QG2 - Quantum Gravity Phenomenology |
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Speaker |
Pinto, Fabrizio |
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Coauthors |
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| Talk Title |
If Detected, Would Hypothetical Gravitational Casimir Effects Prove Gravity Quantization? |
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Abstract |
Two parallel plane, perfectly conducting mirrors attract each other because of fluctuating electromagnetic field boundary effects – the well-known Casimir force. Does this happen with gravitation? Quite recently, this issue has been explored by Quach, who found that, if the as yet unproven Heisenberg-Coulomb (HC) effect is confirmed, such a hypothetical force might exceed its electromagnetic counterpart by one order of magnitude. Importantly, the additional claim has been made that a positive result "would be the first experimental evidence for the ... existence of gravitons." Here we show that these latter claims are unfounded. In analogy with extensive classical electrodynamics results, even if any gravitational Casimir forces were detected, this would not logically imply field quantization. In fact, adopting a standard radiation pressure approach and postulating gravitational-wave mirrors, it can be proven that classical general relativity straightforwardly accommodates gravitational Casimir forces that, for Lorentz-invariant fluctuation spectral energy densities, are intrinsically indistinguishable from those resulting from quantized gravity. |
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