We study the dynamic critical behavior of the Chayes-Machta dynamics for the Fortuin-Kasteleyn random-cluster model, which generalizes the Swendsen-Wang dynamics for the q-state Potts model to noninteger q, in two and three spatial dimensions, by Monte Carlo simulation. We show that the Li-Sokal bound z = is close to but probably not sharp in d 2 and is far from sharp in d 3, for all q. The conjecture z = is false (for some values of q) in both d 2 and d 3. [3,4]: the autocorrelation (relaxation) time diverges as the critical point is approached, most often like z , where is the spatial correlation length and z is a dynamic critical exponent. For local algorithms, one usually has z 2. This effect severely limits the efficiency of Monte Carlo studies of critical phenomena in statistical mechanics and of the continuum limit in quantum field theory.An important advance was made in 1987 with the invention of the Swendsen-Wang (SW) cluster algorithm [5] for simulating the q-state ferromagnetic Potts model [6,7] at positive integer q. The SW algorithm is based on passing back and forth between the Potts spin representation and the Fortuin-Kasteleyn (FK) bond representation [8,9]. This algorithm does not eliminate critical slowing-down, but it radically reduces it compared to local algorithms. Much effort has therefore been devoted, for both theoretical and practical reasons, to understanding the dynamic critical behavior of the SW algorithm as a function of the spatial dimension d and the number q of Potts spin states [10]. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to develop a physical understanding from the small number of ''data points'' at our disposal: second-order transitions occur only for d; q 2; 2 , 2; 3 , 2; 4 , 3; 2 , and 4; 2 [11]. A further advance was made in 1998 by Chayes and Machta (CM) [12], who devised a cluster algorithm for simulating the FK random-cluster model [8,13]-which provides a natural extension of the Potts model to noninteger q-at any real q 1. The CM algorithm generalizes the SW algorithm and in fact reduces to (a slight variant of) it when q is an integer. By using the CM algorithm, we can study the dynamic critical behavior of the SW-CM dynamic universality class as a function of the continuous variable q throughout the range 1 q q c L , where q c L is the maximum q for which the transition is second-order on the lattice L [14]. This vastly enhances our ability to make theoretical sense of the numerical results.In this Letter, we report detailed measurements of the dynamic critical behavior of the CM algorithm for twodimensional random-cluster models with 1 q 4 [15] and for three-dimensional models with q 1:5, 1.8, 2, and 2.2 [16]. Among other things, we find strong evidence against the conjecture z = recently proposed by two of us [10], which had seemed plausible from the data for integer q.The FK random-cluster model with parameter q > 0 is defined on any finite graph G V; E by the partition functionwhere A is the set of ''occupied bonds'' and k A is the number of connected components ('...