Holography, Cosmology and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

David A. Lowe; Richard Easther

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Holography, Cosmology and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

Richard Easther, David A. Lowe

High Energy Physics - Theory · Submitted 11 Feb 1999

abstract compiled · 2026-09-23 · no language-model review

The authors' main claim We propose that in time dependent backgrounds the holographic principle should be replaced by the generalized second law of thermodynamics.

how it is stated · speculative 0.67 read the record →

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The compiled record

The paper's own sentences, arranged. Each label is drawn from a closed vocabulary; the number beside it is the probability the classifier gave that label. Numbers in the tables are the authors', checked by code. No sentence in this record was written by a model.

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Compiled by classifier-1.13-20260917 via OpenRouter, question bank abstract-p1-20260923, 2026-09-23: 1 request, 4,247 input tokens, $0.0002 reported.

What the abstract itself states, as probabilities: claims first 0.03 · states limitation 0.80 · human participants 0.01 · controlled comparison 0.06 · randomized assignment 0.01 · states quantitative result 0.19 · compares with prior results 0.92 · mentions code or data availability 0.01.

The abstract, sentence by sentence

arXiv listing abstract v2. Results and the main claim are underlined; show every role.

We propose that in time dependent backgrounds the holographic principle should be replaced by the generalized second law of thermodynamics. For isotropic open and flat universes with a fixed equation of state, the generalized second law agrees with the cosmological holographic principle proposed by Fischler and Susskind. However, in more complicated spacetimes the two proposals disagree. A modified form of the holographic bound that applies to a post-inflationary universe follows from the generalized second law. However, in a spatially closed universe, or inside a black hole event horizon, there is no simple relationship that connects the area of a region to the maximum entropy it can contain.

background contribution method result interpretation main claim

What the classifier reports for each sentence. The number is the probability it gave the label.
#	sentence	role	the authors' own work	states the main conclusion	strength
s0	We propose that in time dependent backgrounds the holographic principle should be replaced by the generalized second law of thermodynamics.	contribution 1.00	0.81	0.81	speculative 0.67
s1	For isotropic open and flat universes with a fixed equation of state, the generalized second law agrees with the cosmological holographic principle proposed by Fischler and Susskind.	result 0.97	0.43	0.10	asserted 0.99
s2	However, in more complicated spacetimes the two proposals disagree.	result 0.80	0.43	0.11	asserted 1.00
s3	A modified form of the holographic bound that applies to a post-inflationary universe follows from the generalized second law.	result 0.93	0.84	0.16	asserted 1.00
s4	However, in a spatially closed universe, or inside a black hole event horizon, there is no simple relationship that connects the area of a region to the maximum entropy it can contain.	result 0.69	0.64	0.12	asserted 1.00

What kind of paper the classifier reports this is: position or commentary 0.70 · evidence from argument 0.56.

What was examined, and what was not

sources read

arXiv listing abstract v2

not examined

full text
figures and tables
references and citing sentences
relations to other papers

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P abstract

not run

S sections
T body sentences
C citations
R cross-paper relations

Every quoted sentence on this record is the authors'. Every label is from Pith's closed vocabulary, with the probability shown beside it. Every number in the measurements table is the authors', checked by code. Record as JSON

The paper

Original abstract

We propose that in time dependent backgrounds the holographic principle should be replaced by the generalized second law of thermodynamics. For isotropic open and flat universes with a fixed equation of state, the generalized second law agrees with the cosmological holographic principle proposed by Fischler and Susskind. However, in more complicated spacetimes the two proposals disagree. A modified form of the holographic bound that applies to a post-inflationary universe follows from the generalized second law. However, in a spatially closed universe, or inside a black hole event horizon, there is no simple relationship that connects the area of a region to the maximum entropy it can contain.

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References

Forward citations

Cited by 3 Pith papers

Reviewed papers in the Pith corpus that reference this work. Sorted by Pith novelty score. Full citation record

A Covariant Entropy Conjecture
hep-th 1999-05 accept novelty 8.0 of 10

Entropy on any light-sheet bounded by a surface of area A is conjectured never to exceed A/4, in every spacetime allowed by general relativity.
Holography in General Space-times
hep-th 1999-06 conditional novelty 7.0 of 10

A background-independent version of the holographic principle assigns every spacetime a set of screens on which all bulk information fits at no more than one bit per Planck area.
Viscous Cosmology for Early- and Late-Time Universe
gr-qc 2017-06 conditional novelty 2.0 of 10

Bulk viscosity, treated as a free function of density or Hubble rate, can reproduce inflation, late-time acceleration, phantom crossing, and bounces, but the review offers no microphysical derivation of the viscosity itself.

How the literature uses it

8 arXiv papers cite this in 9 sentences

Each citing sentence is taken from the citing paper's LaTeX source and typed by Pith's classifier. A label appears at probability 0.8 or more (0.95 for support), a contest at 0.7 or more; the quoted words are the citing authors'. How each label was checked · JSON

Papers citing it · 4 sentences without a confident label

Builds on it 1 paper

Extending this argument by relating the cosmological entropy in a background with time-dependent Hubble parameter [ref] to the microscopic entropy, one finds [equation]

Punctuated eternal inflation via AdS/CFT · Natural minimization of the cosmological constant · 0.93

Cites it as background 4 papers

Arising from the cosmological application [ref] of the more fundamental holographic principle [ref] , and despite some objections on this approach [ref] , holographic dark energy reveals the dynamical nature of the vacuum energy by relating it to cosmological volumes.

Restoring Holographic Dark Energy in Brane Cosmology · Introduction · 0.98
Several proposals have been suggested in order to remedy this problem, for example, to replace the particle horizon by Hubble horizon or apparent horizon [ref] .

Holography, UV/IR Relation, Causal Entropy Bound and Dark Energy · Introduction · 0.86
The applications of the holographic principle to cosmology was first carried out by Fischler and Susskind [ref] , and in the past decades had been extensively studied [ref] .

Stephani Cosmology: Entropically Viable But Observationally Challenged · Introduction: Inhomogeneous Cosmologies and Their Constraints · 1.00

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