; we won’t have to give up."
Probably the paper should be seen in the context of papers that came out last year by Leonard Susskind, Michael Douglas, and Tom Banks.
L. Susskind, "The Anthropic Landscape of String Theory"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0302219
T. Banks, M. Dine, E. Gorbatov, "Is There a String Theory Landscape?"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0309170
M. R. Douglas, "The statistics of string/M theory vacua"
http://arxiv.org/hep-th/0303194
For additional context, shedding light on Leonard Susskind's contribution, is the December 15 2003 Edge interview involving Leonard Susskind, Paul Steinhardt, and Lee Smolin.
http://www.edge.org/discourse/landscape.html
The links are provided in case anyone wishes to comment on this nexus of string issues
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