Encourage and support rigorous, innovative, and influential thinking about foundational questions in physics and cosmology;

Identify and reward top thinkers in foundational questions; and,

Provide an arena for discussion and exchange of ideas regarding foundational questions.

Relevant: Essays should be topical and foundational.

• Topical: The theme for this Essay Contest is: "What is Ultimately Possible in Physics?" Essays in this competition will explore the limits of physics and the physics of limits. Appropriate topics are those such as, but not limited to:

  • What are the limits of physics' explanatory and predictive power? What does this tell us about the world?

  • What technologies are fundamentally forbidden, or may ultimately be allowed, by physics?

  • What role do 'impossibility' principles or other limits (e.g., sub-lightspeed signaling, Heisenberg uncertainty, cosmic censorship, the second law of thermodynamics, the holographic principle, computational limits, etc.) play in foundational physics and cosmology?

  • (Note: While this topic is broad, successful essays will not use this breadth as an excuse to shoehorn in the author's pet topic, but will rather keep as their central focus the theme of the ultimately possible or fundamentally impossible.)

  • Additionally, to be consonant with FQXi's scope and goals, essays should be primarily concerned with physics (mainly quantum physics, high energy 'fundamental' physics, and gravity), cosmology (mainly of the early universe), or closely related fields (such as astrophysics, astrobiology, biophysics, mathematics, complexity and emergence, and philosophy of physics), insofar as they bear directly on questions in physics or cosmology.

• Foundational: This contest is limited to works addressing, in one of its many facets, our understanding of the deep or "ultimate" nature of reality.

Interesting: Each reader has their own view of what constitutes an interesting essay. However, most would agree that an interesting essay is:

• Original and Creative: Foremost, the intellectual content of the essay must push forward understanding of the topic in a fresh way or with new perspective. While the essay may or may not constitute original research, if the core ideas are largely contained in published works, those works should be the author's. At the same time, the entry should differ substantially from any previously published piece by the author.

• Technically correct and rigorously argued, to the degree of a published work of research or grant proposal.

• Well and clearly written, so that it is comprehensible and enjoyable to read.

• Accessible to a diverse, highly-educated but non-specialist audience, aiming in the range between the level of Scientific American and a review article in Science or Nature.

ENTRY

• Submission: essays and accompanying material must be submitted online using the webform between the dates of May 15, 2009, and October 2, 2009 (until 11:59PM Eastern Time). Applicants will provide accurate contact information, an abstract, a brief biographical statement, and their essay. Immediately after an essay Application is submitted, the applicant will receive an application confirmation email containing this information at their specified email address. This confirmation does not mean your essay has been accepted into the Contest. All essays will be reviewed for rule compliance (see "Publication" below) and those that are eligible will be posted online within one week.
  
  Please note: you will be required to register an email address with FQXi and set up an account to enter the Essay Contest. This information is available here.

• Acceptability: essays must satisfy minimal criteria of quality, relevance and propriety, as determined by the sole discretion of FQXi. (The great majority of entries will satisfy this criterion.)

• Format & length: essays must be submitted as PDF documents. Eligible essays must follow these guidelines:

  • The essay may not exceed 27,500 characters (not including spaces). To ensure your submission fits the character count, you can use our online character counter.

  • The length must not exceed 10 pages, including figures and equations. References can be submitted in addition to the 10 pages, but may total no more than 11 pages. No essay text, figures, notations, or equations can be included on this Reference page.

  • Color figures as well as hyperlinks within the document are acceptable.

  • Although FQXi will accept works from anyone anywhere, the essay must be submitted in English.

• Publication: After submission and review for rule compliance, each essay will be posted (within one week) in the FQXi Community Forum, under the category 'Essay Contest: What is Ultimately Possible in Physics,' here. Additionally, each Author name and bio will also be published there. Thereafter, the author and interested readers (including FQXi Members, other contest entrants, and the general public) are invited to discuss and comment on the essay. (Although commenters will be rating the essays, the goal of the forum is to discuss the essays and the ideas they raise; thus commenters are strongly encouraged to cultivate a supportive atmosphere of scientific conversation rather than a judgmental atmosphere of critical scoring and evaluation.)

JUDGING

• Community evaluation: Every FQXi Member and approved Essay Contest entrant will be provided with a code allowing them to rate essays as a 'Community evaluator.' A rating code will be provided to each entrant in the confirmation email. If an essay is considered ineligible in the Contest, the rating code will not be active. Community ratings can be submitted until 11:59 pm Eastern Time, November 6, 2009.

• Finalists: A set of finalists will be determined once voting closes, including the essays with the top 30 Community ratings satisfying a minimum number of ratings. FQXi may also select up to 10 additional finalists based on other criteria (e.g., Public ratings, statistical measures of Community ratings other than the mean, etc.)

• Expert Judges: A panel of the applicants' peers, chosen by FQXi, will be asked to carefully review, deliberate upon, and rate the finalists, based on the criteria specified under 'Evaluation Criteria' in this document. The ratings of these judges will carry an enhanced weight, so that each judge can play a disproportionate but minor role in the overall rating, but the panel acting in concert can play a large but not absolute role.

• This expert panel of judges will be confidential; their names will not be released, though they are free to post online comments just as any Community or Public evaluator.

• Final Ranking: The final ranking that determines prizes will be determined by Community rating (including weighted ratings from the Judges), rounded to one decimal (i.e., 1.0-10.0).

• Special Commendation: The Judges will also be empowered (but not required) to award up to three special commendation prizes, chosen from the full list of entrants, according to criteria of their own discretion.

• Public evaluation: Members of the public will also be allowed to rate essays. Ratings from the public will be accepted until the final decisions have been made regarding the Contest Winners (date TBD). As noted above, Public and Community ratings (and number of ratings) will be displayed until a week before the voting closes; thereafter an average of the two will be displayed. After the Winners have been announced, we will show the final Community and Public ratings separately.

• Public evaluators will have to submit their email address in order to rate essays. As with the Community evaluator, each Public evaluator can enter one score, 1-10 (10 being extremely relevant and interesting), per essay.

• Prizes will not be awarded directly on the basis of Public ratings, but it is anticipated that these ratings may influence either Community evaluations or Expert judging.

• All decisions of the judges are final and the selection of Winners is at the sole and absolute discretion of FQXi.

PRIZES

• In addition to the cash prizes listed below, all First, Second, and Third Prize Winners will be invited to FQXi Membership, if the applicant is not already a Member.

• First Prize (top ranked essay): US$10,000

• Second Prize (ranks 2-3): US$5000 each

• Third Prize (ranks 4-8): US$2000 each

• Fourth Prize (ranks 9-18): US$1000 each



• Judging panel special commendation prizes (up to 3): US$1000

• In the case that an essay is selected to win both a Juried and a Community Prize, only the higher Prize will be awarded.

TECHNICALITIES & LEGALITIES

• Essays complying with the rules and satisfying minimal relevance and quality criteria will be automatically posted on the FQXi Community Forum website together with authors' names; after Prizes are awarded, contest Winners will be highlighted as such. FQXi reserves no copyrights to the submitted work; however, the contest entry shall constitute both permission by the author that submitted material may be so posted, and warrantee that the posted material infringes upon no copyrighted material. FQXi reserves the right to use essay submissions in its promotional or other internal materials and submission of an entry in the contest constitutes agreement by the author to grant FQXi a perpetual, royalty-free right to use the submitted essay for such purposes.

• Limit one entry per person.

• Collaborative essays written by more than one person can be submitted. If this entry is awarded a Prize, it will be split equally among the collaborators.

• All Prizes are subject to United States Income Tax. Winners are required to furnish FQXi with appropriate tax forms for reporting the Prize, and applicable taxes may be withheld from the Prize.

• Void where prohibited by law. FQXi reserves the right to refuse to award any Prize if doing so violates any applicable laws.

• Judges, FQXi personnel and FQXi subcontractors, and members of their families, are ineligible to win Prizes.

• By submitting an entry in the contest, the author agrees to release, defend and hold harmless FQXi, its directors, officers, employees, agents, volunteers, the contest judges, and their affiliates, heirs, successors and assigns from and against, and waive any right to pursue, any and all claims of any nature whatsoever arising out of or in connection with the essay contest, the selection of Winners, and the use of the submitted essay, the author’s name, and biographical information as authorized under these contest rules.

• All decisions of the judges are final and the selection of Winners is at the sole and absolute discretion of FQXi.