HackerPapers

arXiv:0712.0571hep-th

Eternal Inflation, past and future

Anthony Aguirre

Early discovery. Linked by one identifiable commenter. This paper is outside the main ranking; a mention is not an endorsement.

Abstract

Cosmological inflation, if it occurred, radically alters the picture of the `big bang', which would merely point to reheating at the end of inflation. Moreover, this reheating may be only local, so that inflation continues elsewhere and forever, continually spawning big-bang-like regions. This chapter reviews this idea of `eternal inflation', then focuses on what this may mean for the ultimate beginning of the universe. In particular, I will argue that given eternal inflation, the universe may be free of a cosmological initial singularity, might be eternal (and eternally inflating) to the past, and might obey an interesting sort of cosmological time-symmetry.

arXiv comments
38 pp., 6 color figures. Contribution to R. Vaas (ed.): Beyond the Big Bang. Springer 2008
Journal reference
DOI
Subjects
hep-thHigh Energy Physics, Theory

On Hacker News

Linked by 1 identifiable commenter in 1 comment across 1 thread, from Jun 2019 to Jun 2019.

Comments linking this paper, per year.

Discussed in comments1 thread

  1. Physicists Debate Hawking’s Idea That the Universe Had No Beginning 1 comment

    • Anthony Aguirre at UCSC does research in this area: https://arxiv.org/pdf/0712.0571.pdf http://scipp.ucsc.edu/~aguirre/Research.html

      BalgairView on HNParent context

Submitted to Hacker News

Connected through shared HN threads, not inferred similarity or a recommendation.