LAUSR

We review some recent works by Carone, Erlich and Vaman on composite gravitons in metric-independent quantum field theories, with the aim of clarifying a number of basic issues. Focusing on a theory of scalar fields presented previously in the literature, we clarify the meaning of the tunings required to obtain a massless graviton. We argue that this formulation can be interpreted as the massless limit of a theory of massive composite gravitons in which the graviton mass term is not of Pauli–Fierz form. We then suggest closely related theories that can be defined without such a limiting procedure (and hence without worry about possible ghosts). Finally, we comment on the importance of finding a compelling ultraviolet completion for models of this type, and discuss some possibilities.