Where and How to find $susy$: The auxiliary field interpretation of supersymmetry

TL;DR

This paper reinterprets supersymmetry as a practical auxiliary tool akin to Feynman's ghosts, arguing that the hierarchy problem is a perturbative artifact and emphasizing the utility of susy in data analysis rather than as universal new physics.

Contribution

It introduces a novel perspective of supersymmetry as an auxiliary mathematical tool rather than a fundamental symmetry, challenging traditional views on the hierarchy problem and proposing customized susy data fits.

Findings

Perturbation theory with widely separated scales can give false results.

The hierarchy problem may be a perturbative fiction.

Supersymmetry can be useful as a data-fitting tool rather than a fundamental symmetry.

Abstract

The {\it gauge hierarchy problem} found in perturbation theory is one of the main attractions for supersymmetry. Yet the quantum mechanical coupling of a low energy system to a high energy one invariably leads to {\it perturbative instability}, which is not a valid signal of dynamical inconsistency. We show by examples how perturbation theory with widely separated scales gives false results. We also identify the flaw in perturbative fine-tuning arguments. Non-perturbative features of random subsystems maintain and preserve the hierarchy in which they are embedded. After reviewing the likelihood the hierarchy problem is a perturbative fiction, we suggest a new interpretation of $susy$ as practical auxiliary fields. Their function is much like Feynman's gauge ghosts, developed in perturbation theory to repair illnesses of perturbation theory. $susy$ will be found useful when it is considered a tool of applied mathematics and data-fitting. We propose that $susy$ data fits should be customized to the particular experimental situations they are suited to improve, without dilution from the needless assumption that $susy$ must describe universal new physics. It is likely that $susy$ will soon be discovered a useful part of data analysis and diagnostics towards improving the understanding of the Standard Model, and possibly towards discovering what may constitute new physics after all.