Related papers: Initial Conditions for a Universe
What is the quantum state of the universe? That is the central question of quantum cosmology. This essay describes the place of that quantum state in a final theory governing the regularities exhibited universally by all physical systems in…
We note that in general there exist two basic aspects in any branch of physics, including cosmology - one dealing with the attributes of basic constituents and forces of nature, the other dealing with how structures arise from them and how…
The Kalam cosmological argument, of a metaphysical nature, asserts that the universe had a first cause. This study examines the compatibility of its premises through a bibliographic review of advancements in contemporary physics. Quantum…
The role of topology in elementary quantum physics is discussed in detail. It is argued that attributes of classical spatial topology emerge from properties of state vectors with suitably smooth time evolution. Equivalently, they emerge…
We address the initial conditions for an expanding cosmology using the holographic principle. For the case of a closed model, the old prescription of Fishler and Susskind, that uses the particle horizon to encode the bulk degrees of…
Any canonical quantum theory can be understood to arise from the compatibility of the statistical geometry of distinguishable observations with the canonical Poisson structure of Hamiltonian dynamics. This geometric perspective offers a…
I point out a radical indeterminism in potential-based formulations of Newtonian gravity once we drop the condition that the potential vanishes at infinity (as is necessary, and indeed celebrated, in cosmological applications). This…
We investigate the laws of thermodynamics in an accelerating universe driven by dark energy with a time-dependent equation of state. In the case we consider that the physically relevant part of the Universe is that envelopped by the…
Astrophysics and cosmology can be used to test the standard model of particle physics under conditions and over distance and time scales not accessible to laboratory experiments. Most of the astrophysical observations are in good agreement…
Physics is a model of nature able to both describe and predict the results of measurements made with respect to reference systems. These reference systems, in turn, are themselves physical and thus subject to the laws of physics. The…
Penrose proposed that the big bang singularity should be constrained by requiring that the Weyl curvature vanishes there. The idea behind this past hypothesis is attractive because it constrains the initial conditions for the universe in…
The boundary conditions to be imposed on the quantum state of the whole multiverse could be such that the universes would be created in entangled pairs. Then, inter-universal entanglement would provide us with a vacuum energy for each…
This is a short summary of a project to construct a first principles cosmology of the Standard Model epoch, the period starting shortly before the electro-weak transition. The cosmology is derived from a simple initial state entirely within…
Quantum Cosmology and Gravity are formulated here as the primary and secondary quantizations of the energy constraints by analogy with the historical formulation of quantum field theory. New fact is that both the Universe and its matter are…
A comparison of the standard models in particle physics and in cosmology demonstrates that they are not compatible, though both are well established. Basics of modern cosmology are briefly reviewed. It is argued that the measurements of the…
The aim of this thesis is to question some of the basic assumptions that go into building the $\Lambda$CDM model of our universe. The assumptions we focus on are the initial conditions of the universe, the fundamental forces in the universe…
Quantum mechanics is an extremely successful theory of nature and yet it lacks an intuitive axiomatization. In contrast, the special theory of relativity is well understood and is rooted into natural or experimentally justified postulates.…
Till now, the foundation of quantum physics is still mysterious. To explore the mysteries in the foundation of quantum physics, people always take it for granted that quantum processes must be some types of fields/objects on a rigid space.…
Our conventional understanding of space-time, as well as our notion of geometry, break down once we attempt to describe the very early stages of the evolution of our universe. The extreme physical conditions near the Big Bang necessitate an…
We contrast the initial condition requirements of various contemporary cosmological models, including inflationary and bouncing cosmologies. Various proposals such as Hartle-Hawking's no boundary, or Tunnelling boundary conditions are…