Entropy Revisited: the Plausible Role of Gravitation

TL;DR

This paper explores the foundational role of gravity as a universal background influencing entropy and irreversibility, challenging traditional closed-system assumptions in thermodynamics and statistical physics.

Contribution

It proposes that gravity, due to its unique properties, acts as a universal background, leading to a new understanding of entropy and irreversibility in macroscopic systems.

Findings

Gravity can serve as a universal background affecting thermodynamic behavior

Entropy and irreversibility may emerge from gravitational coupling

Challenges the notion of strictly closed systems in thermodynamics

Abstract

We first present open questions related to the foundations of thermodynamics and statistical physics. We then argue that in principle one can not have "closed systems", and that a universal background should exist. We propose that the gravitational field plays this role, due to its vanishing energy-momentum tensor. This leads to a new possible picture, in which entropy and irreversibility in macroscopic systems emerge from their coupling to the background gravitational field.