Sourcing semiclassical gravity from spontaneously localized quantum matter

TL;DR

This paper proposes a consistent semiclassical gravity model derived from spontaneous localization quantum models, addressing fundamental inconsistencies and making testable predictions in the Newtonian limit.

Contribution

It introduces a stochastic semiclassical gravity framework based on spontaneous localization, providing a new approach to unify quantum matter with classical spacetime.

Findings

Recover the Newtonian pair potential with a short-distance cutoff

Predict an additional gravitational decoherence term

Address fundamental inconsistencies in semiclassical gravity

Abstract

The possibility that a classical space-time and quantum matter cohabit at the deepest level, i.e. the possibility of having a fundamental and not phenomenological semiclassical gravity, is often disregarded for lack of a good candidate theory. The standard semiclassical theory suffers from fundamental inconsistencies (e.g.: Schr\"odinger cat sources, faster-than-light communication and violation of the Born rule) which can only be ignored in simple typical situations. We harness the power of spontaneous localization models, historically constructed to solve the measurement problem in quantum mechanics, to build a consistent theory of (stochastic) semiclassical gravity in the Newtonian limit. Our model makes quantitative and potentially testable predictions: we recover the Newtonian pair potential up to a short distance cut-off (hence we predict no 1 particle self-interaction) and uncover an additional gravitational decoherence term which depends on the specifics of the underlying spontaneous localization model considered. We hint at a possible program to go past the Newtonian limit, towards a consistent general relativistic semiclassical gravity.