Nonlocality as an Explanation for Finetuning and Field replication in Nature

TL;DR

This paper proposes that nonlocal interactions in spacetime could explain the fine-tuning of physical constants, the existence of multiple phases, and the replication of particle generations, offering a new perspective on fundamental physics.

Contribution

It introduces a novel hypothesis that long-range nonlocal interactions underpin the values of physical constants and field replication, connecting these phenomena through a unified framework.

Findings

Nonlocal interactions can explain the fine-tuning of constants.

Multiple point values arise from fixed extensive quantities.

Nonlocal effects may account for three particle generations.

Abstract

Constants of Nature that have nongeneric values pose a riddle often referred to as the finetuning problem. The conspicuous values assumed by many physical constants (e.g., the vanishing effective cosmological constant, the smallness of the Higgs mass compared to the Planck scale, the finestructure constants, $\Theta_{QCD}$) seem to coincide with values that are obtained if one assumes that Nature in general seeks out multiple point values for intensive parameters. Multiple point values would occur in the presence of many coexisting phases. Such coexistence could be enforced by having fixed but not finetuned amounts of extensive quantities. We show that universally fixed amounts of extensive quantities is tantamount to having long range nonlocal interactions of a special type: these interactions are identical between fields at all pairs of spacetime points regardless of the spacetime distance between them. Such omnipresent nonlocal interactions, which can be described by a very general form of a reparameterization invariant action, would not be perceived as ``action at a distance'' but rather most likely incorporated into our theory as constants of Nature. Hence one can speculate that this mild form of nonlocality is the underlying explanation of Nature's affinity for the multiple point. We also speculate that nonlocal effects, described by fields depending on two spacetime points, may be responsible for the replication of the fields in three generations. Such a nonlocal mechanism would also triple the number of boson fields, as in the antigrand unification model. We briefly review the multiple point predictions for the three fine structure constants and the resolution of the quark-lepton mass hierarchy problem in this antigrand unified extension of the Standard Model.