I understand your point and your analogy of mammals and birds and the mathematical gulf, it's a good one. Damn shame you've lost reference to that illustration, I'd love to see it.
Embedded in my comment was the thought that if the empirical evidence for this observation was overwhelming then this tight and specific coupling between QM and GR would be so embarrassing that mathematicians would have no option but to significantly up the ante (and also this new evidence may bring a fresh approach).
We've seen this leapfrogging between math and physics many times before, Newton/calculus, Hamilton/quaternions, Galois/group theory, etc.
Wishful thinking perhaps, but the standoff/gulf has to collapse eventually. It'd be nice if this observation was the impetus.
Embedded in my comment was the thought that if the empirical evidence for this observation was overwhelming then this tight and specific coupling between QM and GR would be so embarrassing that mathematicians would have no option but to significantly up the ante (and also this new evidence may bring a fresh approach).
We've seen this leapfrogging between math and physics many times before, Newton/calculus, Hamilton/quaternions, Galois/group theory, etc.
Wishful thinking perhaps, but the standoff/gulf has to collapse eventually. It'd be nice if this observation was the impetus.