Higher curvature gravities, unlike GR, cannot be bootstrapped from their (usual) linearizations

Abstract

We show that higher curvature order gravities, in particular the propagating quadratic curvature models, cannot be derived by self-coupling from their linear, flat space, forms, except through an unphysical version of linearization; only GR can. Separately, we comment on an early version of the self-coupling bootstrap.

New title, reflecting essential changes in text and conclusions. GRG in press

References in corpus (2)

• Hidden Simplicity of the Gravity Action
• Higher order gravities and the Strong Equivalence Principle

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