A (strictly) contemporary perspective on trans-Planckian censorship

Abstract

I critically discuss a controversial 'trans-Planckian censorship' conjecture, which has recently been introduced to researchers working at the intersection of fundamental physics and cosmology. My focus explicitly avoids any appeals to contingent research within string theory (the sociological origins of the conjecture) or regarding the more general (quantum) gravitational 'swampland'. Rather, I concern myself with the conjecture's foundations in our current, well-trodden physics of quantized fields, spacetime, and (classical) gravity. In doing so, I locate what exactly within trans-Planckian censorship amounts to a departure from current physics -- identifying what is, ultimately, so conjectural about the conjecture.

arXiv commentAccepted at Foundations of Physics

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