Searcharxiv⌕ Search
Home/Archive/arXiv

arXiv · 1301.6173

Scale Anomaly as the Origin of Time

Julian Barbour·Matteo Lostaglio·Flavio Mercati
View original source ↗Read source document ↗Export metadata ↓

Abstract

We explore the problem of time in quantum gravity in a point-particle analogue model of scale-invariant gravity. If quantized after reduction to true degrees of freedom, it leads to a time-independent Schr\"odinger equation. As with the Wheeler--DeWitt equation, time disappears, and a frozen formalism that gives a static wavefunction on the space of possible shapes of the system is obtained. However, if one follows the Dirac procedure and quantizes by imposing constraints, the potential that ensures scale invariance gives rise to a conformal anomaly, and the scale invariance is broken. A behaviour closely analogous to renormalization-group (RG) flow results. The wavefunction acquires a dependence on the scale parameter of the RG flow. We interpret this as time evolution and obtain a novel solution of the problem of time in quantum gravity. We apply the general procedure to the three-body problem, showing how to fix a natural initial value condition, introducing the notion of complexity. We recover a time-dependent Schr\"odinger equation with a repulsive cosmological force in the `late-time' physics and we analyse the role of the scale invariant Planck constant. We suggest that several mechanisms presented in this model could be exploited in more general contexts.

Explore related subjects

gr-qchep-th

Keep this discovery

BibTeXRIS

Julian Barbour, Matteo Lostaglio, Flavio Mercati. 2013-01-25. Scale Anomaly as the Origin of Time. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10714-013-1516-y

Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.

KEEP EXPLORING

Related papers

arXiv2026

Electrovacuum Black Hole Uniqueness

We prove the black hole uniqueness conjecture in the axially symmetric, stationary, electrovacuum setting, subject to the refined asymptotic analysis of the associated singular harmonic maps, which includes an analyticity hypothesis at the axes. More precisely, it is shown that any asymptotically flat solution of the Einstein--Maxwell equations in this class, with more than one black hole horizon component is either: Majumdar--Papapetrou, up to a duality rotation, in which case all logarithmic angle defects vanish, or every finite axis rod logarithmic angle defect is strictly negative and hence every interaction force is strictly attractive. The proof extends the singular harmonic map method used for vacuum Kerr uniqueness in [18].

gr-qc↗
arXiv2026

Constraining Modified Mass-to-Horizon Cosmology Through Primordial Inflationary Observables

We investigate slow-roll inflation in a modified cosmological framework inspired by a generalized mass-to-horizon relation (MHR), $M=\gamma {c^2 L^n}/{G}$, where $n$ is a real parameter and $\gamma$ a dimensional constant. Using Padmanabhan's emergence paradigm, we derive the modified Friedmann equations for a flat FRW universe and analyze the dynamics of a canonical scalar field (inflaton) under the slow-roll approximation. We study the resulting inflationary phenomenology for power-law and Starobinsky potentials. For power-law potentials, the MHR modification fails to reconcile these models with current CMB constraints on $r$ and $n_s$. In contrast, Starobinsky inflation exhibits significant sensitivity to deviations from $n=1$. A perturbative analysis ($n=1+\Delta$) yields corrections to inflationary observables. We observe that the scalar power-spectrum normalization, under a fixed-Starobinsky prescription, imposes the stringent constraint $0.960 \lesssim n \lesssim 1.040$ for $N=60$ efolds. This is considerably tighter than spectral-index bounds. Our results establish inflation, particularly Starobinsky-like models, as a sensitive probe of generalized horizon thermodynamics and departures from standard MHR scaling.

gr-qc↗
arXiv2026

Improving the Sensitivity of Gravitational Wave Detection with Weighted Conformal Prediction

In the last decade, kilometre-scale interferometric gravitational-wave detectors have observed hundreds of compact binary mergers, the majority of which are binary black holes. However, the data are noise-dominated, and multiple independent search algorithms (pipelines) are used to enhance sensitivity and improve robustness. Rather than the standard approach of selecting the most significant pipeline output, we combine the outputs from all pipelines using a conformal prediction-based framework to provide statistically rigorous confidence estimates for candidate events. While combining pipelines improves sensitivity and ranking robustness, it requires a principled statistical framework that remains valid as data properties evolve across observing runs. A key challenge is distribution shifts between simulated datasets used for training and calibration and the real, unlabelled, observations used for testing, which can invalidate coverage guarantees and bias confidence estimates. In this work, we address this challenge by incorporating likelihood-ratio reweighting into our conformal prediction framework to account for covariate shift. Using mock datasets containing simulated signals, we demonstrate that weighted conformal prediction restores well-calibrated coverage under covariate shift and increases the confidence of events near the detection threshold, recovering true signals that would otherwise be missed.

gr-qc↗