CH 16: History of the TOE and E8
It appears that the most famous genius to have lived, Albert Einstein, actually spent the majority of his professional life frustrated at how to reconcile his powerful theories of Relativity with those of Quantum Mechanics. While his theory was remarkably accurate in describing physics of the very large, his equations could not work in conjunction with physics of the very small. From this mathematical inconsistency, the quest of generations of brilliant scientists has been to determine what physical theory can explain both the large and small. This is referred to as the Holy Grail of physics, a Grand Unified Theory (GUT) or a Theory of Everything (TOE) if you include gravity in the calculations.
For several decades now, despite many concerted attempts, no one has been able to convince the majority of scientists that they have worked out a correct TOE. In the fall of 2007, Garrett Lisi, a PhD in Physics and at the time, a relative outsider and unknown, proposed his “An Exceptionally Simple Theory of Everything”. This is his attempt to solve the elusive TOE and he does so using a decidedly mathematical concept, namely the E8. The E8 is a 248 dimensional construct that is critical in understanding many physical phenomena; in mathematical lingo it is known as a finite case of the simple lie group. E8 is perhaps the most complicated structure known to man and according to Dr. Lisi, might hold the answer to everything. The idea is that space-time, the world in which we live in, is part of E8 and every particle and part of our cosmos can be predicted exactly within this 248 dimensional E8 framework.
Dr. Lisi maintains a realistic and grounded opinion of his work, and the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s largest particle accelerator could shed light onto the theory through the discovery of a new Higgs particle, which Dr. Lisi's theory predicts exist.
E8 was simplified in the making of this chapter