Quantum Gravity on the Computer: Impressions of a Workshop

Abstract

Computer simulations allow us to explore non-perturbative phenomena in physics. This has the potential to help us understand quantum gravity. Finding a theory of quantum gravity is a hard problem, but, in the last several decades, many promising and intriguing approaches that utilize or might benefit from using numerical methods were developed. These approaches are based on very different ideas and assumptions, yet they face the common challenge to derive predictions and compare them to data. In March 2018, we held a workshop at the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics (NORDITA) in Stockholm gathering experts in many different approaches to quantum gravity for a workshop on “Quantum gravity on the computer”. In this article, we try to encapsulate some of the discussions held and talks given during this workshop and combine them with our own thoughts on why and how numerical approaches will play an important role in pushing quantum gravity forward. The last section of the article is a road map providing an outlook of the field and some intentions and goalposts that were debated in the closing session of the workshop. We hope that it will help to build a strong numerical community reaching beyond single approaches to combine our efforts in the search for quantum gravity.