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What about the other forces of the standard model? How do their intrinsic strengths vary with distance? In 1973, Gross and Frank
Wilczek at Princeton, and, independently, David Politzer at Harvard, studied this question and found a surprising answer: The
quantum cloud of particle eruptions and annihilations amplifies the strengths of the strong and weak forces. This implies that as we
examine them on shorter distances, we penetrate more of this seething cloud and hence are subject to less of its amplification. And
so, the strengths of these forces get weaker when they are probed on shorter distances.

Georgi, Quinn, and Weinberg took this realization and ran with it to a
remarkable end. They showed that when these effects of the quantum
frenzy are carefully accounted for, the net result is that the strengths of
all three nongravitational forces are driven together. Whereas the
strengths of these forces are very different on scales accessible to current
technology, Georgi, Quinn, and Weinberg argued that this difference is
actually due to the different effect that the haze of microscopic quantum
activity has on each force. Their calculations showed that if this haze is
penetrated by examining the forces not on everyday scales but as they
act on distances of about a hundredth of a billionth of a billionth of a
billionth(10-29) of a centimeter (a mere factor of ten thousand larger than
the Planck length), the three nongravitational force strengths appear to
become equal.

Although far removed from the realm of common experience, the high
energy necessary to be sensitive to such small distances was
characteristic of the roiling, hot early universe when it was about a Figure 7.1 The strengths of the three
thousandth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth (10-39) of a second nongravitational forces as they operate on ever
old—when its temperature was on the order of 1028 Kelvin mentioned shorter distance scales—equivalently, as they act on
earlier. In somewhat the same way that a collection of disparate ever higher energy processes.
ingredients—pieces of metal, wood, rocks, minerals, and so on—all melt
together and become a uniform, homogeneous plasma when heated to sufficiently
high temperature, these theoretical works suggested that the strong, weak, and
electromagnetic forces all merge into one grand force at such immense
temperatures. This is shown schematically in Figure 7.1.54

Although we do not have the technology to probe such minute distance scales or
to produce such scorching temperatures, since 1974 experimentalists have
significantly refined the measured strengths of the three nongravitational forces
under everyday conditions. These data—the starting points for the three force-
strength curves in Figure 7.1—are the input data for the quantum-mechanical
extrapolations of Georgi, Quinn, and Weinberg. In 199 1, Ugo Amaldi of CERN,
Wim de Boer and Hermann Fürstenau of the University of Karlsruhe, Germany,
recalculated the Georgi, Quinn, and Weinberg extrapolations making use of these
experimental refinements and showed two significant things. First, the strengths
of the three nongravitational forces almost agree, but not quite at tiny distance
scales (equivalently, high energy/high temperature) as shown in Figure 7.2.
Second, this tiny but undeniable discrepancy in their strengths vanishes if
supersymmetry is incorporated. The reason is that the new superpartner particles
required by supersymmetry contribute additional quantum fluctuations, and these
fluctuations are just right to nudge the strengths of the forces to converge with one Figure 7.2 A refinement of the calculation
another. of force strengths reveals that without
supersymmetry they almost, but not quite,
To many physicists, it is extremely difficult to believe that nature would choose meet.
the forces so that they almost, but not quite, have strengths that microscopically
unify—microscopically become equal. It's like putting together a jigsaw puzzle in which the final piece is slightly misshapen and
won't cleanly fit into its appointed position. Supersymmetry deftly refines its shape so that all pieces firmly lock into place.

54
One subtle point to note about Figure 7.1 is that the strength of the weak force is shown to be between that of the strong and electromagnetic forces, whereas we have previously said
that it is weaker than both. The reason for this lies in Table 1.2, in which we see that the messenger particles of the weak force are quite massive, whereas those of the strong and
electromagnetic forces are massless. Intrinsically, the strength of the weak force (as measured by its coupling constant—an idea we will come upon in Chapter 12) is as shown in Figure
7.1, but its massive messenger particles are sluggish conveyers of its influence and diminish its effects. In Chapter 14 we will see how the gravitational force fits into Figure 7.1.