On Connes' new principle of general relativity. Can spinors hear the forces of spacetime?

Abstract

Connes has extended Einstein's principle of general relativity to noncommutative geometry. The new principle implies that the Dirac operator is covariant with respect to Lorentz and internal gauge transformations and the Dirac operator must include Yukawa couplings. It further implies that the action for the metric, the gauge potentials and the Higgs scalar is coded in the spectrum of the covariant Dirac operator. This ``universal'' action has been computed by Chamseddine & Connes, it is the coupled Einstein-Hilbert and Yang-Mills-Higgs action. This result is rederived and we discuss the physical consequences.