paper

Big-Bang is a Boundary Condition

arXiv:2308.03926 · doi:10.1016/j.aop.2023.169526

Abstract

There is a common expectation that the big-bang singularity must be resolved in quantum gravity but it is not clear how this can be achieved. A major obstacle here is the difficulty of interpreting wave-functions in quantum gravity. The standard quantum mechanical framework requires a notion of time evolution and a proper definition of an invariant inner product having a probability interpretation, both of which are seemingly problematic in quantum gravity. We show that these two issues can actually be solved by introducing the embedding coordinates as dynamical variables à la Isham and Kuchar. The extended theory is identical to general relativity but has a larger group of gauge symmetries. The Wheeler-DeWitt equations describe the change of the wave-function from one arbitrary spacelike slice to another, however the constraint algebra makes this evolution purely kinematical and furthermore enforces the wave-function to be constrained in the subspace of zero-energy states. An inner product can also be introduced having all the necessary requirements. In this formalism big-bang appears as a finite field space boundary on which certain boundary conditions must be imposed for mathematical consistency. We explicitly illustrate this point both in the full theory and in the minisuperspace approximation.

arXiv commentv2: 16 pages, Revtex 4-1, to appear in Annals of Physics

References in corpus (8)