Quantum Gravity Submitted!

Today I did it! I submitted the manuscript “The Theory of Supramolecular Motion, the Primary Structure of Lignin and its Application in Adhesives” or the sneaky article on quantum gravity to Nature.

In some sense, I’ve been here before. A bit over two years ago I submitted my Theory of Everything -manuscript into Nature, but with feared result. I said in the post:

I’m still afraid that my case isn’t strong enough for the manuscript to be accepted for peer review. I can only hope that the editor sees the potential in the manuscript and accepts the general logic. Somehow, I feel that getting past the editor is even more tricky than getting though peer review.

And I was right. It was desk rejected. And I don't blame the paper. It was quite a weak paper, in retrospect.

However, things are very different this time around. While the old manuscript carried the seed of the manuscript I submitted today, the old manuscript was more of a collection of ideas than a well-thought and carried out whole, with hypotheses and experiments to evaluate them. Why I still think an elementary particle of energy exists, I don’t think it’s a concept that ready to be entertained until the theory of supramolecular motion has gained at least a bit of traction.

So, next I’ll have to suffer the agonizing wait to hear from the editor. I think the more I have to wait, the more probable it is that the manuscript will be accepted for peer review. Desk rejections can sometimes be brutally fast. If I were to place bets, I’d say there’s a better than a 50:50 chance that the manuscript will pass through the editor’s desk. And the reason for this is the fact that it doesn’t just talk about the theory of supramolecular motion, but also the primary structure of lignin, which is a much more tangible concept. In addition, in my cover letter I state that there have been over 9000 publications found by a Google scholar search “lignin nanoparticles” after our seminal paper “A simple process for lignin nanoparticle preparation”, with a huge number of them explicitly citing the paper. This anchors the theory to a new and rapidly growing field that deals with a promising material which is nevertheless poorly understood.

I might badly wrong, but actually now I think there’s not just over 50:50 chance that the manuscript will pass through the editor’s desk, but over a 50:50 chance that the manuscript will also be accepted after peer review. It still might require additional measurements and possibly some changes in the text or additional citations. And I believe all of this because the paper is now about lignin and not about spherical kaus. And I actually have some scientific credibility when it comes to lignin.

And as a comical ending here is an illustration of the even by ChatGPT. I couldn't get it to correct all of the mistakes, so here it is, warts and all: