vix.ing · top · new · best · stats · spec

Causal Sets: Discrete Gravity (Notes for the Valdivia Summer School)

2003/09/01 by Rafael D. Sorkin, Sorkin, Rafael D. · 4 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #Astrophysics (astro-ph) #Black Holes and Theoretical Physics #Cosmology and Gravitation Theories #FOS: Physical sciences #General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc) #High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th) #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #astro-ph #gr-qc #hep-th

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.gr-qc/0309009

plainTeX, 27 pages, no figures To appear in the proceedings of the Valdivia Summer School, edited by A. Gomberoff and D. Marolf

arxiv created 2003/09/01 · openalex publication_date 2003/09/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

Important status notice: This version has been superseded by v2.0. Subsequent work shows that the single-domain three-diagonal construction used here produces an experimentally excluded common-mode photon-speed anisotropy. Readers should consult the revised version and 10.5281/zenodo.21464971. We propose that conservation of probability — the single axiom A=1 — is sufficient to derive the principal results of quantum mechanics without additional postulates. On a bipartite three-dimensional causal lattice T³diamond, each particle is represented as a causal session: an independent phase oscillator that propagates amplitude across the lattice subject to |ψR|² + |ψL|² = 1 at every tick. No Hamiltonian and no measurement postulate are assumed; a Hilbert-space structure with unitary evolution emerges from the U(1) oscillator and the per-session amplitude constraint rather than being postulated a priori. From this single constraint, the paper derives: (i) the Dirac equation in the continuum limit a→0, with the gamma matrices identified as geometric encodings of the bipartite RGB/CMY sublattice geometry; (ii) wave-particle duality and the Born rule as consequences of amplitude redistribution under A=1, with Gleason's theorem securing the |ψ|² uniqueness from the framework's emergent Hilbert space; (iii) quantization of atomic orbitals as Arnold tongue attractors of the two-body phase dynamics, recovering the hydrogen Bohr radius to four significant figures (kmin = 0.0970 vs kBohr = 0.0971) without fitting; (iv) gravity as a clock-density gradient rather than spacetime curvature — a refraction of causal paths through regions of higher session density, reproducing the 1/r² force law with an explicit weak-field metric tensor gμν as a functional of the clock-density field; (v) photon emission as a structural consequence of A=1: the Coulomb interaction is a probability source that a single session cannot accommodate, mandating creation of a new photon session at orbit lock-in; (vi) the structural form of the induced gauge action (Sakharov / Zeldovich), whose leading-order term has the Maxwell form on Oh-averaged observables, with a closed-form gauge-sector birefringence sharing the same optical axis (1,1,−1) as the kinematic-sector prediction. Energy and momentum conservation are not independent inputs — they are consequences of A=1 applied to closed session sets. The numerically tractable results are verified or partially verified by a suite of more than fifteen experiments with no free parameters beyond the Planck-scale calibration of the lattice spacing; an audit table records the status of every claim. The paper conjectures that the Standard Model gauge group SU(3) × SU(2) × U(1), together with Lorentz SO(3,1), is the automorphism group of the framework's extended per-site amplitude — a precise 18-dimensional Lie-algebra equality. The existing framework is shown to carry SO(3,1) × U(1) (dim 7) on the per-site (ψR, ψL) amplitude; the remaining factors require structural extensions (per-site C² isospin and C³ colour indices) that are the subject of a companion paper. Six computational scaffolding scripts establish the conjecture's components. This is Paper I of the A=1 Discrete Causal Lattice series. Companion papers in preparation address the Standard Model gauge derivation, the Farey-sequence mass spectrum (and its Veneziano-amplitude limiting case), plasma and gradient-ionization phenomenology, the proton-interior structure, quantum measurement theory, and a Hilbert-6th-style combinatorial foundation for continuum physics. What changed in v1.0 (since v0.98-RC): * Three new audit-table rows: long-horizon escape mechanism (PART), lock-in resonance grid-independence across 65, 81, 97, 113³ grids (PART), and the Standard Model gauge-group conjecture as a precise 18-dimensional Lie-algebra equality (STUB).* A Gleason-uniqueness subsubsection in the Born-rule discussion, addressing the necessity question for the |ψ|² measure.* An explicit metric-tensor formula in the gravity section, identifying gμν as a functional of ρclock in the weak-field limit.* Refined automorphism conjecture with explicit decomposition into established and structural-extension factors.* New Acknowledgments section. Source code, paper sources, and data files: https://github.com/JackDMenendez/discrete-causal-latticeLicense: Paper text and figures CC BY 4.0; source code MIT.

Citations

Cited by

Related