Quanta, Logic and Spacetime: Variations on Finkelstein's Quantum Relativity

ISBN-13: 9789810232559 / Angielski / Twarda / 1998 / 284 str.

S. A. Selesnick; Steve Selesnick

Opis

In this highly interesting monograph, a brief description of Finkelstein's approach to quantum theory and some of its ramifications is first given. Specifically, his suggestion that some sort of quantum-set-like structure should underlie our macroscopic perception of spacetime is developed to the point where a fair slice of fundamental physics (for a massless world) may be formally derived in an elementary fashion from the ground up. In detail, a model of what Finkelstein has called a "quantum net", in conjunction with a single Schwinger-like dynamical principle, gives rise to the standard Langrangians for: massless Dirac fermions, general relativity, and Yang-Mills fields for the gauge groups SU(n), n = 3, 4. These Lagrangians emerge replete with (Feynman) gauge-fixing terms and ghost fields.