Andrei Linde (who originated chaotic inflation theory) has been very critical of the cyclic model. He has a new paper which is a very interesting read. Although I originally thought he was being overly protective of his own theory, he makes some excellent points in this new paper.
He points out that the cyclic model has had to be revised a number of times already to fix problems that have been pointed by himself and others. He says that it has been changed to incorporate inflation, but that the model is still flawed. He offers a "fix" for the cyclic model and then basically dismisses it as a needless complication to the chaotic inflation model.
You can get a feel for what he thinks about the cyclic model from this quote in the paper.
Quote:
This paper is dedicated to Stephen Hawking celebrating his 60th birthday, and therefore I would like to finish it on a positive note. So here it is:
The ekpyrotic/cyclic scenario is the best alternative to inflation that I am aware of.
I really mean it. I think that we should be very grateful to its authors. Indeed, if a model speculating about an infinite number of inflationary stages separated by an infinite number of singularities is the best alternative to inflation invented during the last 20 years, this means that inflationary theory is in a very good shape.
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I would be very interested in any comments that any of you might have.
Inflationary Theory versus Ekpyrotic/Cyclic Scenario
<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: rsa on 2002-06-05 10:08 ]</font>