Related papers: Tuning, Ergodicity, Equilibrium and Cosmology
The averaging problem in cosmology and the approach of macroscopic gravity to resolve the problem is discussed. The averaged Einstein equations of macroscopic gravity are modified on cosmological scales by the macroscopic gravitational…
It is useful to study the space of all cosmological models from a dynamical systems perspective, that is, by formulating the Einstein field equations as a dynamical system using appropriately normalized variables. We will discuss various…
Linde in hep-th/0611043 shows that some (though not all) versions of the global (volume-weighted) description avoid the "Boltzmann brain" problem raised in hep-th/0610079 if the universe does not have a decay time less than 20 Gyr. Here I…
The cosmological constant problem can be understood as the failure of the decoupling principle behind effective field theory, so that some quantities in the low-energy theory are extremely sensitive to the high-energy properties. While this…
We survey a variety of cosmological problems where the issue of generality has arisen. This is aimed at providing a wider context for many claims and deductions made when philosophers of science choose cosmological problems for…
A theory of gravitation is constructed in which all homogeneous and isotropic solutions are nonsingular, and in which all curvature invariants are bounded. All solutions for which curvature invariants approach their limiting values approach…
Homogeneous isotropic spatial flat cosmological models with two torsion functions in vacuum are built and investigated in the framework of de Sitter gauge theory of gravity. It is shown that by certain choices of parameters of gravitational…
I discuss the classical cosmological tests-- angular size-redshift, flux-redshift, and galaxy number counts-- in the light of the cosmology prescribed by the intepretation of CMB anisotropies. The discussion is somewhat of a primer for…
The recent discovery that Einstein once attempted - and quickly abandoned - a steady-state model of the expanding universe sheds new light on his philosophical journey from static to dynamic cosmologies.
We show that a positive cosmological constant is incompatible with the quantum-corpuscular resolution of de Sitter metric in form of a coherent state. The reason is very general and is due to the quantum self-destruction of the coherent…
I make a review on the aplications of the Bohm-De Broglie interpretation of quantum mechanics to quantum cosmology. In the framework of minisuperspaces models, I show how quantum cosmological effects in Bohm's view can avoid the initial…
It has recently been argued that codimension-two braneworlds offer a promising line of attack on the cosmological constant problem, since in such models the Hubble rate is not directly related to the brane tension. We point out challenges…
With the beginning of the XXIst century, a physical model of our Universe, usually called the Standard Cosmological Model (SCM), is reaching an important level of consolidation, based on accurate astrophysical data and also on theoretical…
It is generally accepted that the entropy of an asymptotically de Sitter universe is bounded by the area, in Planck units, of the de Sitter horizon. Based on an analysis of the entropy associated to the vacuum quantum fluctuations, we…
The received wisdom in statistical mechanics is that isolated systems, when left to themselves, approach equilibrium. But under what circumstances does an equilibrium state exist and an approach to equilibrium take place? In this paper we…
Some modern cosmological models predict the appearance of Boltzmann Brains: observers who randomly fluctuate out of a thermal bath rather than naturally evolving from a low-entropy Big Bang. A theory in which most observers are of the…
These notes give an introductory review on brane cosmology. This subject deals with the cosmological behaviour of a brane-universe, i.e. a three-dimensional space, where ordinary matter is confined, embedded in a higher dimensional…
At present, there is practically no doubt that general relativity is closely related to gravity. Moreover, after the work of Jacobson, Padmanabhan and others, it became clear that a thermodynamic interpretation of Einstein's relativistic…
We present an unconventional approach for addressing the old cosmological constant (CC) problem in a class of F(R,G) models of modified gravity. For a CC of arbitrary size and sign the corresponding cosmological evolution follows an…
The dramatic confrontation between new observations and theories of the early and recent universe makes cosmology one of the most rapidly advancing fields in the physical sciences. The universe is a unique laboratory in which to probe…