Related papers: Spacetime is as spacetime does
In general relativity, the picture of spacetime assigns an ideal clock to each worldline. Being ideal, gravitational effects due to these clocks are ignored and the flow of time according to one clock is not affected by the presence of…
Being able to perform explicit computations in a nonperturbative, Planckian regime is key to understanding quantum gravity as a fundamental theory of gravity and spacetime. Rather than a variety of different approaches to quantum gravity,…
After short historical overview we describe the difficulties with application of standard QFT methods in quantum gravity (QG). The incompatibility of QG with the use of classical continuous space-time required conceptually new approach. We…
This is a chapter of the planned monograph "Out of Nowhere: The Emergence of Spacetime in Quantum Theories of Gravity", co-authored by Nick Huggett and Christian W\"uthrich and under contract with Oxford University Press. (More information…
In fundamental theories that accounts for quantum gravitational effects, the spacetime causal structure is expected to be quantum uncertain. Previous studies of quantum causal structure focused on finite-dimensional systems. Here we present…
An important task faced by all approaches of quantum gravity is to incorporate superpositions and quantify quantum uncertainties of spacetime causal relations. We address this task in 2D. By identifying a global $Z_2$ symmetry of 1+1D…
It is argued that the existence of a minimum size of spacetime may imply the fundamental existence of gravity as a geometric property of spacetime described by general relativity.
This paper presents an brief review of some recent work on the causal set approach to quantum gravity. Causal sets are a discretisation of spacetime that allow the symmetries of GR to be preserved in the continuum approximation. One…
The different roles and natures of spacetime appearing in a quantum field theory and in classical physics are analyzed implying that a quantum theory of gravitation is not necessarily a quantum theory of curved spacetime. Developing an…
Space and time are central concepts for understanding our World. They are important ingredients at the core of every scientific theory and subject of intense debate in philosophy. Albert Einstein's Special and General theories of Relativity…
We review aspects of loop quantum gravity in a pedagogical manner, with the aim of enabling a precise but critical assessment of its achievements so far. We emphasise that the off-shell (`strong') closure of the constraint algebra is a…
We review a novel and authentic way to quantize gravity. This novel approach is based on the fact that Einstein gravity can be formulated in terms of a symplectic geometry rather than a Riemannian geometry in the context of emergent…
According to \textit{effective realism}, scientific theories give us knowledge about the unobservable world, but not at the fundamental level. This view is justified by the well-received \textit{effective-field-theory} (EFT) approach to…
We give a brief overview of the nature of spacetime emerging from string theory. This is radically different from the familiar spacetime of Einstein's relativity. At a perturbative level, the spacetime metric appears as ``coupling…
General relativity treats spacetime as dynamical and exhibits its breakdown at singularities. This failure is interpreted as evidence that quantum gravity is not a theory formulated within spacetime; instead, it must explain the very…
The standard formulation of quantum theory relies on a fixed space-time metric determining the localisation and causal order of events. In general relativity, the metric is influenced by matter, and is expected to become indefinite when…
Two questions are investigated by looking successively at classical mechanics, special relativity, and relativistic gravity: first, how is space related with spacetime? The proposed answer is that each given reference fluid, that is a…
We present a new geometry of spacetime where events may be positive dimensional. This geometry is obtained by applying the identity of indiscernibles, which is a fundamental principle of quantum statistics, to time. Quantum nonlocality…
In quantum gravity space and time lose their status as fundamental parts of the physical reality. However, according to Kant, space and time are the a priori conditions of our experience. Does Kantian characterization of these notions give…
The aim of this work is to review the concepts of time in quantum mechanics and general relativity to show their incompatibility. We show that the absolute character of Newtonian time is present in quantum mechanics and also partially in…