Standard Model and number of fundamental forces

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TL;DR Summary

How many possible fundamental forces can there be?

Just a curious question, is there a limit within the standard model on how many fundamental forces there can be? I have some familiarity with particle physics/QFT(not quite mastery obviously otherwise Id probably be able to answer this myself) and the thought popped in my head when reading about the Higgs boson.

I remember back around 2010 reading articles describing everything as having just the strong, weak,gravitational, and electromagnetic forces. I used to dislike these because I thought how could they say they know there are only four if they don't know everything about the theory? Then of course there was the discovery of the higgs particle. From my understanding it is a matter of opinion right now whether or not it is actually a 5th fundamental force.

But anyway the question I have is: are there possibilities for more fundamental forces? and if so is there a limit to the number of them? Would the standard model be able to be easily modified or already have machinery in place to accept new forces? I am sorry if I am ignorant to anything obvious it has been a while since I've delved into this topic, but I am interested in it. Thanks for your consideration.

 

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I should probably mention that I mostly mean is our current understanding leaning towards the possibilities of new forces. I don't mean something like "you can't prove there aren't more forces so there must be more forces" I hope that clarifies my questions a bit.

 

[bobob]

Summary:: How many possible fundamental forces can there be?

Just a curious question, is there a limit within the standard model on how many fundamental forces there can be? I have some familiarity with particle physics/QFT(not quite mastery obviously otherwise Id probably be able to answer this myself) and the thought popped in my head when reading about the Higgs boson.

The Standard Model can accommodate 3 forces as that it what it was constructed to do. There may be more forces, but if so, those forces will be additions (extensions) to the standard model. For example, if right handed weak interactions were discovered, you would need and additional gauge group, $SU(2)_R$.

 

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Thx