The Quantum Structure of Space and Time (293 pages)

152 The Quantum Structure of Space and Time

I. Klebanov I was also intrigued by Nekrasov’s promise to repay some debts to

condensed matter theorists. A question I had is: Is there any sign in the

topological string of the resonating valence bond wave function, and if so, will

there be a time when Phil Anderson will be learning topological string theory?

N. Nekrasov I am sure there is, but I do not know when it is.

I. Klebanov Is it a classical model or do you see the quantisation of these dimers?

N.

H.

N.

H.

Nekrasov Well, the model which I got is more like a statistical mechanical

model.

Ooguri Statistical mechanical in the sense of a classical statistical mechanical

model?

Nekrasov I am doing the functional integral over the fermions and the gauge

fields and the rest. How do you call it? I call it quantum but some people may

call it classical. When you reduce this problem to dimers, it is just a summation

over dimer configurations. That is probably classical.

Ooguri At the end of the next part, I would like to also have some general

discussion, and in particular I hope to identify some important physics program

for which we would like to develop mathematical tools. So I would like to take

some kind of informal call on this kind of questions. I have entitled the final

part of this discussion session “What is M-theory?” Of course, finding a better

formulation of M-theory is a very important project. We will hear two different

points of view about this.