It had all the ingredients of the perfect story and the media couldn't resist it. A physicist who surfs in Maui and snowboards in Lake Tahoe hits on what he disarmingly calls an "Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything."
The paper that whipped up the storm for Garrett Lisi can be found here. It uses the stunning E8 figure, which is honestly very far from simple, to unify the forces of nature, gravity included.
Now, Lisi has gathered his thoughts and replies to the barrage of emails and calls that have changed his life over the past week or two. He's set them up as two FAQs, one dealing with personal questions, the other on the theory.
I spent the weekend reading his paper knowning full well the content would sail over my head. But there's some good analysis on the physics blogs here, here and here, although as usual the rants weren't far behind.
What do you make of Lisi's proposal? Do you think he might be on to something, or will this sink without a trace?
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