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| image = Member photo 3033.png
| image = Member photo 3033.png
| alt = Alexander Unzicker
| alt = Alexander Unzicker
| birth_date = {{birth date|1965|00|00|mf=y}}
| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1965|3|13}}
| residence = Munich, AB, Germany
| birth_place = Munich, Germany
| residence = Munich, Germany
| nationality = German
| nationality = German
| known_for = [[Particle Physics]]
| fields = [[Physics]], [[Cosmology]], neuroscience
| alma_mater = Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich
| workplaces = Pestalozzi-Gymnasium, Munich
| known_for = [[Mach's principle]]; [[variable speed of light]]; critiques of modern theoretical physics; ''Bankrupting Physics''; ''The Higgs Fake''
}}
}}


(From his website at: http://alexander-unzicker.com)
'''Alexander Unzicker''' (born 13 March 1965) is a German physicist, teacher, and science author. He is best known for a series of popular books that critique modern theoretical physics — including ''[[Bankrupting Physics]]'', ''[[The Higgs Fake]]'' and ''[[Einstein's Lost Key]]'' — and for his YouTube channel "Unzicker's Real Physics" (also known as ''The Machian''). His own research is devoted to [[Mach's principle]] and to [[variable speed of light]] formulations of gravitation, and he argues that fundamental physics lost its way when it abandoned the questions posed by Mach, Einstein, Dirac, Sciama and Dicke.


Physics is my passion. To understand how galaxies, stars and planets have formed from coulds of primordial hydrogen, and to comprehend how billions of years of evolution have led to today's civilization, remains utterly fascinating for me.
==Biography==


Thus the search for the ultimate laws of nature in physis and cosmology continuously accompanies me. Pursuing these matters led me to hold physicists such as Einstein, Schrödinger and Dirac in high respect, because those founding fathers of modern physics have been researching in all fundamental fields, from cosmology to particle physics. Indeed, there are many unknown gems in their papers, while a lot of problems they have named remained unsolved to this day.
Unzicker was born in [[Munich]], Germany. From 1985 he studied physics and law at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, receiving a diploma in physics and a state examination in law in 1993. In 2000 he passed the state examination qualifying him to teach mathematics and physics at the secondary (high school) level, and in 2001 he was awarded a doctorate in the neurosciences at the university's Institute for Medical Psychology.


I my life, I have always tried to deepen my knowledge without narrowing it, and what I have learned in law, and neuroscience and as a teacher helps me to understand physics as a whole. In particular, dealing with the history, methodology and philosophy of science led me to scrutinize the current standard models of physics and to challenge their validity, and to point out some obvious aberrations. My book was given the “Science book of the year” award by the German science journal "Bild der Wissenschaft“ , and its English edition “Bankrupting Physics - How Today’s Top Scientists Gambled Away Their Credibility” was published by Palgrave Macmillan. Another very controversial book was "The Higgs Fake – How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee".
Alongside his writing, Unzicker has taught mathematics and physics at the Pestalozzi-Gymnasium in Munich. He is a son of the German chess grandmaster Wolfgang Unzicker, and himself played competitive club chess in Munich in the 1980s. Between 2013 and 2022 he published science-critical articles in the German magazine ''Telepolis'', and he writes essays on Medium and runs a question-and-answer format, "Frag Unzicker".


My biggest source of motivation are book about and by physicists of past times, such as Ernst Mach, Albert Einstein, Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg, Paul Dirac, Robert Dicke und Richard Feynman. Recently, I’ve been impressed by books of Nassim Taleb, Daniel Kahnemann, Nick Bostrom and Jean Ziegler.
He has stated that his combined background in law, neuroscience and classroom teaching informs a broad, historically minded approach to physics, and he has repeatedly urged younger physicists to read the primary literature of earlier decades, remarking that "the greatest pearls of physics are in articles from 50 years ago."


I am happy and grateful for the privilege to dedicate a significant part of my life to science. I think that freedom and peace, which can be found in this country more than elsewhere, cannot be taken for granted and require our care - and in this respect, particular attention is needed for the information that we get from the media.
==Scientific contributions==


I’d be happy if you follow my views about physics and other matters on twitter or facebook. Apart from physics, my recreational activities are hiking, jogging, playing chess and the piano, and having fun with my family. We all can just hope to contribute a little to the respect humankind may get from future civilizations.
===Mach's principle and a variable speed of light===
 
Unzicker's technical work centres on [[Mach's principle]] — Ernst Mach's proposal that local inertia is not an intrinsic property of a body but is determined by the large-scale distribution of matter in the universe. Building on Dennis Sciama's 1953 inertial-induction hypothesis and Robert Dicke's 1957 flat-space, variable-refractive-index representation of gravitation, Unzicker argues that general relativity can be re-expressed as a theory in which the [[speed of light]] varies with the gravitational potential rather than as a theory of curved spacetime. In ''Mach's Principle and a Variable Speed of Light'' (arXiv:gr-qc/0511038) he shows that such a variable-speed-of-light (VSL) description reproduces the four classical tests of general relativity, while opening the possibility that the gravitational constant itself is a derived, cosmologically determined quantity rather than a fundamental constant.
 
In ''A Machian Version of Einstein's Variable Speed of Light Theory'' (arXiv:1503.06763, with Jan Preuss) he returns to Einstein's own 1911 papers, in which Einstein treated gravitation as a spatially varying ''c'' before adopting the metric formalism. Using Green's functions, the authors put Einstein's 1911 idea into closed analytic form and derive a relation between curvature and the local speed of light, yielding a Machian reading of general relativity. This programme is the subject of his popular book ''Einstein's Lost Key'', whose thesis is that the 1911 variable-speed-of-light approach was the more physical of Einstein's two routes and was abandoned prematurely.
 
He has also examined the historical alternatives directly, in ''A Look at the Abandoned Contributions to Cosmology of Dirac, Sciama and Dicke'' (arXiv:0708.3518), which revisits Dirac's large-number hypothesis and the Sciama and Dicke proposals, and in ''The VSL Discussion: What Does Variable Speed of Light Mean'' (arXiv:0708.2927), which clarifies what is and is not empirically meaningful in VSL claims.
 
===Critique of gravitation and observational tests===
 
Unzicker has questioned how thoroughly Newtonian gravity has actually been tested, in ''Why do we Still Believe in Newton's Law? Facts, Myths and Methods in Gravitational Physics'' (arXiv:gr-qc/0702009), and has proposed and carried out simple empirical checks: a solar-system test of Mach's principle using gravimetric data (arXiv:gr-qc/0610028), an approach to verifying the Pioneer anomaly (arXiv:gr-qc/0702151), and angular-size and galaxy-distribution tests using Sloan Digital Sky Survey data (arXiv:1011.4956, arXiv:0806.1506). Earlier work applied continuum mechanics and teleparallel geometry to field theory, including ''Teleparallel Space-Time with Defects yields Geometrization of Electrodynamics'' (arXiv:gr-qc/9612061) and a translation of Einstein's teleparallel unified-field-theory attempt (arXiv:physics/0503046).
 
===Critique of particle physics and string theory===
 
Unzicker is a sharp critic of the [[standard model]] of particle physics, of string theory, of supersymmetry and of cosmic inflation, which he regards as untestable, over-parameterised and insufficiently constrained by observation. He satirised the supersymmetry programme in ''Immanuel Kant on Supersymmetry: A Practical Evaluation'' (arXiv:1003.2967) and analysed the statistical basis of Higgs detection claims in ''How to Determine the Probability of the Higgs Boson Detection'' (arXiv:0912.0443). These arguments are developed at book length in ''The Higgs Fake: How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee'', a critique of the Large Hadron Collider programme at CERN and of the theoretical model underpinning it.
 
His broader position, set out in ''The Mathematical Reality'', is that a fundamental theory should ultimately explain — and thereby eliminate — the dimensionless constants of nature, rather than accumulate free parameters. He is accordingly a critic of what he sees as an over-mathematised physics detached from measurement, and an advocate for physics as a natural science in the empirical tradition.
 
==CNPS talks==
 
He has presented in the CNPS online seminar series:
* [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uo5MAhLpNu4 "Author Dr. Alexander Unzicker: Conversations on Fundamental Physics"] (23 January 2021) — a wide-ranging discussion of science journalism in the internet era, critical thinking, the state of particle physics, and the challenges facing the dissident science community.


==Books==
==Books==


* 2016 - "[[Einstein's Lost Keys]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Einsteins-Lost-Key-Overlooked-Century/dp/1519473435/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1468365012 Read in full])
* 2020 - ''The Mathematical Reality: Why Space and Time Are an Illusion''
* 2013 - "[[Bankrupting Physics]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Bankrupting-Physics-Scientists-Gambling-Credibility/dp/1137278234 Read in full])
* 2015 - "[[Einstein's Lost Key]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Einsteins-Lost-Key-Overlooked-Century/dp/1519473435/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1468365012 Read in full]) — published as ''Einstein's Lost Key: How We Overlooked the Best Idea of the 20th Century'' (first edition 2015; revised edition 2022)
* 2013 - "[[The Higgs Fake]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Higgs-Fake-Particle-Physicists-Committee/dp/1492176249?ie=UTF8&ref_=asap_bc Read in full])
* 2013 - "[[Bankrupting Physics]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Bankrupting-Physics-Scientists-Gambling-Credibility/dp/1137278234 Read in full]) — ''Bankrupting Physics: How Today's Top Scientists are Gambling Away Their Credibility'', Palgrave Macmillan
* 2013 - "[[The Higgs Fake]]" ([https://www.amazon.com/Higgs-Fake-Particle-Physicists-Committee/dp/1492176249?ie=UTF8&ref_=asap_bc Read in full]) — ''The Higgs Fake: How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee''
* 2012 - ''Auf dem Holzweg durchs Universum'' (German)
* 2010 - ''Vom Urknall zum Durchknall'' (German; English edition: ''Bankrupting Physics'')
 
He is also the author of ''Make Physics Great Again'', a historical account of the differing scientific traditions of Europe and America.
 
His German-language book ''Vom Urknall zum Durchknall'' (2010), published in English as ''Bankrupting Physics: How Today's Top Scientists are Gambling Away Their Credibility'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), was named "most controversial science book of the year" by the German science magazine ''Bild der Wissenschaft''.
 
==Selected papers==
 
* ''A Machian Version of Einstein's Variable Speed of Light Theory'' (with J. Preuss), [https://arxiv.org/abs/1503.06763 arXiv:1503.06763] (2015)
* ''Do Galaxies Change in Size? An Angular Size Test at Low Redshift with SDSS Data'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/1011.4956 arXiv:1011.4956] (2010)
* ''Immanuel Kant on Supersymmetry: A Practical Evaluation'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/1003.2967 arXiv:1003.2967] (2010)
* ''How to Determine the Probability of the Higgs Boson Detection'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/0912.0443 arXiv:0912.0443] (2009)
* ''A Quick Verification of the 2-D Galaxy Distribution with SDSS Data'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/0806.1506 arXiv:0806.1506] (2008)
* ''A Look at the Abandoned Contributions to Cosmology of Dirac, Sciama and Dicke'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/0708.3518 arXiv:0708.3518] (2007)
* ''The VSL Discussion: What Does Variable Speed of Light Mean'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/0708.2927 arXiv:0708.2927] (2007)
* ''A Quick and Dirty Approach to Verify the Pioneer Anomaly'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0702151 arXiv:gr-qc/0702151] (2007)
* ''Why do we Still Believe in Newton's Law? Facts, Myths and Methods in Gravitational Physics'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0702009 arXiv:gr-qc/0702009] (2007)
* ''A Solar System Test of Mach's Principle with Gravimetric Data'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0610028 arXiv:gr-qc/0610028] (2006)
* ''Mach's Principle and a Variable Speed of Light'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0511038 arXiv:gr-qc/0511038] (2005)
* ''Translation of Einstein's Attempt of a Unified Field Theory with Teleparallelism'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0503046 arXiv:physics/0503046] (2005)
* ''Galaxies as Rotating Buckets'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0308087 arXiv:gr-qc/0308087] (2003)
* ''What can Physics learn from Continuum Mechanics?'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0011064 arXiv:gr-qc/0011064] (2000)
* ''Teleparallel Space-Time with Defects yields Geometrization of Electrodynamics'', [https://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/9612061 arXiv:gr-qc/9612061] (1996)
 
==Honors==
 
* "Science book of the year" recognition from the German science magazine ''Bild der Wissenschaft'' for ''Vom Urknall zum Durchknall'' (English edition: ''Bankrupting Physics'').
 
==External links==
 
* [http://alexander-unzicker.com Official website]
* [https://alexander-unzicker.de/ alexander-unzicker.de] — personal site, including his page on Mach's principle
* [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2r6quRlj_KdT7QBPjB3GsA Unzicker's Real Physics] on YouTube
* [https://arxiv.org/a/unzicker_a_1 Alexander Unzicker] on arXiv
* [https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Unzicker Alexander Unzicker] on the German Wikipedia


[[Category:Scientist|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Scientist|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Philosophy|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Philosophy|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Particle Physics|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Particle Physics|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Relativity|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Cosmology|Unzicker Alexander]]
[[Category:Worldwide List of Dissident Scientists]]
[[Category:Mach's Principle]]
[[Category:Light]]

Latest revision as of 21:02, 20 July 2026

Alexander Unzicker
Alexander Unzicker
Born (1965-03-13) March 13, 1965 (age 61)
Munich, Germany
ResidenceMunich, Germany
NationalityGerman
Alma materLudwig Maximilian University of Munich
Known forMach's principle; variable speed of light; critiques of modern theoretical physics; Bankrupting Physics; The Higgs Fake
Scientific career
FieldsPhysics, Cosmology, neuroscience
InstitutionsPestalozzi-Gymnasium, Munich

Alexander Unzicker (born 13 March 1965) is a German physicist, teacher, and science author. He is best known for a series of popular books that critique modern theoretical physics — including Bankrupting Physics, The Higgs Fake and Einstein's Lost Key — and for his YouTube channel "Unzicker's Real Physics" (also known as The Machian). His own research is devoted to Mach's principle and to variable speed of light formulations of gravitation, and he argues that fundamental physics lost its way when it abandoned the questions posed by Mach, Einstein, Dirac, Sciama and Dicke.

Biography

Unzicker was born in Munich, Germany. From 1985 he studied physics and law at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, receiving a diploma in physics and a state examination in law in 1993. In 2000 he passed the state examination qualifying him to teach mathematics and physics at the secondary (high school) level, and in 2001 he was awarded a doctorate in the neurosciences at the university's Institute for Medical Psychology.

Alongside his writing, Unzicker has taught mathematics and physics at the Pestalozzi-Gymnasium in Munich. He is a son of the German chess grandmaster Wolfgang Unzicker, and himself played competitive club chess in Munich in the 1980s. Between 2013 and 2022 he published science-critical articles in the German magazine Telepolis, and he writes essays on Medium and runs a question-and-answer format, "Frag Unzicker".

He has stated that his combined background in law, neuroscience and classroom teaching informs a broad, historically minded approach to physics, and he has repeatedly urged younger physicists to read the primary literature of earlier decades, remarking that "the greatest pearls of physics are in articles from 50 years ago."

Scientific contributions

Mach's principle and a variable speed of light

Unzicker's technical work centres on Mach's principle — Ernst Mach's proposal that local inertia is not an intrinsic property of a body but is determined by the large-scale distribution of matter in the universe. Building on Dennis Sciama's 1953 inertial-induction hypothesis and Robert Dicke's 1957 flat-space, variable-refractive-index representation of gravitation, Unzicker argues that general relativity can be re-expressed as a theory in which the speed of light varies with the gravitational potential rather than as a theory of curved spacetime. In Mach's Principle and a Variable Speed of Light (arXiv:gr-qc/0511038) he shows that such a variable-speed-of-light (VSL) description reproduces the four classical tests of general relativity, while opening the possibility that the gravitational constant itself is a derived, cosmologically determined quantity rather than a fundamental constant.

In A Machian Version of Einstein's Variable Speed of Light Theory (arXiv:1503.06763, with Jan Preuss) he returns to Einstein's own 1911 papers, in which Einstein treated gravitation as a spatially varying c before adopting the metric formalism. Using Green's functions, the authors put Einstein's 1911 idea into closed analytic form and derive a relation between curvature and the local speed of light, yielding a Machian reading of general relativity. This programme is the subject of his popular book Einstein's Lost Key, whose thesis is that the 1911 variable-speed-of-light approach was the more physical of Einstein's two routes and was abandoned prematurely.

He has also examined the historical alternatives directly, in A Look at the Abandoned Contributions to Cosmology of Dirac, Sciama and Dicke (arXiv:0708.3518), which revisits Dirac's large-number hypothesis and the Sciama and Dicke proposals, and in The VSL Discussion: What Does Variable Speed of Light Mean (arXiv:0708.2927), which clarifies what is and is not empirically meaningful in VSL claims.

Critique of gravitation and observational tests

Unzicker has questioned how thoroughly Newtonian gravity has actually been tested, in Why do we Still Believe in Newton's Law? Facts, Myths and Methods in Gravitational Physics (arXiv:gr-qc/0702009), and has proposed and carried out simple empirical checks: a solar-system test of Mach's principle using gravimetric data (arXiv:gr-qc/0610028), an approach to verifying the Pioneer anomaly (arXiv:gr-qc/0702151), and angular-size and galaxy-distribution tests using Sloan Digital Sky Survey data (arXiv:1011.4956, arXiv:0806.1506). Earlier work applied continuum mechanics and teleparallel geometry to field theory, including Teleparallel Space-Time with Defects yields Geometrization of Electrodynamics (arXiv:gr-qc/9612061) and a translation of Einstein's teleparallel unified-field-theory attempt (arXiv:physics/0503046).

Critique of particle physics and string theory

Unzicker is a sharp critic of the standard model of particle physics, of string theory, of supersymmetry and of cosmic inflation, which he regards as untestable, over-parameterised and insufficiently constrained by observation. He satirised the supersymmetry programme in Immanuel Kant on Supersymmetry: A Practical Evaluation (arXiv:1003.2967) and analysed the statistical basis of Higgs detection claims in How to Determine the Probability of the Higgs Boson Detection (arXiv:0912.0443). These arguments are developed at book length in The Higgs Fake: How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee, a critique of the Large Hadron Collider programme at CERN and of the theoretical model underpinning it.

His broader position, set out in The Mathematical Reality, is that a fundamental theory should ultimately explain — and thereby eliminate — the dimensionless constants of nature, rather than accumulate free parameters. He is accordingly a critic of what he sees as an over-mathematised physics detached from measurement, and an advocate for physics as a natural science in the empirical tradition.

CNPS talks

He has presented in the CNPS online seminar series:

Books

  • 2020 - The Mathematical Reality: Why Space and Time Are an Illusion
  • 2015 - "Einstein's Lost Key" (Read in full) — published as Einstein's Lost Key: How We Overlooked the Best Idea of the 20th Century (first edition 2015; revised edition 2022)
  • 2013 - "Bankrupting Physics" (Read in full) — Bankrupting Physics: How Today's Top Scientists are Gambling Away Their Credibility, Palgrave Macmillan
  • 2013 - "The Higgs Fake" (Read in full) — The Higgs Fake: How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee
  • 2012 - Auf dem Holzweg durchs Universum (German)
  • 2010 - Vom Urknall zum Durchknall (German; English edition: Bankrupting Physics)

He is also the author of Make Physics Great Again, a historical account of the differing scientific traditions of Europe and America.

His German-language book Vom Urknall zum Durchknall (2010), published in English as Bankrupting Physics: How Today's Top Scientists are Gambling Away Their Credibility (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), was named "most controversial science book of the year" by the German science magazine Bild der Wissenschaft.

Selected papers

  • A Machian Version of Einstein's Variable Speed of Light Theory (with J. Preuss), arXiv:1503.06763 (2015)
  • Do Galaxies Change in Size? An Angular Size Test at Low Redshift with SDSS Data, arXiv:1011.4956 (2010)
  • Immanuel Kant on Supersymmetry: A Practical Evaluation, arXiv:1003.2967 (2010)
  • How to Determine the Probability of the Higgs Boson Detection, arXiv:0912.0443 (2009)
  • A Quick Verification of the 2-D Galaxy Distribution with SDSS Data, arXiv:0806.1506 (2008)
  • A Look at the Abandoned Contributions to Cosmology of Dirac, Sciama and Dicke, arXiv:0708.3518 (2007)
  • The VSL Discussion: What Does Variable Speed of Light Mean, arXiv:0708.2927 (2007)
  • A Quick and Dirty Approach to Verify the Pioneer Anomaly, arXiv:gr-qc/0702151 (2007)
  • Why do we Still Believe in Newton's Law? Facts, Myths and Methods in Gravitational Physics, arXiv:gr-qc/0702009 (2007)
  • A Solar System Test of Mach's Principle with Gravimetric Data, arXiv:gr-qc/0610028 (2006)
  • Mach's Principle and a Variable Speed of Light, arXiv:gr-qc/0511038 (2005)
  • Translation of Einstein's Attempt of a Unified Field Theory with Teleparallelism, arXiv:physics/0503046 (2005)
  • Galaxies as Rotating Buckets, arXiv:gr-qc/0308087 (2003)
  • What can Physics learn from Continuum Mechanics?, arXiv:gr-qc/0011064 (2000)
  • Teleparallel Space-Time with Defects yields Geometrization of Electrodynamics, arXiv:gr-qc/9612061 (1996)

Honors

  • "Science book of the year" recognition from the German science magazine Bild der Wissenschaft for Vom Urknall zum Durchknall (English edition: Bankrupting Physics).

External links

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