Is Gravity Just Entropy Rising? Long-Shot Idea Gets Another Look.
1 min read
Summary
Entropic gravity is the idea that gravity isn’t a fundamental force of nature, but a consequence of the “thermal” behaviour of the microscopic components of space-time.
The basic idea is that, just as heat arises from the jiggling and mixing of the atoms and molecules that make up matter, the attraction between objects might arise from the jiggling and mixing of some other unseen constituents of the universe.
In earlier work, experimental tests of the idea turned up null, but it’s nevertheless an idea that won’t die, and still attracts physicists.
Now, two new models in the literature seek to make the idea more concrete, and even testable.
One proposes that space is filled with a crystalline grid of quantum particles, or qubits.
Each has an orientation, like a compass needle.
These qubits will align themselves with a nearby object that possesses mass and exert a force on that object.
In another model, space is filled with “nonlocal” qubits that can exert forces on objects without themselves being local.
Both models derive Newtonian gravity from the statistical behavior of these qubits.
