Given the very restrictive no-go results that surround the theory of higher spin interactions—to be reviewed in Chapter2—one may very well question the meaningfulness of pursuing the subject at all. The common view is to see the no-go results as something positive—almost as a prediction of general quantum field theory—that delimit the spin spectrum that one needs to consider regarding fundamental theory. This has been the mainstream view since the supergravity days in the late 1970s, although the experimentally verified spin spectrum of fundamental fields conspicuously does not contain spin 3/2.
For those who anyway have chosen to pursue the subject, one may be curious as to their motivations. In an answer to that, one could then argue that it is an interesting problem ofmathematical physics that need not have anything to do with reality. However, given thattheoretical physics is ultimately about understanding fundamental physics as it presents itself to us through observation and experimentation, the hope would be that there is some role for higher spin gauge fields to play in nature.
Let me begin by stating my own point of view regarding these questions. I do think that higher spin gauge field theory constitutes a very interesting and challenging area of mathematical physics. But I also sincerely hope that the theory has some role t
