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Quantum Gravity's Controversial Ties To Anti-Gravity [Curt Documentary]
June 30, 2023
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The Economist covers math, physics, philosophy, and AI in a manner that shows how different countries perceive developments and how they impact markets. They recently published a piece on China's new neutrino detector. They cover extending life via mitochondrial transplants, creating an entirely new field of medicine. But it's also not just science they analyze.
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The year is 1915. World War I rages on. Ford manufactures its millionth Model T, and Einstein formulates general relativity. This changed gravity from a force to the curvature of a certain structure called spacetime.
spurring a surge of interest and research into gravity and its effects. However, what most people don't know is that this enthusiasm for relativity began to wane shortly after this 1915 breakthrough. The transition from a decades-long season of inactivity to the so-called Renaissance of general relativity is a tapestry woven from the threads of political intrigue, changing scientific norms, and a tale of
two wealthy investors' obsession with antigravity that changed the course of physics, the effects of which, much like space-time itself, are still rippling to this day. My name's Kurt Jaimungal, and on this channel, we explore theories of everything, primarily in podcast form from a theoretical physics perspective, but today we have something different. Hold on, because this is a tale of secrecy, flying saucers, and some of the biggest names in physics. This rabbit hole goes deep.
In the period following World War II, a shift took place in the way physics was researched, in particular regarding the then nascent field of quantum gravity. The study of quantum gravity, a now trendy subject at the intersection of quantum field theory and general relativity, was not a popular choice among physicists at the time.
Other areas, such as the behavior of particles like quarks and gluons, held a more central place in theoretical physics discourse. This remained mainstream even until the 1980s, where a physicist Marie Gelman underscored this by exclusion. Gelman, in a famous talk, outlined four problems in physics. Number one, why is there chirality?
Number two, why are there three families? Number three, how many sets of Higgs bosons are there? And lastly, why is it this particular group instead of some other simple or semi-simple one? Notice the conspicuous absence of quantum gravity as one of the most important unresolved problems, according at least to one of the leading physicists of the day. Now, there are two major players in this story. The first is Roger Babson,
Born into a merchant family in 1875 Massachusetts, Roger Babson was a businessman and a writer. In fact, Babson was a highly successful businessman and the founder of Babson College as well as Babson Statistical Organization. His company pioneered financial forecasting and investment analysis, earning him pedigree in the business world. For reasons that will become clear in a moment, Babson had a morbid fascination with gravity and in particular, anti-gravity.
The second player in this story is Agnew Banson, an industrialist born in North Carolina in 1915. Having grown his family's air conditioning business into a thriving aeronautical equipment company, Agnew wasn't a physicist but developed an interest in gravitational physics later in life.
Like Roger, he was intrigued by the concept of antigravity and its potential applications. Roger Babson and Agnubansen leveraged their wealth to influence the course of gravitational physics. Notice that I keep saying gravitational physics and not, say, general relativity. The reason is that Roger and Agnu, at least embryonically, were interested in modifications to Newton's laws as well as other accounts of gravity that weren't relegated to Einstein's formulation.
For instance, Roger took the principle of action slash reaction from Newton's third law as primary, even metaphysically relating it to consciousness, which, as you could imagine, along with their interest in antigravity, made most researchers disinclined to associate with them in the early stages.
Babson, unfortunately, lost his older sister and grandson to drowning, which he attributed to gravity. Thus his interest in this force wasn't mere curiosity, but rather a vendetta.
Now, why did he ascribe the fault of drowning to gravity rather than to the myriad other potential contributors like H2O, the seizing up of muscles, or even the harmonic oscillator? I don't know. However, we're lucky that he chose gravity as a target given that you and I are interested in this subject and directly because of his vengeance,
There's now a profusion of work that we can research and showcase in podcast form on this channel, all the way from loop quantum gravity to string theory to even alternative approaches to deriving general relativity from what doesn't look like spacetime, such as Wolfram's approach and others.
Babson firmly believed that conquering gravity had the potential to revolutionize human life, just as electricity had done some decades earlier. While Roger's impetus into grand unified theories was personal loss, as far as I can tell, Agnew's was intellectual curiosity, much like you and myself.
In 1948, Babson established what's called the Gravity Research Foundation. This is important to this story and is a continuing thread in the development of modern theories of gravity. Babson's friend, Thomas Edison, apparently suggested the creation of the Gravity Research Foundation to Babson as a way to encourage and support scientific research related to gravity, focusing on developing practical technologies to control gravity. In other words, anti-gravity.
In the year of Einstein's death, 1955, Agnew Bansin, on the other hand, initiated the Institute for Field Physics at the University of North Carolina. Both Agnew's Institute and Rogers Foundation were hubs that attracted leading scientists from around the world to discuss problems related to gravitation and ultimately unified field theories. Note that there are two separate organizations that were initially independent
the gravity research foundation and the institute for field physics there's usually a large point of confusion here and it's worth pointing out so that we're not befuddled because the names of the patrons involved also sound similar so i'll try to enunciate when i can there's roger babson
and then there's Agnew Bansin. Rather than using their last names, I'll attempt to use their first to avoid ambiguity. Their involvement wasn't just about giving out funds to universities. Both gentlemen played an active role in the research and their financial resources allowed certain universities to focus on these subjects, a subject which at the time was considered unfruitful and even fringe.
So, why did private individuals need to come in to fund research into gravitational physics? Why wasn't this being studied by academia much after the 1920s? A combination of world events and shifting academic furor to the quantum world. Hear that sound?
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The atomic bomb's success, if we can even call it that, had nations investing heavily into atomic and subatomic physics. The private patronage of Roger and Agnew was unprecedented in physics. Remember, this is the 1950s. Most of the time, when you wanted something funded academically, you sourced it from tuition or the government directly. Sure, there were donations here and there, but they didn't prescribe specific research directions, generally speaking.
Roger Babson and Agnew Benson are seminal in that regard. In fact, they meticulously selected the researchers and institutions to fund, focusing on those that shared their interest in gravitational physics along with other idiosyncratic qualities like radial distance from a major city sufficient enough to evade fallout from a nuclear bomb. Hey, this was the Cold War after all.
Each of these organizations were involved in manifold activities including theoretical studies, experimental design and setup, data analysis, and even scientific communication. This latter point is especially the case with the Gravity Research Foundation's Essay Contest.
This is an annually organized essay competition open to physicists around the world. These essays actually continue on to this day and play a crucial role in this story. The winners of this contest were awarded cash prizes and a degree of prestige in the scientific community. At least that was the intention, though it didn't work out like that originally and we'll talk more about that later.
In other words, the story of post-war physics is often framed as this surge in federal spending on research, namely defense-related agencies. However, Babson and Benson changed that. Their private funding induced research from outside the government.
In particular, it did so for gravitational studies, which was actually by necessity, since quote-unquote gravity didn't align with the government's particle physics dominated focus. This is a theme Noam Chomsky talks about in Manufacturing Consent. We tend to think that academics just pursue what they're interested in, motivated purely by the love of truth and science. However, professors are just like anyone else, and they need and want payment and prestige.
Thus, wherever the grants go, the research follows. The contest attracted a variety of participants, some of whom were already eminence in their field, while others were yet to make their mark. Notable participants, and even winners, include Cecile and Bryce Dewitt, Stanley Desser, and Richard Arnewitt,
Philip Morrison and Thomas Gold, John Wheeler, Maurice Allais, Stephen Hawking, Ilya Prigozhin, and Roger Penrose. We'll get into each of these individuals as well as their research later. Cecile and Bryce DeWitt play a pivotal role here as they helped legitimize the Gravity Research Foundation. Most intellectuals don't want to associate with something if they perceive other intellectuals distancing themselves from it.
However, someone needed to be there at the inception of burgeoning fields. In this case, it was the DeWitts. The physics enthusiasts among us know about Bryce DeWitt through the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, as well as because he was the popularizer of Everett's many-world interpretation. Some of you may even recognize the name DeWitt from Bioshock Infinite as the inspiration for the quantum-mechanical explosion of multiverses in time travel was indeed DeWitt's research.
Cecile and her husband Bryce spent their academic life aiming to unify all interactions akin to Einstein, though they had more of a quantum algebraic approach compared to Einstein's classical geometric one. What you may not know is that Bryce DeWitt's work gained considerable traction thanks to the resources and platform afforded to him by the Gravity Research Foundation.
Topics explored in these contests ranged from the relationship between magnetism and gravity, with some participants even echoing thoughts attributed to Nikola Tesla, while some others, including Oppenheimer, a physicist known for his role in the Manhattan Project, explored the cosmological implications for general relativity and the nature of singularities.
The notion that progress in the disjoint fields of particle physics and gravity could be achieved through a union of them was further reinforced by the victorious submission the following year. This time it was penned by two postdoctoral researchers at the Institute for Advanced Study, namely Arnowit and Desser, both of whom were proteges of Julian Schwinger at Harvard. You may recognize their name as the AD in the ADM decomposition.
However, their paper was a ruse. It was submitted for fun and was nonsense. This apparently upset Oppenheimer. Desser apologized to Oppenheimer, stating the sin of the entry was to win when it was only meant to entertain. Nevertheless, the paper's concept that gravity could be transformed into nuclear energy was lauded by the lesson formed and eventually it caught the attention of military and industrial sources.
The Gravity Research Foundation did not go without criticism. For instance, Martin Gardner, a renowned author of popular mathematics and science, wrote vituberative remarks stating that the contest irresponsibly encourages radical ideals, calling it perhaps the most useless scientific project of the 20th century. Roger Babson wanted to create insulators, reflectors, and absorbers of gravity, much like how there exists such material for electromagnetism. However,
the non-linearity of general relativity, in contrast to the linearity of Maxwell's equations, make it either not possible in practice, or not possible in principle, at least according to the standard theory. Why not? Well, in quantum mechanics, if you have two solutions, you can add them to form a third, whereas this doesn't work with the field equations of Einstein.
Further, there's no negative mass to balance the positive mass and create a neutral object analogous to an electric insulator. In terms of particle physics, this is one of the reasons why the graviton isn't seen to have spin 1. Thirdly, there's no currently accepted way to quote-unquote bounce a gravitational field off a surface, for instance. Sure, there are wormholes, but that's more like diverting rather than reflecting. Lastly,
All known matter types are coupled to gravity. This makes an absorption mechanism difficult to even conceptualize. Now keep in mind, we don't have a so-called final theory, and thus it's easy to come to the conclusion that all bets are off and anything is possible. One should note that Joel Shirk showed in the late 1970s that extended supergravity naturally leads to antigravity.
Further, almost all of the points above are contested, especially when it comes to the details, because in condensed matter physics, and when dealing with metamaterials, there are plenty of exotic properties that can emerge. It should also be noted that gravity can be derived from matter dynamics, rather than psychologically being seen as the a priori stage that matter plays on.
Mathematically, contrary to the way the story is taught in undergrad, gravity is derived from the behavior of matter. That is, we tend to think of the Lorentzian metric as coming afterward and giving rise to a playground for matter. However, historically, the way that it works is that you take Maxwell's matter so sacredly
that you impose a Lorentzian structure and we luckily see that this is the stage that the rest of matter plays. It may be that there are new types of matter and the existence of these exotic fields will dictate a change in the geometry itself. This is called the principal polynomial method.
Let's get back to Agnew Benson. In addition to being an entrepreneur, Agnew was a private pilot with an interest in astronomy. In fact, Agnew was a participant in Operation Moonwatch. So what is Operation Moonwatch? It was a program led by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory that encouraged amateur astronomers to track artificial satellites, a pursuit closely tied to the broader Cold War context. In other words, watch the skies.
This may have fueled Agnew's and Roger's fascination with anti-gravity and UFOs. The interest in flying saucers held by both Roger and Agnew seemed eccentric to many, including Wheeler. However, it was Roger and Agnew's willingness to support alternative avenues of research that led to fresh perspectives in gravitational physics, which we now enjoy.
Because of the excoriation from Wheeler and others like Martin Gardner, Agnew had developed a protection clause, which would accompany any publicity related to his Institute. This clause made it clear that any work conducted at Agnew's Institute was not associated with antigravity and instead was based on the Newton-Einstein analysis. Despite this,
Agnew Banson privately remained steadfast in his pursuit of anti-gravity, even exploring the concept of electro-gravitics and achieving lift with the help of his collaborator T.T. Brown. It was a claim that piqued the interest of physicists.
To verify these claims, Bryce DeWitt and other renowned physicists, like Edward Teller, were called upon to evaluate these devices, though they maintained a scientific stance and noted that the lift was likely due to electrostatic effects. Agnew was, after all, maintaining immense voltages across small distances.
In fact, in another unexpected twist to this story, the poster child of string theory, Ed Whitten, has a family involvement in this. His father, Lewis Whitten, was involved with Bansin, stating, I went to visit him and visited his laboratory. And the basic idea of his laboratory was he had a strong electrostatic field, which was about 150,000 volts over the distance of about a meter.
And he had an operator operating this thing, but I knew enough about experiments to know that this was not a very happy place. Because I know that for strong electrostatic fields, there shouldn't be any sharp points around. Everything should be curved, and nothing was curved.
Lewis Whitten also indicated that Agnew started the Institute for Field Physics, in particular for Bryce DeWitt. Perhaps he wanted some facade to get physicists like DeWitt to verify and even build his anti-gravity crafts.
Companies like IBM, General Dynamics, and even Glenn Martin Aircraft Manufacturing Company saw potential applications of anti-gravity technologies in their business. These corporations weren't just spectators, they were actively engaged. Actually, it was Glenn Martin that after several mergers became what's now known as Lockheed Martin.
Gravitational physics was no longer just an academic pursuit, it had real-world applications that could irrevocably alter industry.
You've heard of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. This is the place that was home to some of the greatest minds in history, including Albert Einstein and Kurt Gödel. It's also the current home of Ed Witten and Nima Arkani Hamad and Juan Maldacena. Well, Glenn Martin of Lockheed Martin, inspired by Benson and Babson, aimed to create an industrial version of the Institute for Advanced Study.
a place where theoretical discoveries could be applied to solve practical challenges. It was called the R-IAS, that is the Research Institute for Advanced Studies, and it was established in 1955. Coming back into the fold, Ed Whitten's father, Lewis Whitten, was not only hired but helped connect people
organized workshops and also arranged some of the funding for Glenn Martin's Research Institute at a time when this was extremely uncommon.
In fact, Lewis Whitten was the only one in charge of finding research for the Institute, identifying everyone who could potentially help with Martin's Institute and hiring them. Even Burkhard Heim was contracted by the RIAS. You may remember Heim from Gary Nolan's podcast, On Tow, where Gary talked about Heim's theories. But basically, this structure that he draws here at the end,
is a visual representation of
without using biology but using purely materialistic approaches, build a sufficiently complex machine that creates an object with consciousness and a soul.
That's fascinating. Heim was one of the first, if not the first, to posit that all interactions, gravity, EM, weak and strong, are unified in a higher dimensional Euclidean space, with extra so-called imaginary dimensions. This was prior even to Yang-Mills. Apparently, Hermann Weyl said that the highest chance of anti-gravity lay with Heim's theories, but unfortunately, after several attempts, I wasn't able to track down this source.
If someone viewing this has the source of the text on screen, then please let me know and place it in the comments. While it wasn't said publicly, it was known through the grapevine that the Glenn Martin Company was interested in antigravity. Recall, you can think of the Glenn Martin Company as the predecessor to Lockheed Martin. In Witten's words, there was a new thing in the wind at the time which was antigravity. It was in the wind.
I quickly learned that I should talk about gravity, and that they would ask me about anti-gravity. And I'd say, well, we just learn about gravity. If there's anything to anti-gravity, it'll come along. MIT professor of the history of science, David Kaiser, along with University of Sydney professor of philosophy and physics, Dean Rickles, catalog this, and the links are in the description, as well as links to all sources.
Now, if this wasn't convoluted enough, Witten explicitly commented on potential anti-gravity materials, saying a guy in France was discovering that on the night of a new moon, a pendulum swung faster or slow. A guy named Townsend discovered that there was a type of bismuth that was repelled instead of attracting. The first astrophysics symposium not only started this field of relativistic astrophysics, but it ended
small chapter in the history of relativity. I'm referring to the worldwide craze that lasted for about 10 years in the discovery of antigravity. And I bring that in because that impacted on my life quite considerably. In the middle 1950s I found myself after
a different, I should say, youth than one might expect, employed by the Martin Company, now the Lockheed Martin Company, which was mentioned by the Dean earlier. In the mid-1950s then, I found myself employed at the Martin Company with a rather weak PhD, I would say. At the age of about 35,
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The company was building airplanes and building rockets. It ultimately built the Titan rocket, which was used for many space vehicle flights. The vice president had the idea, which was to him a wonderful idea, to develop anti-gravity. Of course, when he tried the idea in public,
You can imagine the greeting he received by these scientists. Let's sum up so far in five points. Number one, in 1915, Einstein publishes General Relativity. Number two, since around the 1920s, work in gravity stagnates. Number three, years later from a personal interest in anti-gravity, Babson and Manson started privately funding research into gravity around the 1950s.
4. The reputation of these two organizations, so the Gravity Research Foundation and the Institute for Field Physics, grew as the DeWitts and other physicists associated themselves with it, eventually even mavens like Penrose and Hawking. 5. Private industry, like the primogenitors of Lockheed Martin, become involved with Babson by first being a donor and then second by creating an industry-oriented clone of his institute.
The Institute for Field Physics held a monumental conference known as the Chapel Hill Conference in 1957. To explain why this was a huge deal in the history of gravity research, you have to know that if you look through the history of physics conferences, you'll find that after Einstein published General Relativity, which recall was in 1915, that there was a distinct lack of gravity related conferences.
Sure, there was the 1927 Solvay Conference, but that was primarily regarding quantum mechanics. Thus, the Chapel Hill Conference, organized by Agnew Bansin, was the Gravity Conference to rival that of the Solvay Conference. It was here that the gravity community came together and shaped the future of the field. For many researchers, it was their first opportunity to interact with like-minded individuals who shared a passion for exploring the mysteries of gravity.
For instance, this is where Witten and Feynman first met. The role of gravitation in physics was a report commissioned by the Gravity Research Foundation. This report was a comprehensive survey of the state of gravitational physics, highlighting the latest discoveries, ongoing challenges, and potential future directions. It took me quite some time to find, but I managed to get a digital reprint. The report still reads well to this day, even though it was published well over half a century ago.
As the 1960s approached, the relativity renaissance that Roger Babson and Agnew Banson helped instigate was in full swing. Agnew's Institute sponsored Peter Higgs while he was working on his now-famous Higgs boson research. John Wheeler made critical contributions to black hole thermodynamics and the notion of quantum foam.
the latter suggesting that space-time at the smallest scales is subject to quantum fluctuations, a step toward bridging quantum mechanics and general relativity that some still take today. In the 1960s and 70s, Stephen Hawking developed a series of significant results that broadened the horizons of theoretical physics. Notably, this stretch predates his more recognized work, such as the popular book, A Brief History of
of time. Many of Hawking's ideas were disseminated first in essay form through this contest, sponsored by the Gravity Research Foundation, prior to appearing in full article form. Some even prior to the famous Penrose-Hawking singularity theorems, though Penrose published his first result in 1965. So think about what this means. Hawking was popularized in part because of Babson's funding.
We don't know the degree to which those nascent ideas in Hawking's head were catalyzed into a rigorous form because he was allowed to be more speculative due to this contest. The same with other results. That is to say, without Babson and Banson, who knows if we'd have the results of gravitational waves by Bondi and others in 1957 or 1958 with the ADM formalism.
or in 1960, with the gravitational wave detector being built, which was eventually improved and refined, leading to the creation of LIGO, or in 1961, RegiCalculus, which is a discrete approximation to general relativity that replaces the continuous spacetime with a simplicial complex.
Or in 1962, the Bondi-Sachs formalism, which analyzes the asymptotic structure of spacetime at null infinity, allowing for the study of gravitational radiation and energy loss in general relativity. Or in 1963, the famous Kerr solution,
or the Singularity Theorem of 1965 along with the Ray Chowdery equation or later on with computational methods of numerical relativity and black hole mechanics in 1971 with Brandon Carter and 1973 with the Hawking entropy with Bekenstein or 1974 with Hawking radiation that is Hawking predicted that black holes should radiate as if they were black bodies at a certain temperature. This theoretical prediction provides a link between general relativity
During the post-Cold War period, the study of gravity underwent a tremendous shift with theorists increasingly favoring string theoretic approaches as not only a potential solution to a particular physics problem, but instead string theory was seen as the solution to the primary physics problem called quantum gravity. Notice the shift.
Agnew Bansin's life was intrinsically tied to his quest to understand gravity. But in a mirthless, merciless jest of destiny, the very force he sought to understand would play a part in his untimely demise. Bansin died from a plane crash and burned at Worcester Airport. Bansin, a man who dedicated his existence to dissecting and directing gravity, was ironically vanquished by the very force he dared to defy.
This lineage was instrumental in spawning a community of researchers, including notable figures such as Roger Penrose, Roy Kerr, Jurgen Ehlers, and the others listed on screen. Their research into gravity has unmistakably deepened our understanding of the universe, a testament to the enduring impact of Babson and Benson.
In the end, the patrons' audacious bets paid off in unexpected directions. They may or may not have found a way to control gravity, but they did what's even more significant. They ignited an intellectual inferno that changed the face of physics forever. For this reason, we remember those who started the unassuming Gravity Research Foundation and the Institute for Field Physics.
They weren't mere businessmen or enthusiasts. Instead, they were the unlikely pioneers of the gravitational physics revolution. In the words of Professor of Physics and History Dean Rickles, he states, which were established by the creation of the atomic bomb,
and desperate gravity experts in search of funds, it is clear that gravitational research, LIGO very much included, would have been set back by decades. While scraped from multiple sources, this work is primarily based off of Dean Rickles and David Kaiser's work into the history of gravity. Links to the sources are in the description, including Rickles' interview of Louis Witten, David Kaiser's dissertation on gravity, as well as their joint work.
If you enjoyed this disquisition and want to see more, I was thinking of doing others in a similar style. The ones that I'm toying with are the history of E8 and physics. Another one may be a modern survey of ADS-CFT correspondence. Another one that excites me because I'd love to research it is who was Alexander Grothendieck? And then another one that also excites me is
the full Standard Model Lagrangian explained in 10 minutes. Let me know which of these you want most or if you have a different suggestion, make sure to leave it in the comments so that others can vote and comment on your comment. I'd also like to thank all of the patrons, the patrons, you patrons, you who donate, help bring this to people at zero cost.
you help support this channel you help support me i'm extremely grateful and i just want to thank you thank you to all the patrons if you would like to become a patron feel free to visit patreon.com slash kurtjie mungle and donate whatever you like regardless thank you to all the patrons thank you to you who are watching thank you and have a great day
The podcast is now concluded. Thank you for watching. If you haven't subscribed or clicked on that like button, now would be a great time to do so as each subscribe and like helps YouTube push this content to more people. You should also know that there's a remarkably active Discord and subreddit for theories of everything where people explicate tolls, disagree respectfully about theories, and build as a community our own tolls. Links to both are in the description.
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Last but not least, you should know that this podcast is on iTunes, it's on Spotify, it's on every one of the audio platforms. Just type in theories of everything and you'll find it. Often I gain from re-watching lectures and podcasts and I read in the comments that hey, toe listeners also gain from replaying. So how about instead re-listening on those platforms? iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, whichever podcast catcher you use.
If you'd like to support more conversations like this, then do consider visiting patreon.com slash Kurt Jaimungal and donate whatever you like. Again, it's support from the sponsors and you that allow me to work on toe full time. You get early access to ad free audio episodes there as well. Every dollar helps far more than you may think. Either way, your viewership is generosity enough. Thank you.
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"start_time": 73.131,
"text": " The year is 1915. World War I rages on. Ford manufactures its millionth Model T, and Einstein formulates general relativity. This changed gravity from a force to the curvature of a certain structure called spacetime."
},
{
"end_time": 118.37,
"index": 4,
"start_time": 91.152,
"text": " spurring a surge of interest and research into gravity and its effects. However, what most people don't know is that this enthusiasm for relativity began to wane shortly after this 1915 breakthrough. The transition from a decades-long season of inactivity to the so-called Renaissance of general relativity is a tapestry woven from the threads of political intrigue, changing scientific norms, and a tale of"
},
{
"end_time": 148.166,
"index": 5,
"start_time": 118.37,
"text": " two wealthy investors' obsession with antigravity that changed the course of physics, the effects of which, much like space-time itself, are still rippling to this day. My name's Kurt Jaimungal, and on this channel, we explore theories of everything, primarily in podcast form from a theoretical physics perspective, but today we have something different. Hold on, because this is a tale of secrecy, flying saucers, and some of the biggest names in physics. This rabbit hole goes deep."
},
{
"end_time": 174.343,
"index": 6,
"start_time": 155.486,
"text": " In the period following World War II, a shift took place in the way physics was researched, in particular regarding the then nascent field of quantum gravity. The study of quantum gravity, a now trendy subject at the intersection of quantum field theory and general relativity, was not a popular choice among physicists at the time."
},
{
"end_time": 195.196,
"index": 7,
"start_time": 174.343,
"text": " Other areas, such as the behavior of particles like quarks and gluons, held a more central place in theoretical physics discourse. This remained mainstream even until the 1980s, where a physicist Marie Gelman underscored this by exclusion. Gelman, in a famous talk, outlined four problems in physics. Number one, why is there chirality?"
},
{
"end_time": 220.896,
"index": 8,
"start_time": 195.196,
"text": " Number two, why are there three families? Number three, how many sets of Higgs bosons are there? And lastly, why is it this particular group instead of some other simple or semi-simple one? Notice the conspicuous absence of quantum gravity as one of the most important unresolved problems, according at least to one of the leading physicists of the day. Now, there are two major players in this story. The first is Roger Babson,"
},
{
"end_time": 249.377,
"index": 9,
"start_time": 220.896,
"text": " Born into a merchant family in 1875 Massachusetts, Roger Babson was a businessman and a writer. In fact, Babson was a highly successful businessman and the founder of Babson College as well as Babson Statistical Organization. His company pioneered financial forecasting and investment analysis, earning him pedigree in the business world. For reasons that will become clear in a moment, Babson had a morbid fascination with gravity and in particular, anti-gravity."
},
{
"end_time": 266.954,
"index": 10,
"start_time": 249.377,
"text": " The second player in this story is Agnew Banson, an industrialist born in North Carolina in 1915. Having grown his family's air conditioning business into a thriving aeronautical equipment company, Agnew wasn't a physicist but developed an interest in gravitational physics later in life."
},
{
"end_time": 295.213,
"index": 11,
"start_time": 266.954,
"text": " Like Roger, he was intrigued by the concept of antigravity and its potential applications. Roger Babson and Agnubansen leveraged their wealth to influence the course of gravitational physics. Notice that I keep saying gravitational physics and not, say, general relativity. The reason is that Roger and Agnu, at least embryonically, were interested in modifications to Newton's laws as well as other accounts of gravity that weren't relegated to Einstein's formulation."
},
{
"end_time": 313.387,
"index": 12,
"start_time": 295.213,
"text": " For instance, Roger took the principle of action slash reaction from Newton's third law as primary, even metaphysically relating it to consciousness, which, as you could imagine, along with their interest in antigravity, made most researchers disinclined to associate with them in the early stages."
},
{
"end_time": 325.947,
"index": 13,
"start_time": 313.66,
"text": " Babson, unfortunately, lost his older sister and grandson to drowning, which he attributed to gravity. Thus his interest in this force wasn't mere curiosity, but rather a vendetta."
},
{
"end_time": 346.988,
"index": 14,
"start_time": 326.493,
"text": " Now, why did he ascribe the fault of drowning to gravity rather than to the myriad other potential contributors like H2O, the seizing up of muscles, or even the harmonic oscillator? I don't know. However, we're lucky that he chose gravity as a target given that you and I are interested in this subject and directly because of his vengeance,"
},
{
"end_time": 364.121,
"index": 15,
"start_time": 346.988,
"text": " There's now a profusion of work that we can research and showcase in podcast form on this channel, all the way from loop quantum gravity to string theory to even alternative approaches to deriving general relativity from what doesn't look like spacetime, such as Wolfram's approach and others."
},
{
"end_time": 382.466,
"index": 16,
"start_time": 364.121,
"text": " Babson firmly believed that conquering gravity had the potential to revolutionize human life, just as electricity had done some decades earlier. While Roger's impetus into grand unified theories was personal loss, as far as I can tell, Agnew's was intellectual curiosity, much like you and myself."
},
{
"end_time": 413.473,
"index": 17,
"start_time": 383.831,
"text": " In 1948, Babson established what's called the Gravity Research Foundation. This is important to this story and is a continuing thread in the development of modern theories of gravity. Babson's friend, Thomas Edison, apparently suggested the creation of the Gravity Research Foundation to Babson as a way to encourage and support scientific research related to gravity, focusing on developing practical technologies to control gravity. In other words, anti-gravity."
},
{
"end_time": 441.323,
"index": 18,
"start_time": 413.473,
"text": " In the year of Einstein's death, 1955, Agnew Bansin, on the other hand, initiated the Institute for Field Physics at the University of North Carolina. Both Agnew's Institute and Rogers Foundation were hubs that attracted leading scientists from around the world to discuss problems related to gravitation and ultimately unified field theories. Note that there are two separate organizations that were initially independent"
},
{
"end_time": 459.155,
"index": 19,
"start_time": 441.323,
"text": " the gravity research foundation and the institute for field physics there's usually a large point of confusion here and it's worth pointing out so that we're not befuddled because the names of the patrons involved also sound similar so i'll try to enunciate when i can there's roger babson"
},
{
"end_time": 483.439,
"index": 20,
"start_time": 459.582,
"text": " and then there's Agnew Bansin. Rather than using their last names, I'll attempt to use their first to avoid ambiguity. Their involvement wasn't just about giving out funds to universities. Both gentlemen played an active role in the research and their financial resources allowed certain universities to focus on these subjects, a subject which at the time was considered unfruitful and even fringe."
},
{
"end_time": 502.039,
"index": 21,
"start_time": 483.439,
"text": " So, why did private individuals need to come in to fund research into gravitational physics? Why wasn't this being studied by academia much after the 1920s? A combination of world events and shifting academic furor to the quantum world. Hear that sound?"
},
{
"end_time": 528.626,
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"start_time": 502.5,
"text": " That's the sweet sound of success with Shopify. Shopify is the all-encompassing commerce platform that's with you from the first flicker of an idea to the moment you realize you're running a global enterprise. Whether it's handcrafted jewelry or high-tech gadgets, Shopify supports you at every point of sale, both online and in person. They streamline the process with the internet's best converting checkout, making it 36% more effective than other leading platforms."
},
{
"end_time": 554.718,
"index": 23,
"start_time": 528.626,
"text": " There's also something called Shopify Magic, your AI-powered assistant that's like an all-star team member working tirelessly behind the scenes. What I find fascinating about Shopify is how it scales with your ambition. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. Join the ranks of businesses in 175 countries that have made Shopify the backbone."
},
{
"end_time": 578.097,
"index": 24,
"start_time": 554.718,
"text": " of their commerce. Shopify, by the way, powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States, including huge names like Allbirds, Rothies, and Brooklynin. If you ever need help, their award-winning support is like having a mentor that's just a click away. Now, are you ready to start your own success story? Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com"
},
{
"end_time": 588.626,
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"text": " go to shopify.com slash theories now to grow your business no matter what stage you're in shopify.com slash theories"
},
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"text": " Razor blades are like diving boards. The longer the board, the more the wobble, the more the wobble, the more nicks, cuts, scrapes. A bad shave isn't a blade problem, it's an extension problem. Henson is a family-owned aerospace parts manufacturer that's made parts for the International Space Station and the Mars Rover."
},
{
"end_time": 637.858,
"index": 27,
"start_time": 609.377,
"text": " Now they're bringing that precision engineering to your shaving experience. By using aerospace-grade CNC machines, Henson makes razors that extend less than the thickness of a human hair. The razor also has built-in channels that evacuates hair and cream, which make clogging virtually impossible. Henson Shaving wants to produce the best razors, not the best razor business, so that means no plastics, no subscriptions, no proprietary blades, and no planned obsolescence."
},
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"end_time": 654.241,
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"start_time": 637.858,
"text": " It's also extremely affordable. The Henson razor works with the standard dual edge blades that give you that old school shave with the benefits of this new school tech. It's time to say no to subscriptions and yes to a razor that'll last you a lifetime. Visit hensonshaving.com slash everything."
},
{
"end_time": 671.22,
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"text": " If you use that code, you'll get two years worth of blades for free. Just make sure to add them to the cart. Plus 100 free blades when you head to H E N S O N S H A V I N G dot com slash everything and use the code everything."
},
{
"end_time": 701.732,
"index": 30,
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"text": " The atomic bomb's success, if we can even call it that, had nations investing heavily into atomic and subatomic physics. The private patronage of Roger and Agnew was unprecedented in physics. Remember, this is the 1950s. Most of the time, when you wanted something funded academically, you sourced it from tuition or the government directly. Sure, there were donations here and there, but they didn't prescribe specific research directions, generally speaking."
},
{
"end_time": 725.623,
"index": 31,
"start_time": 701.732,
"text": " Roger Babson and Agnew Benson are seminal in that regard. In fact, they meticulously selected the researchers and institutions to fund, focusing on those that shared their interest in gravitational physics along with other idiosyncratic qualities like radial distance from a major city sufficient enough to evade fallout from a nuclear bomb. Hey, this was the Cold War after all."
},
{
"end_time": 743.695,
"index": 32,
"start_time": 726.647,
"text": " Each of these organizations were involved in manifold activities including theoretical studies, experimental design and setup, data analysis, and even scientific communication. This latter point is especially the case with the Gravity Research Foundation's Essay Contest."
},
{
"end_time": 766.374,
"index": 33,
"start_time": 743.695,
"text": " This is an annually organized essay competition open to physicists around the world. These essays actually continue on to this day and play a crucial role in this story. The winners of this contest were awarded cash prizes and a degree of prestige in the scientific community. At least that was the intention, though it didn't work out like that originally and we'll talk more about that later."
},
{
"end_time": 785.162,
"index": 34,
"start_time": 767.363,
"text": " In other words, the story of post-war physics is often framed as this surge in federal spending on research, namely defense-related agencies. However, Babson and Benson changed that. Their private funding induced research from outside the government."
},
{
"end_time": 814.462,
"index": 35,
"start_time": 785.162,
"text": " In particular, it did so for gravitational studies, which was actually by necessity, since quote-unquote gravity didn't align with the government's particle physics dominated focus. This is a theme Noam Chomsky talks about in Manufacturing Consent. We tend to think that academics just pursue what they're interested in, motivated purely by the love of truth and science. However, professors are just like anyone else, and they need and want payment and prestige."
},
{
"end_time": 835.725,
"index": 36,
"start_time": 814.462,
"text": " Thus, wherever the grants go, the research follows. The contest attracted a variety of participants, some of whom were already eminence in their field, while others were yet to make their mark. Notable participants, and even winners, include Cecile and Bryce Dewitt, Stanley Desser, and Richard Arnewitt,"
},
{
"end_time": 862.193,
"index": 37,
"start_time": 835.725,
"text": " Philip Morrison and Thomas Gold, John Wheeler, Maurice Allais, Stephen Hawking, Ilya Prigozhin, and Roger Penrose. We'll get into each of these individuals as well as their research later. Cecile and Bryce DeWitt play a pivotal role here as they helped legitimize the Gravity Research Foundation. Most intellectuals don't want to associate with something if they perceive other intellectuals distancing themselves from it."
},
{
"end_time": 889.241,
"index": 38,
"start_time": 862.193,
"text": " However, someone needed to be there at the inception of burgeoning fields. In this case, it was the DeWitts. The physics enthusiasts among us know about Bryce DeWitt through the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, as well as because he was the popularizer of Everett's many-world interpretation. Some of you may even recognize the name DeWitt from Bioshock Infinite as the inspiration for the quantum-mechanical explosion of multiverses in time travel was indeed DeWitt's research."
},
{
"end_time": 912.312,
"index": 39,
"start_time": 889.241,
"text": " Cecile and her husband Bryce spent their academic life aiming to unify all interactions akin to Einstein, though they had more of a quantum algebraic approach compared to Einstein's classical geometric one. What you may not know is that Bryce DeWitt's work gained considerable traction thanks to the resources and platform afforded to him by the Gravity Research Foundation."
},
{
"end_time": 932.039,
"index": 40,
"start_time": 912.312,
"text": " Topics explored in these contests ranged from the relationship between magnetism and gravity, with some participants even echoing thoughts attributed to Nikola Tesla, while some others, including Oppenheimer, a physicist known for his role in the Manhattan Project, explored the cosmological implications for general relativity and the nature of singularities."
},
{
"end_time": 957.602,
"index": 41,
"start_time": 932.039,
"text": " The notion that progress in the disjoint fields of particle physics and gravity could be achieved through a union of them was further reinforced by the victorious submission the following year. This time it was penned by two postdoctoral researchers at the Institute for Advanced Study, namely Arnowit and Desser, both of whom were proteges of Julian Schwinger at Harvard. You may recognize their name as the AD in the ADM decomposition."
},
{
"end_time": 984.582,
"index": 42,
"start_time": 957.602,
"text": " However, their paper was a ruse. It was submitted for fun and was nonsense. This apparently upset Oppenheimer. Desser apologized to Oppenheimer, stating the sin of the entry was to win when it was only meant to entertain. Nevertheless, the paper's concept that gravity could be transformed into nuclear energy was lauded by the lesson formed and eventually it caught the attention of military and industrial sources."
},
{
"end_time": 1016.561,
"index": 43,
"start_time": 986.8,
"text": " The Gravity Research Foundation did not go without criticism. For instance, Martin Gardner, a renowned author of popular mathematics and science, wrote vituberative remarks stating that the contest irresponsibly encourages radical ideals, calling it perhaps the most useless scientific project of the 20th century. Roger Babson wanted to create insulators, reflectors, and absorbers of gravity, much like how there exists such material for electromagnetism. However,"
},
{
"end_time": 1038.49,
"index": 44,
"start_time": 1016.561,
"text": " the non-linearity of general relativity, in contrast to the linearity of Maxwell's equations, make it either not possible in practice, or not possible in principle, at least according to the standard theory. Why not? Well, in quantum mechanics, if you have two solutions, you can add them to form a third, whereas this doesn't work with the field equations of Einstein."
},
{
"end_time": 1064.172,
"index": 45,
"start_time": 1038.49,
"text": " Further, there's no negative mass to balance the positive mass and create a neutral object analogous to an electric insulator. In terms of particle physics, this is one of the reasons why the graviton isn't seen to have spin 1. Thirdly, there's no currently accepted way to quote-unquote bounce a gravitational field off a surface, for instance. Sure, there are wormholes, but that's more like diverting rather than reflecting. Lastly,"
},
{
"end_time": 1085.384,
"index": 46,
"start_time": 1064.172,
"text": " All known matter types are coupled to gravity. This makes an absorption mechanism difficult to even conceptualize. Now keep in mind, we don't have a so-called final theory, and thus it's easy to come to the conclusion that all bets are off and anything is possible. One should note that Joel Shirk showed in the late 1970s that extended supergravity naturally leads to antigravity."
},
{
"end_time": 1106.544,
"index": 47,
"start_time": 1085.384,
"text": " Further, almost all of the points above are contested, especially when it comes to the details, because in condensed matter physics, and when dealing with metamaterials, there are plenty of exotic properties that can emerge. It should also be noted that gravity can be derived from matter dynamics, rather than psychologically being seen as the a priori stage that matter plays on."
},
{
"end_time": 1125.725,
"index": 48,
"start_time": 1106.544,
"text": " Mathematically, contrary to the way the story is taught in undergrad, gravity is derived from the behavior of matter. That is, we tend to think of the Lorentzian metric as coming afterward and giving rise to a playground for matter. However, historically, the way that it works is that you take Maxwell's matter so sacredly"
},
{
"end_time": 1142.142,
"index": 49,
"start_time": 1125.725,
"text": " that you impose a Lorentzian structure and we luckily see that this is the stage that the rest of matter plays. It may be that there are new types of matter and the existence of these exotic fields will dictate a change in the geometry itself. This is called the principal polynomial method."
},
{
"end_time": 1172.329,
"index": 50,
"start_time": 1142.637,
"text": " Let's get back to Agnew Benson. In addition to being an entrepreneur, Agnew was a private pilot with an interest in astronomy. In fact, Agnew was a participant in Operation Moonwatch. So what is Operation Moonwatch? It was a program led by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory that encouraged amateur astronomers to track artificial satellites, a pursuit closely tied to the broader Cold War context. In other words, watch the skies."
},
{
"end_time": 1195.503,
"index": 51,
"start_time": 1172.329,
"text": " This may have fueled Agnew's and Roger's fascination with anti-gravity and UFOs. The interest in flying saucers held by both Roger and Agnew seemed eccentric to many, including Wheeler. However, it was Roger and Agnew's willingness to support alternative avenues of research that led to fresh perspectives in gravitational physics, which we now enjoy."
},
{
"end_time": 1218.746,
"index": 52,
"start_time": 1195.503,
"text": " Because of the excoriation from Wheeler and others like Martin Gardner, Agnew had developed a protection clause, which would accompany any publicity related to his Institute. This clause made it clear that any work conducted at Agnew's Institute was not associated with antigravity and instead was based on the Newton-Einstein analysis. Despite this,"
},
{
"end_time": 1234.206,
"index": 53,
"start_time": 1218.746,
"text": " Agnew Banson privately remained steadfast in his pursuit of anti-gravity, even exploring the concept of electro-gravitics and achieving lift with the help of his collaborator T.T. Brown. It was a claim that piqued the interest of physicists."
},
{
"end_time": 1254.514,
"index": 54,
"start_time": 1234.206,
"text": " To verify these claims, Bryce DeWitt and other renowned physicists, like Edward Teller, were called upon to evaluate these devices, though they maintained a scientific stance and noted that the lift was likely due to electrostatic effects. Agnew was, after all, maintaining immense voltages across small distances."
},
{
"end_time": 1280.572,
"index": 55,
"start_time": 1255.162,
"text": " In fact, in another unexpected twist to this story, the poster child of string theory, Ed Whitten, has a family involvement in this. His father, Lewis Whitten, was involved with Bansin, stating, I went to visit him and visited his laboratory. And the basic idea of his laboratory was he had a strong electrostatic field, which was about 150,000 volts over the distance of about a meter."
},
{
"end_time": 1295.043,
"index": 56,
"start_time": 1280.572,
"text": " And he had an operator operating this thing, but I knew enough about experiments to know that this was not a very happy place. Because I know that for strong electrostatic fields, there shouldn't be any sharp points around. Everything should be curved, and nothing was curved."
},
{
"end_time": 1310.981,
"index": 57,
"start_time": 1296.647,
"text": " Lewis Whitten also indicated that Agnew started the Institute for Field Physics, in particular for Bryce DeWitt. Perhaps he wanted some facade to get physicists like DeWitt to verify and even build his anti-gravity crafts."
},
{
"end_time": 1334.36,
"index": 58,
"start_time": 1311.493,
"text": " Companies like IBM, General Dynamics, and even Glenn Martin Aircraft Manufacturing Company saw potential applications of anti-gravity technologies in their business. These corporations weren't just spectators, they were actively engaged. Actually, it was Glenn Martin that after several mergers became what's now known as Lockheed Martin."
},
{
"end_time": 1343.814,
"index": 59,
"start_time": 1334.906,
"text": " Gravitational physics was no longer just an academic pursuit, it had real-world applications that could irrevocably alter industry."
},
{
"end_time": 1368.217,
"index": 60,
"start_time": 1344.906,
"text": " You've heard of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. This is the place that was home to some of the greatest minds in history, including Albert Einstein and Kurt Gödel. It's also the current home of Ed Witten and Nima Arkani Hamad and Juan Maldacena. Well, Glenn Martin of Lockheed Martin, inspired by Benson and Babson, aimed to create an industrial version of the Institute for Advanced Study."
},
{
"end_time": 1389.343,
"index": 61,
"start_time": 1368.217,
"text": " a place where theoretical discoveries could be applied to solve practical challenges. It was called the R-IAS, that is the Research Institute for Advanced Studies, and it was established in 1955. Coming back into the fold, Ed Whitten's father, Lewis Whitten, was not only hired but helped connect people"
},
{
"end_time": 1398.643,
"index": 62,
"start_time": 1389.343,
"text": " organized workshops and also arranged some of the funding for Glenn Martin's Research Institute at a time when this was extremely uncommon."
},
{
"end_time": 1423.439,
"index": 63,
"start_time": 1398.985,
"text": " In fact, Lewis Whitten was the only one in charge of finding research for the Institute, identifying everyone who could potentially help with Martin's Institute and hiring them. Even Burkhard Heim was contracted by the RIAS. You may remember Heim from Gary Nolan's podcast, On Tow, where Gary talked about Heim's theories. But basically, this structure that he draws here at the end,"
},
{
"end_time": 1453.848,
"index": 64,
"start_time": 1423.848,
"text": " is a visual representation of"
},
{
"end_time": 1466.578,
"index": 65,
"start_time": 1453.848,
"text": " without using biology but using purely materialistic approaches, build a sufficiently complex machine that creates an object with consciousness and a soul."
},
{
"end_time": 1495.179,
"index": 66,
"start_time": 1467.125,
"text": " That's fascinating. Heim was one of the first, if not the first, to posit that all interactions, gravity, EM, weak and strong, are unified in a higher dimensional Euclidean space, with extra so-called imaginary dimensions. This was prior even to Yang-Mills. Apparently, Hermann Weyl said that the highest chance of anti-gravity lay with Heim's theories, but unfortunately, after several attempts, I wasn't able to track down this source."
},
{
"end_time": 1520.896,
"index": 67,
"start_time": 1495.179,
"text": " If someone viewing this has the source of the text on screen, then please let me know and place it in the comments. While it wasn't said publicly, it was known through the grapevine that the Glenn Martin Company was interested in antigravity. Recall, you can think of the Glenn Martin Company as the predecessor to Lockheed Martin. In Witten's words, there was a new thing in the wind at the time which was antigravity. It was in the wind."
},
{
"end_time": 1544.326,
"index": 68,
"start_time": 1520.896,
"text": " I quickly learned that I should talk about gravity, and that they would ask me about anti-gravity. And I'd say, well, we just learn about gravity. If there's anything to anti-gravity, it'll come along. MIT professor of the history of science, David Kaiser, along with University of Sydney professor of philosophy and physics, Dean Rickles, catalog this, and the links are in the description, as well as links to all sources."
},
{
"end_time": 1571.476,
"index": 69,
"start_time": 1544.326,
"text": " Now, if this wasn't convoluted enough, Witten explicitly commented on potential anti-gravity materials, saying a guy in France was discovering that on the night of a new moon, a pendulum swung faster or slow. A guy named Townsend discovered that there was a type of bismuth that was repelled instead of attracting. The first astrophysics symposium not only started this field of relativistic astrophysics, but it ended"
},
{
"end_time": 1605.282,
"index": 70,
"start_time": 1575.282,
"text": " small chapter in the history of relativity. I'm referring to the worldwide craze that lasted for about 10 years in the discovery of antigravity. And I bring that in because that impacted on my life quite considerably. In the middle 1950s I found myself after"
},
{
"end_time": 1636.459,
"index": 71,
"start_time": 1606.903,
"text": " a different, I should say, youth than one might expect, employed by the Martin Company, now the Lockheed Martin Company, which was mentioned by the Dean earlier. In the mid-1950s then, I found myself employed at the Martin Company with a rather weak PhD, I would say. At the age of about 35,"
},
{
"end_time": 1651.049,
"index": 72,
"start_time": 1636.783,
"text": " Hear that sound?"
},
{
"end_time": 1678.029,
"index": 73,
"start_time": 1651.937,
"text": " That's the sweet sound of success with Shopify. Shopify is the all-encompassing commerce platform that's with you from the first flicker of an idea to the moment you realize you're running a global enterprise. Whether it's handcrafted jewelry or high-tech gadgets, Shopify supports you at every point of sale, both online and in person. They streamline the process with the Internet's best converting checkout, making it 36% more effective than other leading platforms."
},
{
"end_time": 1704.121,
"index": 74,
"start_time": 1678.029,
"text": " There's also something called Shopify Magic, your AI-powered assistant that's like an all-star team member working tirelessly behind the scenes. What I find fascinating about Shopify is how it scales with your ambition. No matter how big you want to grow, Shopify gives you everything you need to take control and take your business to the next level. Join the ranks of businesses in 175 countries that have made Shopify the backbone."
},
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"text": " of their commerce. Shopify, by the way, powers 10% of all e-commerce in the United States, including huge names like Allbirds, Rothy's, and Brooklyn. If you ever need help, their award-winning support is like having a mentor that's just a click away. Now, are you ready to start your own success story? Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com"
},
{
"end_time": 1743.729,
"index": 76,
"start_time": 1727.517,
"text": " Think Verizon, the best 5G network is expensive? Think again. Bring in your AT&T or T-Mobile bill to a Verizon store"
},
{
"end_time": 1768.166,
"index": 77,
"start_time": 1748.217,
"text": " . . . . . . . ."
},
{
"end_time": 1794.428,
"index": 78,
"start_time": 1770.572,
"text": " The company was building airplanes and building rockets. It ultimately built the Titan rocket, which was used for many space vehicle flights. The vice president had the idea, which was to him a wonderful idea, to develop anti-gravity. Of course, when he tried the idea in public,"
},
{
"end_time": 1823.814,
"index": 79,
"start_time": 1795.879,
"text": " You can imagine the greeting he received by these scientists. Let's sum up so far in five points. Number one, in 1915, Einstein publishes General Relativity. Number two, since around the 1920s, work in gravity stagnates. Number three, years later from a personal interest in anti-gravity, Babson and Manson started privately funding research into gravity around the 1950s."
},
{
"end_time": 1851.374,
"index": 80,
"start_time": 1823.814,
"text": " 4. The reputation of these two organizations, so the Gravity Research Foundation and the Institute for Field Physics, grew as the DeWitts and other physicists associated themselves with it, eventually even mavens like Penrose and Hawking. 5. Private industry, like the primogenitors of Lockheed Martin, become involved with Babson by first being a donor and then second by creating an industry-oriented clone of his institute."
},
{
"end_time": 1877.483,
"index": 81,
"start_time": 1853.387,
"text": " The Institute for Field Physics held a monumental conference known as the Chapel Hill Conference in 1957. To explain why this was a huge deal in the history of gravity research, you have to know that if you look through the history of physics conferences, you'll find that after Einstein published General Relativity, which recall was in 1915, that there was a distinct lack of gravity related conferences."
},
{
"end_time": 1907.483,
"index": 82,
"start_time": 1877.483,
"text": " Sure, there was the 1927 Solvay Conference, but that was primarily regarding quantum mechanics. Thus, the Chapel Hill Conference, organized by Agnew Bansin, was the Gravity Conference to rival that of the Solvay Conference. It was here that the gravity community came together and shaped the future of the field. For many researchers, it was their first opportunity to interact with like-minded individuals who shared a passion for exploring the mysteries of gravity."
},
{
"end_time": 1937.176,
"index": 83,
"start_time": 1907.483,
"text": " For instance, this is where Witten and Feynman first met. The role of gravitation in physics was a report commissioned by the Gravity Research Foundation. This report was a comprehensive survey of the state of gravitational physics, highlighting the latest discoveries, ongoing challenges, and potential future directions. It took me quite some time to find, but I managed to get a digital reprint. The report still reads well to this day, even though it was published well over half a century ago."
},
{
"end_time": 1958.831,
"index": 84,
"start_time": 1938.626,
"text": " As the 1960s approached, the relativity renaissance that Roger Babson and Agnew Banson helped instigate was in full swing. Agnew's Institute sponsored Peter Higgs while he was working on his now-famous Higgs boson research. John Wheeler made critical contributions to black hole thermodynamics and the notion of quantum foam."
},
{
"end_time": 1983.439,
"index": 85,
"start_time": 1958.831,
"text": " the latter suggesting that space-time at the smallest scales is subject to quantum fluctuations, a step toward bridging quantum mechanics and general relativity that some still take today. In the 1960s and 70s, Stephen Hawking developed a series of significant results that broadened the horizons of theoretical physics. Notably, this stretch predates his more recognized work, such as the popular book, A Brief History of"
},
{
"end_time": 2009.462,
"index": 86,
"start_time": 1983.439,
"text": " of time. Many of Hawking's ideas were disseminated first in essay form through this contest, sponsored by the Gravity Research Foundation, prior to appearing in full article form. Some even prior to the famous Penrose-Hawking singularity theorems, though Penrose published his first result in 1965. So think about what this means. Hawking was popularized in part because of Babson's funding."
},
{
"end_time": 2036.937,
"index": 87,
"start_time": 2009.787,
"text": " We don't know the degree to which those nascent ideas in Hawking's head were catalyzed into a rigorous form because he was allowed to be more speculative due to this contest. The same with other results. That is to say, without Babson and Banson, who knows if we'd have the results of gravitational waves by Bondi and others in 1957 or 1958 with the ADM formalism."
},
{
"end_time": 2054.292,
"index": 88,
"start_time": 2036.937,
"text": " or in 1960, with the gravitational wave detector being built, which was eventually improved and refined, leading to the creation of LIGO, or in 1961, RegiCalculus, which is a discrete approximation to general relativity that replaces the continuous spacetime with a simplicial complex."
},
{
"end_time": 2069.701,
"index": 89,
"start_time": 2054.292,
"text": " Or in 1962, the Bondi-Sachs formalism, which analyzes the asymptotic structure of spacetime at null infinity, allowing for the study of gravitational radiation and energy loss in general relativity. Or in 1963, the famous Kerr solution,"
},
{
"end_time": 2099.957,
"index": 90,
"start_time": 2069.957,
"text": " or the Singularity Theorem of 1965 along with the Ray Chowdery equation or later on with computational methods of numerical relativity and black hole mechanics in 1971 with Brandon Carter and 1973 with the Hawking entropy with Bekenstein or 1974 with Hawking radiation that is Hawking predicted that black holes should radiate as if they were black bodies at a certain temperature. This theoretical prediction provides a link between general relativity"
},
{
"end_time": 2126.869,
"index": 91,
"start_time": 2099.957,
"text": " During the post-Cold War period, the study of gravity underwent a tremendous shift with theorists increasingly favoring string theoretic approaches as not only a potential solution to a particular physics problem, but instead string theory was seen as the solution to the primary physics problem called quantum gravity. Notice the shift."
},
{
"end_time": 2157.21,
"index": 92,
"start_time": 2128.422,
"text": " Agnew Bansin's life was intrinsically tied to his quest to understand gravity. But in a mirthless, merciless jest of destiny, the very force he sought to understand would play a part in his untimely demise. Bansin died from a plane crash and burned at Worcester Airport. Bansin, a man who dedicated his existence to dissecting and directing gravity, was ironically vanquished by the very force he dared to defy."
},
{
"end_time": 2180.981,
"index": 93,
"start_time": 2158.302,
"text": " This lineage was instrumental in spawning a community of researchers, including notable figures such as Roger Penrose, Roy Kerr, Jurgen Ehlers, and the others listed on screen. Their research into gravity has unmistakably deepened our understanding of the universe, a testament to the enduring impact of Babson and Benson."
},
{
"end_time": 2206.476,
"index": 94,
"start_time": 2182.773,
"text": " In the end, the patrons' audacious bets paid off in unexpected directions. They may or may not have found a way to control gravity, but they did what's even more significant. They ignited an intellectual inferno that changed the face of physics forever. For this reason, we remember those who started the unassuming Gravity Research Foundation and the Institute for Field Physics."
},
{
"end_time": 2229.514,
"index": 95,
"start_time": 2206.476,
"text": " They weren't mere businessmen or enthusiasts. Instead, they were the unlikely pioneers of the gravitational physics revolution. In the words of Professor of Physics and History Dean Rickles, he states, which were established by the creation of the atomic bomb,"
},
{
"end_time": 2258.763,
"index": 96,
"start_time": 2229.514,
"text": " and desperate gravity experts in search of funds, it is clear that gravitational research, LIGO very much included, would have been set back by decades. While scraped from multiple sources, this work is primarily based off of Dean Rickles and David Kaiser's work into the history of gravity. Links to the sources are in the description, including Rickles' interview of Louis Witten, David Kaiser's dissertation on gravity, as well as their joint work."
},
{
"end_time": 2280.452,
"index": 97,
"start_time": 2258.763,
"text": " If you enjoyed this disquisition and want to see more, I was thinking of doing others in a similar style. The ones that I'm toying with are the history of E8 and physics. Another one may be a modern survey of ADS-CFT correspondence. Another one that excites me because I'd love to research it is who was Alexander Grothendieck? And then another one that also excites me is"
},
{
"end_time": 2301.425,
"index": 98,
"start_time": 2280.452,
"text": " the full Standard Model Lagrangian explained in 10 minutes. Let me know which of these you want most or if you have a different suggestion, make sure to leave it in the comments so that others can vote and comment on your comment. I'd also like to thank all of the patrons, the patrons, you patrons, you who donate, help bring this to people at zero cost."
},
{
"end_time": 2321.271,
"index": 99,
"start_time": 2301.425,
"text": " you help support this channel you help support me i'm extremely grateful and i just want to thank you thank you to all the patrons if you would like to become a patron feel free to visit patreon.com slash kurtjie mungle and donate whatever you like regardless thank you to all the patrons thank you to you who are watching thank you and have a great day"
},
{
"end_time": 2346.613,
"index": 100,
"start_time": 2321.271,
"text": " The podcast is now concluded. Thank you for watching. If you haven't subscribed or clicked on that like button, now would be a great time to do so as each subscribe and like helps YouTube push this content to more people. You should also know that there's a remarkably active Discord and subreddit for theories of everything where people explicate tolls, disagree respectfully about theories, and build as a community our own tolls. Links to both are in the description."
},
{
"end_time": 2362.807,
"index": 101,
"start_time": 2346.613,
"text": " Also, I recently found out that external links count plenty toward the algorithm, which means that when you share on Twitter, on Facebook, on Reddit, etc., it shows YouTube that people are talking about this outside of YouTube, which in turn greatly aids the distribution on YouTube as well."
},
{
"end_time": 2386.408,
"index": 102,
"start_time": 2362.807,
"text": " Last but not least, you should know that this podcast is on iTunes, it's on Spotify, it's on every one of the audio platforms. Just type in theories of everything and you'll find it. Often I gain from re-watching lectures and podcasts and I read in the comments that hey, toe listeners also gain from replaying. So how about instead re-listening on those platforms? iTunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, whichever podcast catcher you use."
},
{
"end_time": 2407.927,
"index": 103,
"start_time": 2386.408,
"text": " If you'd like to support more conversations like this, then do consider visiting patreon.com slash Kurt Jaimungal and donate whatever you like. Again, it's support from the sponsors and you that allow me to work on toe full time. You get early access to ad free audio episodes there as well. Every dollar helps far more than you may think. Either way, your viewership is generosity enough. Thank you."
}
]
}No transcript available.