Related papers: Conceptual Problems in Cosmology
This paper gives an elementary introduction to some of the conceptual problems of quantum cosmology. Contents: 1. Why quantum cosmology? 2. Time in quantum gravity 3.Decoherence and the recovery of the Schrodinger equation 4. The direction…
Loop quantum gravity and cosmology are reviewed with an emphasis on evaluating the dynamics, rather than constructing it. The three crucial parts of such an analysis are (i) deriving effective equations, (ii) controlling the theory's…
This work may be defined as a modern philosophical approach to theoretical physics. Since ancient times science and philosophy evolved in parallel, thus renewing from time to time the epochal paradigms of human thought. We could not…
Theoretical and observational challenges to standard cosmology such as the cosmological constant problem and tensions between cosmological model parameters inferred from different observations motivate the development and search of new…
What are the important unanswered questions in cosmology? The choice as to which are the most important is somewhat personal. In the view of the author, the ten topics chosen here for discussion must be included among the most fundamental.…
We review current theoretical cosmology, including fundamental and mathematical cosmology and physical cosmology (as well as cosmology in the quantum realm), with an emphasis on open questions.
This article looks at philosophical aspects and questions that modern astrophysical research gives rise to. Other than cosmology, astrophysics particularly deals with understanding phenomena and processes operating at "intermediate" cosmic…
The good agreement between large-scale observations and the predictions of the now-standard $\Lambda$CDM theory gives us hope that this will become a lasting foundation for cosmology. After briefly reviewing the current status of the key…
Barbour, Hawking, Misner and others have argued that time cannot play an essential role in the formulation of a quantum theory of cosmology. Here we present three challenges to their arguments, taken from works and remarks by Kauffman,…
Quantum gravity is expected to be necessary in order to understand situations where classical general relativity breaks down. In particular in cosmology one has to deal with initial singularities, i.e. the fact that the backward evolution…
In this short review we study the state of the art of the great problems in cosmology and their interrelationships. The reconciliation of these problems passes undoubtedly through the idea of a quantum universe.
The idea of possible time or space variations of the `fundamental' constants of nature, although not new, is only now beginning to be actively considered by large numbers of researchers in the particle physics, cosmology and astrophysics…
Principles in the form of heuristic guidelines or generally accepted dogma play an important role in the development of physical theories. In particular, philosophical considerations and principles figure prominently in the work of Albert…
While purely philosophical in the early times, and still very speculative at the beginning of the twentieth century, Cosmology has gradually entered into the realm of experimental science over the past eighty years. It has raised some…
We present an elementary account of mathematical cosmology through a series of important unsolved problems. We introduce the fundamental notion of `a cosmology' and focus on the issue of singularities as a theme unifying many current,…
Modern fundamental physics poses new questions for philosophy, which, as it seems to us, have not yet received appropriate attention from philosophers of science. This paper formulates a number of such questions in order to present them to…
During the last three decades, there has been a growing realization among physicists and cosmologists that the relation between particle physics and cosmology may constitute yet another successful example of the unity of science. However,…
Astrophysical observations provide a picture of the universe as a 4-dim homogeneous and isotropic flat space-time dominated by an unknown form of dark energy. To achieve such a cosmology one has to consider in the early universe an…
The large amount of cosmological data already available (and in the near future) makes necessary the development of efficient numerical codes. Many software products have been implemented to perform cosmological analyses considering one or…
The basic problem of quantum cosmology is the definition of the quantum state of the universe, with appropriate boundary conditions on Riemannian three-geometries. This paper describes recent progress in the corresponding analysis of…