So, what is the deal with virtual particles? I am a particle physicist by training but I was curious as to what are the available answers on the web regarding these particles so I spent quite some time in searching online. I want to give you a heads up that the views I will be describing here are going to be quite different from what other particle physicist say about these particles.
If you have been following my blog, you might have noticed that I am a big fan of Lorentz violation. I believe that particle physicists are too biased when it comes to Lorentz symmetry and they ignore to even say the term Lorentz violation when it is apparently present in some cases, like CPT violation.
So you might have guessed by now. I think that Lorentz violation has something to do with virtual particles. Real particles obey the "on-shell" equation, i.e.,
or
This equation is not obeyed by a virtual particle, i.e., 
. In other words, these particles do not obey the dispersion relation of a relativistic particle. So it appears that these particles might be described by Lorentz violating operators. Its weird that particle physicists, whenever they come across things like these they devise these fancy names as a cover for their biasness. Moreover, they try their best to come up with explanations that sound very convincing but in reality are not.
. In other words, these particles do not obey the dispersion relation of a relativistic particle. So it appears that these particles might be described by Lorentz violating operators. Its weird that particle physicists, whenever they come across things like these they devise these fancy names as a cover for their biasness. Moreover, they try their best to come up with explanations that sound very convincing but in reality are not.
Let me give you an example, the Higgs field is a tachyonic field, which means that it is described by an equation that allows for faster than light travel speeds. When asked about this they say that it is not a physical field while the Higgs boson which is a fluctuation of the Higgs field is the physical particle. Oh, so the Higgs boson is a fluctuation in a non-physical field, great! As I said, I am a particle physicist and I dont find these explanations convincing. I have an alternate way of viewing this concept and that has to do with Lorentz violation.
It is usually said that virtual particles are allowed to exist for a short interval given by the uncertainty principle. This indicates that Lorentz violation might be allowed in the Universe for time scales given by the uncertainty principle! My claim is not based on whim because I have shown in one of my published papers that certain Lorentz violating operators are enhanced in condensed matter physics. This also indicates that we might be missing something in particle physics.
We should be open to the possibility of enhancement of Lorentz violation in particle physics as well. I am not saying that this is a correct claim, what I am saying is that how would we know that Lorentz violation is not possible if we havent even checked the implications of its presence in particle physics!
[1] See video on Virual Particles in the particle physics course on coursera
https://www.coursera.org/learn/particle-physics/lecture/zvi2t/1-2c-virtual-particles-optional
