Cosmic Time as an Emergent Property of Cosmic Thermodynamics

Abstract

This paper, in conjunction with recent Flat Space Cosmology (FSC) publications, provides theoretical support for cosmic time being an emergent property of cosmic entropy and temperature. Therefore, if Verlinde’s “emergent gravity” theory is correct, both time and gravity are most fundamentally emergent properties of cosmic thermodynamics. Since emergent properties within complex systems with a huge number of degrees of freedom are often not definable at the smallest scales, these results suggest that quantum time and quantum gravity may be no more definable than consciousness within two connecting neurons. String theorists now struggling to define quantum space-time and quantum gravity should bear this in mind.