The Small Scale Structure of Spacetime

Abstract

Several lines of evidence hint that quantum gravity at very small distances may be effectively two-dimensional. I summarize the evidence for such ``spontaneous dimensional reduction,'' and suggest an additional argument coming from the strong-coupling limit of the Wheeler-DeWitt equation. If this description proves to be correct, it suggests a fascinating relationship between small-scale quantum spacetime and the behavior of cosmologies near an asymptotically silent singularity.

14 pages, two eps figures; to appear in Foundations of Space and Time, edited by George Ellis, Jeff Murugan, Amanda Weltman (Cambridge University Press)