TY - JOUR
T1 - Inflationary schism
AU - Ijjas, Anna
AU - Steinhardt, Paul J.
AU - Loeb, Abraham
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank T. Baker, J.-L. Lehners, J. Pollack, D. Spergel, and C. Steinhardt for comments on the manuscript. This research was partially supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant number DE-FG02-91ER40671 (PJS), by NSF grant AST-0907890 and NASA grants NNX08AL43G and NNA09DBB30A (AL). The work of AI is supported in part by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation . The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the John Templeton Foundation (Grant 37433 ). AI thanks the Physics Department of Princeton University for hospitality while this research was completed.
PY - 2014/9/7
Y1 - 2014/9/7
N2 - Classic inflation, the theory described in textbooks, is based on the idea that, beginning from typical initial conditions and assuming a simple inflaton potential with a minimum of fine-tuning, inflation can create exponentially large volumes of space that are generically homogeneous, isotropic and flat, with nearly scale-invariant spectra of density and gravitational wave fluctuations that are adiabatic, Gaussian and have generic predictable properties. In a recent paper, we showed that, in addition to having certain conceptual problems known for decades, classic inflation is for the first time also disfavored by data, specifically the most recent data from WMAP, ACT and Planck2013. Guth, Kaiser and Nomura and Linde have each recently published critiques of our paper, but, as made clear here, we all agree about one thing: the problematic state of classic inflation. Instead, they describe an alternative inflationary paradigm that revises the assumptions and goals of inflation, and perhaps of science generally.
AB - Classic inflation, the theory described in textbooks, is based on the idea that, beginning from typical initial conditions and assuming a simple inflaton potential with a minimum of fine-tuning, inflation can create exponentially large volumes of space that are generically homogeneous, isotropic and flat, with nearly scale-invariant spectra of density and gravitational wave fluctuations that are adiabatic, Gaussian and have generic predictable properties. In a recent paper, we showed that, in addition to having certain conceptual problems known for decades, classic inflation is for the first time also disfavored by data, specifically the most recent data from WMAP, ACT and Planck2013. Guth, Kaiser and Nomura and Linde have each recently published critiques of our paper, but, as made clear here, we all agree about one thing: the problematic state of classic inflation. Instead, they describe an alternative inflationary paradigm that revises the assumptions and goals of inflation, and perhaps of science generally.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.physletb.2014.07.012
DO - 10.1016/j.physletb.2014.07.012
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84904480185
SN - 0370-2693
VL - 736
SP - 142
EP - 146
JO - Physics Letters, Section B: Nuclear, Elementary Particle and High-Energy Physics
JF - Physics Letters, Section B: Nuclear, Elementary Particle and High-Energy Physics
ER -