English

The Return of a Static Universe and the End of Cosmology

Astrophysics 2009-06-23 v3 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology High Energy Physics - Phenomenology High Energy Physics - Theory

Abstract

We demonstrate that as we extrapolate the current Λ\LambdaCDM universe forward in time, all evidence of the Hubble expansion will disappear, so that observers in our "island universe" will be fundamentally incapable of determining the true nature of the universe, including the existence of the highly dominant vacuum energy, the existence of the CMB, and the primordial origin of light elements. With these pillars of the modern Big Bang gone, this epoch will mark the end of cosmology and the return of a static universe. In this sense, the coordinate system appropriate for future observers will perhaps fittingly resemble the static coordinate system in which the de Sitter universe was first presented.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0704.0221,
  title  = {The Return of a Static Universe and the End of Cosmology},
  author = {Lawrence M. Krauss and Robert J. Scherrer},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0704.0221},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

5th prize 2007 Gravity Research Foundation Essay Competition, to appear, GRG October 2007; typos corrected; references updated