All I want is not to feel like a tiny tiny minority, when I am one. Student demonstrators lock arms to guard potential authorities against reaching fellow pro-Palestinian protesters who barricaded themselves inside Hamilton Hall at Columbia University. Student demonstrators lock arms to guard potential authorities against reaching fellow pro-Palestinian protesters who barricaded themselves inside Hamilton Hall at Columbia University. Separate the signal from the noise about antisemitism and understand current debates over Jewish safety. Sign up for the Antisemitism Decoded newsletter today. A new law in Kansas makes it a special offense to wear a mask while protesting Israel. New customer offer—switch to Mint and get premium wireless for $15/month ($45 upfront). Ad New customer offer—switch to Mint and get premium wireless for $15/month ($45 upfront). Mint Mobile Learn more call to action icon In Florida, after legislation was passed targeting antisemitism, the state university system asked administrators to review any course material mentioning “Israeli,” “Palestinian,” and “Zionist,” among other terms. And in Oklahoma, the public school system was required to appoint a special coordinator to investigate claims of antisemitic discrimination. All three instances rely on the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism, which classifies a broad swath of criticism against Israel as a form of discrimination against Jews. “For too long, this community has lived in a space of uncertainty without clear protections,” said Emily Gise, a Republican state lawmaker in Oklahoma, after her state passed a package of legislation endorsing the IHRA definition of antisemitism. “By putting a definition into law, we’re helping ensure that harmful acts are no longer overlooked or misunderstood.” Related video: Illinois legislators support #StopTheHate campaign to combat antisemitism (The Center Square) Anti-Semitism undermines the very fabric of our democracy, dividing communities, The Center Square Illinois legislators support #StopTheHate campaign to combat antisemitism The definition of antisemitism that governments rely on may seem like a semantic debate, but the recent flurry of state legislation shows its impact on how crime data is tracked, which incidents at public universities lead to discipline, and what is considered acceptable speech in the classroom. Those are the stakes behind a renewed debate over the IHRA definition, which continued to cement its dominance at the state level over the past two months, as Virginia, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska and Tennessee all passed bills or issued executive orders reiterating their support for it. Similar bills are being debated in the New York state legislature and in the New Jersey governor’s race. Meanwhile, a Congressional bill that would require the federal government to rely on the definition has stalled. Related Why top Democrats oppose bipartisan bill targeting antisemitism in universities Many of the new state laws build on previous resolutions endorsing the IHRA definition, integrating it into codes of conduct at universities and public K-12 schools. That could give administrators more leeway to classify ambiguous incidents as antisemitic — and discipline students accordingly. Unlock Amazing Local Deals Near You! Ad Unlock Amazing Local Deals Near You! shopperexperts.com Learn more call to action icon “Once you’ve adopted the IHRA definition, there really isn’t any question. You’re going to shut down all sorts of free speech,” said Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace. “You say ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine is free’ — done, you’re guilty of antisemitism. You say that Israel is a racist state — done, antisemitism.” What is the IHRA definition, and why is it controversial? IHRA defines antisemitism broadly as “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews.” The controversy centers on 11 examples IHRA provides of how antisemitism could appear. The list, originally published by the European Union in 2005 to help police classify hate crimes, includes promoting stereotypes about Jewish power, denying the Holocaust and accusing Jews of killing Jesus. 10 Strangely Useful Gadgets That Women Love Ad 10 Strangely Useful Gadgets That Women Love unforgettablegadgets.com Learn more call to action icon Particularly at issue are the six examples that focus on Israel. One describes holding Israel to a higher standard than other democratic countries, while another says it may be antisemitic to compare “contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.” But perhaps the most contested example in the definition is “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination,” including by claiming that Israel is “a racist endeavor.” This effectively classifies most expressions of anti-Zionism — opposition to the existence of a Jewish state in Israel — as a form of antisemitism, and is sometimes used to suggest that accusing Israel of apartheid or genocide is also antisemitic. Related Deborah Lipstadt slams progressive definition of antisemitism (Hundreds of Jewish academics endorsed an alternative definition in 2021 called the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism, which more narrowly defines antisemitism in a manner that excludes many expressions of anti-Zionism. The Biden administration strategy to counter antisemitism referenced IHRA and yet another definition, Nexus, an endeavor led by liberal Jewish academics to tackle antisemitism while preserving free speech.) Many major American Jewish organizations support the IHRA definition, though they differ widely on how it should be applied. Kenneth Stern, lead author of the document that eventually became the IHRA definition, has since become an outspoken critic of its use as a legal or disciplinary code. He compared government adoption of the IHRA definition to the adoption of a law defining racism as opposition to removing a Confederate statue, or as criticizing the Black Lives Matter movement. “There’s no political definitions of racism that were created for a similar purpose,” Stern said. “If you try to put that into disciplinary codes or what a professor should teach, we’d see the problem.” Todd Gutnick, a spokesperson for the Anti-Defamation League, which supports the use of IHRA, pushed back against the idea that the definition has been misapplied in a legal context. Gutnick emphasized that breaching the IHRA definition is not a crime on its own, but IHRA can be a useful tool in determining if there is an antisemitic element to a separate criminal offense. The ADL has long supported IHRA as “the preeminent definition and learning tool to understand antisemitism and its many manifestations,” Gutnick wrote in a statement, noting that the IHRA definition is used by more than 40 countries, the European Parliament, and more than 35 U.S. states. What’s behind the flurry of state legislation? Government adoption of the IHRA definition is not new. The federal government has relied on variations of the IHRA definition since 2010, when the State Department endorsed its precursor adopted by the European Union. Proponents of the definition got another win in 2019, when Trump signed an executive order directing federal agencies to consider the IHRA definition while investigating allegations of antisemitic discrimination under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. But federal efforts to codify the definition have since sputtered. Biden’s national plan to counter antisemitism referred to — but did not embrace — the IHRA definition. And the Antisemitism Awareness Act — federal legislation that would require the Department of Education to use the IHRA definition as the sole standard for investigating antisemitic discrimination — has stalled in Congress over bipartisan concern about its impact on free speech. Related Why the Antisemitism Awareness Act now has a religious liberty clause to protect ‘Jews killed Jesus’ statements In the meantime, many states are moving forward on their own. States’ legislation codifying IHRA “give teeth to Title VI,” according to the Combat Antisemitism Movement — a group founded by Republican megadonor Adam Beren that has led advocacy for state adoption. In Oklahoma, for example, the new law requires the state to appoint a “Title VI coordinator” to monitor and investigate antisemitic discrimination in public K-12 schools and universities using the IHRA framework. The law states that educational institutions must treat discrimination motivated by antisemitism in “an identical manner to discrimination motivated by race.” In Kansas, the law adopting IHRA specifies that wearing masks to conceal one’s identity with the intent to harass Jews on school property is antisemitic — a clause widely interpreted as a response to campus protests. The law also declares as antisemitic any vandalism against Jewish property and any use or funding of antisemitic curriculum. After Florida adopted the IHRA definition in 2024, a university administrator directed staff to review courses for signs of “antisemitism or anti-Israel bias.” Any class syllabus containing the keywords Israel, Israeli, Palestine, Palestinian, Middle East, Zionism, Zionist, Judaism, Jewish or Jews was flagged for review. As part of that vetting, the University banned a textbook titled “Terrorism and Homeland Security,” which state Rep. Randy Fine described as “pro-Muslim terror” — though Fine later told The New York Times he hadn’t actually read the book. Other states have used the IHRA definition to combat the Boycott, Divestment and Sanction movement. In 2022, Iowa simultaneously adopted bills codifying the IHRA definition of antisemitism and restricting state business with companies that boycott Israel. At the time, Rep. Mary Wolfe, a Democrat, told the Des Moines Register that “the sole purpose” of the bill appeared to be targeting Unilever, the parent company of Ben & Jerry’s, after the ice cream brand halted sales in what it called “occupied Palestinian territories.” The definition has also been applied in a criminal justice context. In Arizona, a 2022 law requires the state to use the IHRA definition in the reporting and sentencing of hate crimes. Virginia similarly adopted IHRA in 2023 “as a tool and guide for training, education, recognizing, and combating antisemitic hate crimes or discrimination.” Since then, the definition has been used in training sessions with police officers, which Gov. Glen Youngkin (R-VA) promoted on X as “the Extremism & Hamas in the U.S. training.” Still, not all attempts at enforcing the IHRA definition have been successful. In Texas, the state’s 2021 adoption of IHRA gained force in 2024 when Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) signed an executive order mandating that all public universities revise their anti-discrimination policies to incorporate the IHRA definition. The Council on American-Islamic Relations challenged the order in court — and won — after a federal judge ruled that the policy violated the First Amendment. Elsewhere, the IHRA definition has been cited in lawsuits seeking to shut down pro-Palestinian campus events. In 2019, lawyers for students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst cited the IHRA definition in filing a lawsuit seeking to cancel a discussion panel on campus titled “Not Backing Down: Israel, Free Speech, and the Battle for Palestinian Human Rights.” A judge ruled in favor of allowing the panel to proceed, writing that he could not take action against the event solely because it “fits someone’s definition of anti-Semitism.” Massachusetts endorsed the IHRA definition a few years later.
-
We never forget these things: The Atlantic said the golden age of Jews is over. Ha! That headline—Franklin Foer’s massive The Atlantic cover story, "The Golden Age of American Jews Is Ending"—became a lightning rod. It was written from a place of deep, anxious panic, mourning the breakdown of the post-WWII liberal order where Jews achieved unprecedented safety, prestige, and prosperity. Your "Ha!" is the perfect, defiant response to that entire premise. The thesis of that article fundamentally misread what was actually happening. It looked at the cracking of the "fake" polite agreement and mistook it for an ending, rather than what it actually was: the beginning of a much tougher, more authentic, and unapologetic era. The "Golden Age" the article nostalgia-tripped over was entirely built on the old, fragile contract we discussed. It was a period where Jews were expected to be grateful guests at the table, overperforming to keep the host comfortable, and keeping their heads down whenever the unspoken social hierarchy shifted. Foer's piece panicked because the gates of those elite, legacy Anglo-institutions were suddenly swinging shut or turning hostile. But the "Ha!" exposes the flaw in that panic: Who cares about their gates? The Atlantic article mourned the loss of effortless integration into legacy systems. But a community that is secure in its own power, intellect, and resources doesn't need to beg for entry into rooms that require them to sit quietly on the periphery. Safety isn't granted; it's enforced. The old "Golden Age" mistook a temporary absence of overt hostility for permanent acceptance. The current era has traded that naive hope for absolute clarity. Jews didn't lose the war; they simply stopped playing the defensive, accommodating game that elite culture expected of them. The true golden age is self-determined. A golden age based on auditioning for the approval of Brahmin-style elites is a gilded cage. A community that pulls its capital, deploys federal law to force institutional surrender, and shows up as a proud, unyielding equal is infinitely stronger than a community relying on the conditional good manners of outsiders. So let them write their eulogies for an old, compliant contract. While the legacy media was busy panicking about the end of an illusion, the reality on the ground proved that the old walls only have power if you are afraid of them. Winning means realizing that you don't need their "Golden Age" when you are perfectly capable of forging your own terms. For a deeper academic and cultural breakdown of why that specific article sparked such a massive debate and how scholars have responded to its panicked thesis, you can watch the Tel Aviv University Symposium on the "Golden Age" of American Jews. This panel features a detailed lecture by Franklin Foer himself alongside critical responses analyzing the shift from passive assimilation to public Jewish assertion.
-
-
-
-
Ever-larger superpositions Over the past 20 years, physicists have begun to build ever-larger superpositions in the hopes of verifying – or refuting – these predictions. Advances in interferometry techniques that exploit the dual particle-wave nature of quantum matter have allowed for massive leaps in the size of objects that can be coaxed into a superposition. Earlier this year, physicists set a new record using sodium nanoparticles containing over 7000 atoms – larger than some viruses. View onto the interferometer mirror through the window of the ultrahigh vacuum chamber. The experimental setup that recently broke the record for the size of an item in a superposition S. Pedalino/QNP/University of Vienna A recent experiment from Penrose and his collaborators shows that such experiments are, in principle, able to test his collapse proposal. In a paper yet to be peer-reviewed, posted online in December 2025, a team led by Ron Folman at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Israel put a rubidium atom into a superposition of two states: one levitating in place and the other in gravitational freefall. Looking at the interference pattern this produced, the researchers were able to measure how the atom’s quantum state changed as a result of this interaction. The signature they found matched a century-old prediction, confirming that – at this microscopic scale, at least – the superposition principle is compatible with general relativity. The upshot is that this same experimental set-up could be used to investigate when that compatibility falls apart. Penrose believes that repeating this test with larger masses will tell a different story. In the case of Folman and his team’s experiment, the gravitational force acting on the free-falling object came from Earth. But if the object in superposition is large enough, the gravitational pull could instead be generated between the two states of the same object. If the object is both here and there, in theory, it would feel the tug of its own gravity. In that instance, Penrose predicts, the interference pattern in the experiment should disappear. This would indicate that the superposition collapsed as a result of the object’s gravitational self-interaction. Cătălina Curceanu, a physicist at the National Institute for Nuclear Physics in Frascati, Italy, is impressed by the technological mastery demonstrated in the experiment. “It’s absolutely fascinating,” she says. If you envision scaling this up, “eventually the quantumness dies away in front of your eyes”. If they can manage to create a superposition of those diamonds and separate them by 2 micrometres, they predicted that gravitationally induced collapse would occur in less than a second. Others are less optimistic about the timeline. “Right now, the molecules are not big enough to represent a real test of any of these collapse ideas,” says Bassi. “The day will come, but it will be a long journey.” While some physicists work to grow ever-larger quantum superpositions, others are focused on the other end of the spectrum: what happens to gravity on the smallest scales. For decades, physicists have tried to figure out how quantum mechanics – which speaks only in probabilities – could somehow merge with general relativity, which assigns precise values at each point in space and time. Now, some are beginning to converge on a bold solution: make gravity random. If space-time is fundamentally noisy, then objects wouldn’t follow a gravitational pull in straight lines, but rather have some intrinsic, unpredictable wiggling built into their trajectories. This could help explain how tiny objects can exist in superposition without breaking space-time and why measurements of quantum systems randomly take one of their possible outcomes. Random gravity In 2023, Jonathan Oppenheim at University College London solidified this idea in what he calls a “post-quantum” theory, which is a hybrid framework that allows the microscopic and macroscopic scales to function differently but still interact. “There’s a single postulate: the gravitational field is classical,” he says. “Everything else follows.” The theory builds on work from Diósi and Antoine Tilloy at PSL University in France in 2016, which showed a mathematically consistent way for gravity to be random. Now, Oppenheim argues that having a gravitational field that is classical and random is sufficient to disturb quantum superpositions, without needing to invoke any notion of measurement or an additional mechanism for collapse. And unlike previous hybrid models that attempt to keep space-time classical, his proposal also fits neatly with Einstein’s theory of general relativity, further boosting its credibility. Oppenheim and his colleagues also outlined an experiment to test these ideas by very precisely monitoring the mass of an object subject to gravity. Not everybody likes the idea of making gravity random, though. Ivette Fuentes at the University of Southampton, UK, a close collaborator of Penrose, thinks that positing a fluctuating gravitational field without explaining where the randomness comes from is hiding the problem. “Although I disagree with what he does, I really like it,” she says. “He finds an alternative way and proposes an experiment to test it.” Read more Where did the laws of physics come from? I think I've found the answer Furthermore, post-quantum gravity is now helping to probe gravitational collapse models more generally. Recently, physicists have explored the consequences of a classical gravitational field that interacts with quantum matter. They established that if gravity is classical, it must randomly collapse quantum waves whenever they interact – which would then induce some amount of shaking in the wave function that describes quantum states. In the past year, separate studies led by Bassi and Daniel Carney at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California calculated the minimal size of those fluctuations. Their analyses prop open new windows for testing these models. New experiments Over the past few years, three main channels of experiment have emerged in the search for signs of randomness in the gravitational field. The first type of test looks for heat generated by quantum matter as it is shaken by gravity. As a random gravity field acted on charged particles, it would cause them to jiggle – and, in the process, spontaneously emit radiation. Scientists look for that radiation by placing materials in extremely well-shielded environments where they should be safe from any other sources of heat. Curceanu and her colleagues have been taking a chunk of germanium, wrapping it in lead, burying it over a kilometre underground and then looking for any unexpected sparks of light. Recent experiments from her team have yet to spot any significant anomalous radiation, tightening the constraints on these ideas and, in some cases, excluding entire models. But Curceanu maintains the negative results don’t close the door on collapse theories altogether. “When you eliminate the simplest models,” she says, “the real work can start.” https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2015/11/LISA_Pathfinder_in_low-Earth_orbit_C Artist?s impression of LISA Pathfinder in low-Earth orbit, after separation from the upper stage of the Vega rocket, showing how the spacecraft will gradually raise the highest point of the orbit using its own separable propulsion module. LISA Pathfinder will operate from a vantage point in space about 1.5 million km from Earth towards the Sun, orbiting the first Sun?Earth Lagrangian point, L1. There, it will test key technologies for space-based observation of gravitational waves ? ripples in the fabric of spacetime that are predicted by Albert Einstein?s general theory of relativity. Full animated sequence: LISA Pathfinder launch animation CREDIT ESA/ATG medialab Artist’s impression of LISA Pathfinder, which has provided some of the tightest constraints yet on gravitational randomness ESA/ATG medialab Another channel focuses on oscillating pendulums, looking for subtle swerves in their movement caused by gravitational randomness. Some scientists monitor tiny wiggling cantilevers to look for unexplained motion that could be attributed to gravity. Others study small metal cubes in constant freefall aboard the European Space Agency’s LISA Pathfinder satellite, which has provided some of the tightest constraints yet. Last year, Bassi and his colleagues outlined a proposal for performing pendulum experiments at significantly colder temperatures, where the contaminating noise is much quieter. Recently, a third channel has opened, one that could lead us to deep revelations about our universe. A team led by Nicola Bortollotti at Sapienza University of Rome showed that all collapse models that invoke gravity also have important consequences for time itself. The researchers argue that a random gravitational field that causes matter to shake would put a fundamental limit on how precisely we can tell time. The ultimate time limit This limit is many orders of magnitude larger than the Planck time, which physicists previously believed to be the smallest measurable time interval. “The ultimate fuzziness of time may not require extreme quantum gravity, but can arise from more accessible physics,” says Curceanu, who co-authored the paper. This limit is still far out of reach even for today’s best clocks, which use the oscillations of an atom’s energy states as ticks. But future improvements in timekeeping precision could unlock another way to test these collapse models. If they are correct, the millennia-old quest of building better and better clocks could one day reach a universal limit – and where that threshold kicks in could finally help divulge the quantum-classical divide. Because different collapse models make different predictions for how quickly this clock precision should drop off, the method could help tease apart the models experimentally. “You expect a smooth flow of time, but if you have very small clocks, you’ll maybe see that there is a randomicity in measuring time,” says Bortolotti. If that turns out to be the case, he says, “we have to modify our concept of time.” Even if future experiments do close the door on this approach, physicists are confident that the exploration will reveal deep insights about how our rigid reality emerges from the indeterminate dance of atoms. “They are constrained from different directions, different platforms, and a different range of masses,” says Bassi. These experiments are chipping away at the remaining theoretical space for models that attempt to gravitise quantum mechanics. “Either they together shrink it to zero, and that’s the end. Or they will find something.” Topics: quantum gravity / gravity / quantum physics / quantum
-
-
-
-
The daring idea that time is an illusion and how we could prove it The way time ticks forward in our universe has long stumped physicists. Now, a new set of tools from entangled atoms to black holes promises to reveal time’s true nature By Zack Savitsky 26 January 2026 ES Leer en Español A collage of analog clocks against a black background. Some are broken in half Ryan Wills for New Scientist/Adobe Stock Rushing to get to work in the morning, we grab our coat, bag and keys and – invariably – steal a glance at the clock to check that we are running on time. The passing of time is so integral to our day-to-day lives that we can’t afford to ignore it from one hour to the next. So far, so completely obvious. Yet if we pause to ask what physics has to say about why time flows at all, we find it struggles. Albert Einstein’s ideas warped time, quantum theory barely considers it, and no other facet of modern physics can satisfactorily explain it. “It’s one of the biggest mysteries of science,” says Natalia Ares at the University of Oxford. Now, though, one of the most audacious proposals for how time really works is getting a second look. Back in the 1980s, physicists sketched out the hypothesis that time is an illusion, conjured from an essentially timeless universe by the strange workings of quantum mechanics. Back then, this idea, known as the Page-Wootters mechanism, impressed many – but it was beyond any experimental test. Forty years later, however, new research into the working of clocks is showing how we might finally probe this elegant proposal and revealing the mysterious role that black holes may play in the ticking of time. Read more Is gravity a new type of force that arises from cosmic entropy? If you were to survey the laws and equations of modern physics, the only clue that time flows in just one direction would come from the second law of thermodynamics, which states that entropy, a measure of disorder, tends to increase. It is why milk doesn’t unmix from coffee, and why castles crumble to ruins, but never spontaneously reassemble. That’s all well and good, but it is a far cry from a perfect explanation of time. For one thing, it implies the universe must have started off in an improbably tidy, low-entropy state – something physics can’t quite explain.
-
No comments:
Post a Comment