Related papers: Seminar on Records Theory
In quantum gravity, one seeks to combine quantum mechanics and general relativity. In such attempts, one comes across the `problem of time' impasse: the notion of time is conceptually different in each of these theories. In this paper, I…
The problem of time in quantum gravity occurs because `time' is taken to have a different meaning in each of general relativity and ordinary quantum theory. This incompatibility creates serious problems with trying to replace these two…
Time is absolute in standard quantum theory and dynamical in general relativity. The combination of both theories into a theory of quantum gravity leads therefore to a "problem of time". In my essay I shall investigate those consequences…
One of the major issues confronting theoretical physics is finding a quantum theory of gravity and a resolution to the cosmological constant problem. It is believed that a true quantum theory of gravity will lead to a solution to the this…
Because of the non-locality of quantum entanglement, realist approaches to completing quantum mechanics have implications for our conception of space. Quantum gravity also is expected to predict phenomena in which the locality of classical…
Quantum gravity--the marriage of quantum physics with general relativity--is bound to contain deep and important lessons for the nature of physical time. Some of these lessons shall be canvassed here, particularly as they arise from quantum…
It is often said that in general relativity time does not exist. This is because the Einstein equations generate motion in time that is a symmetry of the theory, not true time evolution. In quantum gravity, the timelessness of general…
On one popular view, the general covariance of gravity implies that change is relational in a strong sense, such that all it is for a physical degree of freedom to change is for it to vary with regard to a second physical degree of freedom.…
In this paper I argue that the fundamental aspect of our notion of time is that it defines an order relation, be it a total order relation between configurations of the world or just a partial order relation between events. This position is…
The treatment of time in relativity does not conform to that in quantum theory. In the context of quantum gravity this is called "the problem of time". A crucial difference is that time $t$ may be seen as an observable in relativity theory,…
Following a line of research that I have developed for several years, I argue that the best strategy for understanding quantum gravity is to build a picture of the physical world where the notion of time plays no role. I summarize here this…
The theory of quantum gravity is aimed to fuse general relativity with quantum theory into a more fundamental framework. The space of quantum gravity provides both the non-fixed causality of general relativity and the quantum uncertainty of…
This paper is an exposition of the author's recent work (arXiv:1001.3382 [hep-th], arXiv:1005.5430 [cond-mat.dis-nn], arXiv:1212.4956 [quant-ph]) on modeling M-theory vacua and quantum mechanical observers in the framework of a temporally…
Quantum gravity (or quantum spacetime) is to unify general relativity and quantum mechanics into a single theoretical framework and presented as the most important open puzzle in fundamental physics. The development of a microscopic theory…
By studying the set of correlations that are theoretically possible between physical systems without allowing for signalling of information backwards in time, we here identify correlations that can only be achieved if the time ordering…
In quantum gravity there is no notion of absolute time. Like all other quantities in the theory, the notion of time has to be introduced "relationally", by studying the behavior of some physical quantities in terms of others chosen as a…
We point out a fundamental problem that hinders the quantization of general relativity: quantum mechanics is formulated in terms of systems, typically limited in space but infinitely extended in time, while general relativity is formulated…
Observed physical phenomena can be described well by quantum mechanics or general relativity. People may try to find an unified fundamental theory which mainly aims to merge gravity with quantum theory. However, difficulty in merging those…
In this review we present the problem of time in quantum physics, including a short history of the problem and the known objections about considering time a quantum observable. The need to deal with time as an observable is elaborated…
We propose a solution to the problem of time for systems with a single global Hamiltonian constraint. Our solution stems from the observation that, for these theories, conventional gauge theory methods fail to capture the full classical…