Edward Witten Quotes

There was a long history of speculation that in quantum gravity, unlike Einstein’s classical theory, it might be possible for the topology of spacetime to change.

The theory has to be interpreted that extra dimensions beyond the ordinary four dimensions the three spatial dimensions plus time are sufficiently small that they haven’t been observed yet.

Technically you need the extra dimensions. At first people didn’t like them too much, but they’ve got a big benefit, which is that the ability of string theory to describe all the elementary particles and their forces along with gravity depends on using the extra dimensions.

String theory is an attempt at a deeper description of nature by thinking of an elementary particle not as a little point but as a little loop of vibrating string.

Spreading out the particle into a string is a step in the direction of making everything we’re familiar with fuzzy. You enter a completely new world where things aren’t at all what you’re used to.

So when you ask me how string theory might be tested, I can tell you what’s likely to happen at accelerators or some parts of the theory that are likely to be tested.