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Relativity and Gravitation pp 355–361Cite as

Is There a Flatness Problem in Classical Cosmology?

Part of the Springer Proceedings in Physics book series (SPPHY,volume 157)

Abstract

I discuss various definitions of the flatness problem and previous claims that it does not exist. I also present a new quantitative argument which shows that it does not exist in cosmological models which collapse in the future.

Keywords

  • Cosmological Model
  • Sitter Model
  • Maximum Expansion
  • Anthropic Principle
  • Unstable Fixed Point

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Historically, the flatness problem was first discussed during a time when \(\lambda \) was thought to be zero. If \(\lambda \) is not constrained to be zero, then the flatness problem should be re-phrased as the Einstein– de Sitter problem, i.e. the question is why the universe is (in some sense) close to the Einstein–de Sitter model (which is an unstable fixed point and a repulsor) today when \(|\lambda |\) and \(\varOmega \) can take on values between \(0\) and \(\infty \). However, for brevity I will continue to use the term ‘flatness problem’ even for the more general case and sometimes mention only the change in \(\varOmega \) with time.

References

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  1. Thomas-Mann-Str. 9, 63477, Maintal, Germany

    Phillip Helbig

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  1. Phillip Helbig
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Correspondence to Phillip Helbig .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic

    Jiří Bičák

  2. Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic

    Tomáš Ledvinka

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Helbig, P. (2014). Is There a Flatness Problem in Classical Cosmology?. In: Bičák, J., Ledvinka, T. (eds) Relativity and Gravitation. Springer Proceedings in Physics, vol 157. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-06761-2_50

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