Why are researchers so intent on proving Einstein right or wrong? It’s not simply that he is a towering figure whose name is synonymous with genius, someone whose work has profoundly shaped physics for more than a century.
Instead, much of the incentive stems from gravity itself, which has been something of a problem child in the field. Physicists, including Einstein, have long hoped to devise a unified theory of the universe, but they’ve struggled to get gravity to mesh with the other fundamental forces. As a result, we currently have a theory of gravity (Einstein’s general relativity) and a separate theory of everything else (the “standard model” of particle physics). Unfortunately, these two extremely successful theories are incompatible with each other — and sometimes even contradictory.
This arrangement just won’t do for physicists, who believe there ought to be a single theory of nature that covers everything. Clues for achieving the long-sought unification may come from a better understanding of how — and under what circumstances — general relativity breaks down.
