PIRSA:25100108

Video URL

https://pirsa.org/25100108

What are the `axioms’ of General Relativity? Ask Quantum Gravity!

Dowker, F. (2025). What are the `axioms’ of General Relativity? Ask Quantum Gravity!. Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. https://pirsa.org/25100108

Dowker, Fay. What are the `axioms’ of General Relativity? Ask Quantum Gravity!. Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, Oct. 02, 2025, https://pirsa.org/25100108 

          @misc{ scivideos_PIRSA:25100108,
            doi = {10.48660/25100108},
            url = {https://pirsa.org/25100108},
            author = {Dowker, Fay},
            keywords = {Quantum Gravity},
            language = {en},
            title = {What are the {\textquoteleft}axioms{\textquoteright} of General Relativity? Ask Quantum Gravity!},
            publisher = {Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics},
            year = {2025},
            month = {oct},
            note = {PIRSA:25100108 see, \url{https://scivideos.org/pirsa/25100108}}
          }

Fay Dowker Imperial College London

Talk numberPIRSA:25100108
DOI10.48660/25100108
Source RepositoryPIRSA
Collection
Talk Type Scientific Series
Subject

Abstract

The good books on GR agree on certain aspects of the theory that we could consider to be its “core” features. Beyond the core, however, we do not know exactly what GR should allow or not allow physically. For example, should we consider spacetimes with closed causal loops as part of physical GR or not? Are spacetimes with certain types of boundaries or singularities part of GR?  Most people expect that the answer to these sorts of questions will be answered by quantum gravity when we have it.  We can start to address them within different quantum gravity approaches even at their current partial state of their development. Within the framework of the path integral for quantum gravity and a Feynmanian heuristic for the recovery of the classical approximation, I will sketch out how answers may arise. I will use the example of causal set quantum gravity but I suggest that the ideas are applicable to other path integral approaches.