Mario Castagnino et al 2003 Class. Quantum Grav. 20 369 doi:10.1088/0264-9381/20/2/310
Mario Castagnino1, Luis Lara2 and Olimpia Lombardi3
Show affiliationsIn this paper, we address the problem of the arrow of time from a cosmological point of view, rejecting the traditional entropic approach that defines the future direction of time as the direction of the entropy increase: from our perspective, the arrow of time has a global origin and it is an intrinsic, geometrical feature of spacetime. Time orientability and the existence of a cosmic time are necessary conditions for defining an arrow of time, which is manifested globally as the time asymmetry of the universe as a whole, and locally as a time-asymmetric energy flux. We also consider arrows of time of different origins (quantum, electromagnetic, thermodynamic, etc) showing that they can be non-conventionally defined only if the geometrical arrow is previously defined.
Issue 2 (21 January 2003)
Received 1 November 2002
Published 3 January 2003
Mario Castagnino et al 2003 Class. Quantum Grav. 20 369
Nobuyuki Kawahara et al 2002 Meas. Sci. Technol. 13 125
Y Murakami et al 2007 Phys. Med. Biol. 52 2301
S Choi and N P Bigelow 2005 J. Opt. B: Quantum Semiclass. Opt. 7 S413
R Johnsen et al 2009 J. Phys.: Conf. Ser. 192 012009
A Shashurin et al 2010 Plasma Sources Sci. Technol. 19 015002
A E Kovalsky and G P Pronko 2002 J. Phys. A: Math. Gen. 35 L509
D McGrouther et al 2005 J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 38 3348
H K Jassal and L Sriramkumar 2007 Class. Quantum Grav. 24 2589
G. Hallinan et al. 2006 ApJ 653 690