“When you look at a vacuum in a quantum theory of fields, it isn't exactly nothing.”
in video Meet Peter Higgs http://cdsweb.cern.ch/record/1019670 by CERN (July 2004).
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Peter Higgs 8
British physicist 1929Related quotes
[The Universe Speaks in Numbers: Robbert Dijkgraaf and Edward Witten in Conversation, 30 May 2019, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjthuCDzAnY] (quote at 7:18 of 21:39)
Interview in The Hindu (2013)
Context: The improved understanding of the equations of hydrodynamics is general in nature; it applies to all quantum field theories, including those like quantum chromodynamics that are of interest to real world experiments. I think this is a good (though minor) example of the impact of string theory on experiments. At our current stage of understanding of string theory, we can effectively do calculations only in particularly simple — particularly symmetric — theories. But we are able to analyse these theories very completely; do the calculations completely correctly. We can then use these calculations to test various general predictions about the behaviour of all quantum field theories. These expectations sometimes turn out to be incorrect. With the string calculations to guide you can then correct these predictions. The corrected general expectations then apply to all quantum field theories, not just those very symmetric ones that string theory is able to analyse in detail.
(1955) as quoted in Some strangeness in the proportion: a centennial symposium to celebrate the achievements of Albert Einstein (1980) Addison-Wesley Pub. Co., Advanced Book Program.
1950s
Interview in The Hindu (2013)
Context: The improved understanding of the equations of hydrodynamics is general in nature; it applies to all quantum field theories, including those like quantum chromodynamics that are of interest to real world experiments. I think this is a good (though minor) example of the impact of string theory on experiments. At our current stage of understanding of string theory, we can effectively do calculations only in particularly simple — particularly symmetric — theories. But we are able to analyse these theories very completely; do the calculations completely correctly. We can then use these calculations to test various general predictions about the behaviour of all quantum field theories. These expectations sometimes turn out to be incorrect. With the string calculations to guide you can then correct these predictions. The corrected general expectations then apply to all quantum field theories, not just those very symmetric ones that string theory is able to analyse in detail.
"Quantum Locality", Found Phys (2011) 41: 705–733
Three Roads to Quantum Gravity (2000)
[1992, Intersection Theory, Integrable Hierarchies and Topological Field Theory by Robbert Dijkgraaf, Fröhlich J., ’t Hooft G., Jaffe A., Mack G., Mitter P.K., Stora R. (eds.), New Symmetry Principles in Quantum Field Theory, NATO ASI Series (Series B: Physics), vol. 295, 95–158, Springer, Boston, MA, 10.1007/978-1-4615-3472-3_4]
“The quantum revolution showed us why the old picture of a vacuum as an empty box was untenable.”
...Gradually, this exotic new picture of quantum nothingness succumbed to experimental exploration... in the form of vacuum tubes, light bulbs and X-rays. Now the 'empty' space itself started to be probed. ...There was always something left: a vacuum energy that permeated every fibre of the Universe.
Source: The Book of Nothing (2009), chapter nought "Nothingology—Flying to Nowhere"