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Energy-momentum restrictions on the creation of Gott time machines

Sean M. Carroll, Edward Farhi, Alan H. Guth, and Ken D. Olum

  • Center for Theoretical Physics, Laboratory for Nuclear Science, Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139

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Phys. Rev. D 50, 6190 – Published 15 November, 1994

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.50.6190

Abstract

The discovery by Gott of a remarkably simple spacetime with closed timelike curves (CTC’s) provides a tool for investigating how the creation of time machines is prevented in classical general relativity. The Gott spacetime contains two infinitely long, parallel cosmic strings, which can equivalently be viewed as point masses in (2+1)-dimensional gravity. We examine the possibility of building such a time machine in an open universe. Specifically, we consider initial data specified on an edgeless, noncompact, spacelike hypersurface, for which the total momentum is timelike (i.e., not the momentum of a Gott spacetime). In contrast to the case of a closed universe (in which Gott pairs, although not CTC’s, can be produced from the decay of stationary particles), we find that there is never enough energy for a Gott-like time machine to evolve from the specified data; it is impossible to accelerate two particles to a sufficiently high velocity. Thus, the no-CTC theorems of Tipler and Hawking are enforced in an open (2+1)-dimensional universe by a mechanism different from that which operates in a closed universe. In proving our result, we develop a simple method to understand the inequalities that restrict the result of combining momenta in (2+1)-dimensional gravity.

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Phys. Rev. D 50, 6190– Published 15 November, 1994
  • Received 21 June 1994

© 1994 American Physical Society

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