Lorentz violation and black-hole thermodynamics

Abstract

We consider nonstandard photons from nonbirefringent modified Maxwell theory and discuss their propagation in a fixed Schwarzschild spacetime background. This particular modification of Maxwell theory is Lorentz-violating and allows for maximal photon velocities differing from the causal speed c of the asymptotic background spacetime. In the limit of geometrical optics, light rays from modified Maxwell theory are found to propagate along null geodesics in an effective metric. We observe that not every Lorentz-violating theory with multiple maximal velocities different from the causal speed c modifies the notion of the event horizon, contrary to naive expectations. This result implies that not every Lorentz-violating theory with multiple maximal velocities necessarily leads to a contradiction with the generalized second law of thermodynamics.