Dark energy and the fitting problem

TL;DR

This paper investigates how different cosmic measurement methods influence the interpretation of the universe's accelerated expansion, revealing that fitting processes can create an apparent dark energy effect and explaining the Hubble tension.

Contribution

It establishes the fitting processes for key cosmic probes and shows how these influence the observed acceleration and the Hubble tension, highlighting conceptual differences.

Findings

Fitting processes can induce an apparent dark energy effect.

Differences in fitting methods explain the Hubble tension.

Conceptual distinctions between probes affect cosmological interpretations.

Abstract

At a global scale, the universe is generally fitted by an idealized manifold described by the FLRW metric. This is in particular the case when probing the universe to determine its dynamics. The process that fits the idealized manifold to the real universe is however not uniquely defined. This process may depend on the cosmic probe that has been used for the measurements, and could hence lead to different observed temporal evolutions of the scale factor. A correct interpretation of the observed accelerated expansion of the universe requires therefore first a thorough understanding of the fitting process that has been implicitly applied. In this article we establish the fitting processes for the SNIa, BAO and CMB cosmic probes, and deduce the related averaged Einstein equations. We demonstrate that the way these fittings have been applied in practice lead to an apparent dark energy effect. We also highlight the conceptual differences in the fitting processes between the SNIa and BAO probes on the one hand, and the CMB probe on the other hand. Considering those differences, we then show how the so-called Hubble tension can be explained.