Gravity from transactions: fulfilling the entropic gravity program

Abstract

We present new developments in entropic gravity in light of the Relativistic Transactional Interpretation (RTI). A transactional approach to spacetime events can give rise in a natural way to entropic gravity (in the way originally proposed by Erik Verlinde) while also overcoming extant objections to that research program. The theory also naturally gives rise to a Cosmological Constant and to Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND) and thus provides a physical explanation for the phenomena historically attributed to "dark energy" and "dark matter".

On Mach’s Principle in Entropic Gravity

“…We also note that the conception of quantum states as fields over spacetime uses the spacetime parameters as possibilities for localization relative to a particular inertial frame and that such quantum states are not physically "in spacetime", where the latter is understood as the emergent manifold of connected events. In this regard, it is worth quoting our remarks from [9] concerning this point:…”

“…We then sketch how the field theory of gravity and Einstein's equations are derived. For a detailed presentation, especially of the last part, we refer to [8,9].…”

“…So far, we have proposed the idea that the formalism of quantum physics is suited to explain the emergence of empirical space and time as unified, yet distinct, dimensions by the mechanism of transactions. Real photon exchange creates metric relations between emitters and absorbers, as described in [9], and the mechanism contains therefore an intrinsic way to measure time intervals by means of the exchanged photons. This approach clearly lends itself to the relational view of spacetime as it emerges from pairs of emitters and absorbers, and there is no spacetime without matter (although the matter itself is not a component of metrical spacetime; [11], Chapter 8).…”

“…This reflects the fact that the light-cone structure together with a length-gauge in a time-like direction locally determines the four-metric [15]. We are not giving the details here, since they can be found in [8,9]. In the process, we also find the reason for the general validity of the clock hypothesis (timelike curves on a Lorentz manifold can be approximated arbitrarily closely by a zig-zag of null curves (i.e., light clocks) [16]).…”

“…Recently, it was shown that the physics of quantum events, induced by transactions, do complete the entropic gravity program [8][9][10]. We will call this theory "transactional gravity".…”