The Bogdanov Affair

To think that all these years I have tried to master the field of theoretical physics and possibly make a contribution. It turns out that I didn't need to learn anything and could have just made up my contribution. Has the field of physics been reduced to the level of "social criticism" where any idea no matter how nonsensical can be published? How can this happen?

What, you may ask, am I talking about. I'm speaking about the Bogdanov affair. First, let's start with just the facts (from Wikipedia)...

The Bogdanov Affair is an academic dispute regarding a series of theoretical physics papers written by French twin brothers Igor and Grichka Bogdanov (or Bogdanoff). These papers were published in reputable scientific journals, and culminated in a proposed theory for describing what occurred at the Big Bang. While the Bogdanovs defend the veracity of their work, many physicists have alleged that the papers are nonsense, emphasizing the fallibility of the peer review system used to approve papers. The Bogdanovs obtained Ph.D. degrees from the University of Bourgogne; Grichka Bogdanov received his degree in mathematics in 1999, and Igor Bogdanov received his in theoretical physics in 2002. Both were given the low but passing grade of "honorable", in Igor's case only after publishing in respected physics journals to establish the acceptability of his work.

Before moving on to other topics, let's consider briefly the appalling intellectual laziness of allowing journals to establish the "acceptability" of the work. If you don't understand the paper, you have no business recommending the awarding of a doctorate.

Inside Higher Education said it best: "A PhD is a license to reproduce and an obligation to maintain the quality of your intellectual descendants. [...] If you vote to pass someone who is marginal or worse they, in turn, have the same privilege. If they are not up to standard, it is likely that some of their descendants will also not be."

Leaving this shameful aspect of the affair, let's now look at some actual text from the papers in question, courtesy of John Baez's blog...

We consider inertia as a topological field, linked to the topological charge Q = 1 of the "singular zero size gravitational instanton" which can be identified with the initial singularity of space-time in the standard model.

Huh?

Baez: "The paper goes on to discuss the supposed connection between N = 2 supergravity, Donaldson theory, KMS states and the Foucault pendulum experiment, which he claims 'cannot be explained satisfactorily in either classical or relativistic mechanics.' If you know some physics you'll find this statement odd. The Foucault pendulum behaves exactly the way classical mechanics predicts: it is a standard textbook exercise."

We draw from the above that whatever the orientation, the plane of oscillation of Foucault's pendulum is necessarily aligned with the initial singularity marking the origin of physical space S3, that of Euclidean space E4, and, finally, that of Lorentzian space-time M4.

Baez: "How in the world could the plane of oscillation of a Foucault's pendulum be 'aligned with the initial singularity', i.e. the big bang?"

We simply suggest that at 0 scale, the observables must be replaced by the homology cycles in the moduli space of gravitational instantons. We then get a deep correspondence - a symmetry of duality - between physical theory and topological field theory.

Baez: "(1) Could you please define "at 0 scale"? (2) "Observables" in which theory? (3) You say "must be replaced". Why? How? (4) You speak of a "deep correspondence" between some unspecified physical theory and some unspecified topological field theory. Which theories are you talking about here? How does the correspondence go?"

Lee Smolin: "They were at best wrong, and most likely just throwing around words with no calculations or proofs to back them up."

Jacques Distler: "The papers consist of buzzwords from various fields of mathematical physics, string theory and quantum gravity, strung together into syntactically correct, but semantically meaningless, prose."

Eli Hawkins: "This paper is built around the idea that 'at the Planck scale, the space-time system is in a themodynamical equilibrium state.' It is not quite clear what the author means by this. He may mean that when the matter is at the Planck temperature, it is in thermodymanic equilibrium with the geometry. He does not explain why there should not be thermal equilibrium at all temperatures. It may be simply that the author does not know what he is talking about. The main result of this paper is that this thermodynamic equilibrium should be a KMS state. This almost goes without saying; for a quantum system, the KMS condition is just the concrete definition of thermodynamic equilibrium. The hard part is identifying the quantum system to which the condition should be applied. It is difficult to describe what is wrong in Section 4, since almost nothing is right. The author seems to believe that just because an analytic continuation of a function exists, the argument must be considered a complex number. He also makes the rather obvious claims that complex numbers should be the sums of real and imaginary parts. The remainder of the paper is a jumble of misquoted results from math and physics. It would take up too much space to enumerate all the mistakes: indeed it is difficult to say where one error ends and the next begins."

So the papers are clearly recognizable as nonsense to anybody with a basic understanding of physics. Now we get to the more depressing elements of the story. Not only did these con artists get their theses by ignorant committee members, but they got them published in some of the most prestigious physics journals (Classical and Quantum Gravity, Nuovo Cimento, Annals of Physics). Here are some of the comments regarding the quality of the papers by what I would have thought were strong physicists...

Roman Jackiw (MIT) (According to most sources, the thesis had "many" things Dr. Jackiw didn't understand, but I have been unable to find a direct quote to this effect.): "The author proposes a novel, speculative solution to the problem of the pre-Big-Bang initial singularity ... the thesis and the published papers provide an excellent introduction to these ideas, and can serve as a useful springboard for further research in this area. All these were ideas that could possibly make sense. It showed some originality and some familiarity with the jargon. That's all I ask."

That's all you ask?!?! WTF?!?! I have some familiarity with the jargon. I'm sure I can write something original (especially if these Bogdanov papers are setting the bar for "originality"). Where the hell is my Ph.D.?!?!

Jack Morava (Johns Hopkins University): "The thesis work is of great interest, dominated by new ideas with fundamental physical implications in cosmology and in many other fields connected with gravitation."

Lubos Motl (Harvard): "They are proposing something that has, speculatively, the potential to be an alternative story about quantum gravity. What they are proposing is a potential new calculational framework for gravity."

So, there you have it. Physicists at some of the best universities in the world have been taken in by this meaningless pile of crap. Amazing! One almost hopes that these folks were bribed or have some other ulterior motive in stating that these papers constitute good physics. Because the alternative explanation - that they are fools - is too terrible to contemplate. However, deep down I have become convinced that this is in fact the case. I have to accept that the field that I have loved for over 20 years is turning into a pathetic joke. I will finish this post with two quotes that most clearly explain the situation...

Jackiw: "One person looks at a piece of art and says it is gibberish; another person looks and says it's wonderful."

When did physics become comparable to modern art in deciding what was of value? I seem to recall learning about something called "the scientific method" in high school (oh, so many years ago). I will give the last word to Frank Wilczek (MIT) who provides the best explanation of why we find ourselves in this sorry state.

"This says something profound about what happens to theoretical physics in the absence of the discipline of experiment."