Some Results on Causal Modalities in General Spacetimes

Causality is one of the fundamental structures of spacetimes, determining the possible behaviour and propagation of physical information.Causal structure can be analysed through the various modal logics it induces.The modal logics for the chronological and causal relations of the archetypal Minkowski spacetime have been classified.However, only partial results have been achieved for the strict variant of the causal relation, known as the after relation.Towards classification, it was shown by Shapirovsky and Shehtman that the after modality in Minkowski space satisfies a formula we call the 'after formula'.The present work continues this analysis towards arbitrary spacetimes.In particular, we prove that the after modality in any smooth spacetime satisfies the after formula.We introduce a related modal formula that demonstrates that the logic of two-dimensional spacetimes are more expressive than higher-dimensional ones.Lastly, we study the interrelation between the logical properties and physical properties along the causal ladder.

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Publication Details

Journal
Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science
Published
2026-06-28
DOI
https://doi.org/10.4204/eptcs.447.33
Primary Topic
Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Some Results on Causal Modalities in General Spacetimes

Marco Lewis, Nesta van der Schaaf
Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science
Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories
article

Some Results on Causal Modalities in General Spacetimes

Marco Lewis, Nesta van der Schaaf
article en

Abstract

Causality is one of the fundamental structures of spacetimes, determining the possible behaviour and propagation of physical information.Causal structure can be analysed through the various modal logics it induces.The modal logics for the chronological and causal relations of the archetypal Minkowski spacetime have been classified.However, only partial results have been achieved for the strict variant of the causal relation, known as the after relation.Towards classification, it was shown by Shapirovsky and Shehtman that the after modality in Minkowski space satisfies a formula we call the 'after formula'.The present work continues this analysis towards arbitrary spacetimes.In particular, we prove that the after modality in any smooth spacetime satisfies the after formula.We introduce a related modal formula that demonstrates that the logic of two-dimensional spacetimes are more expressive than higher-dimensional ones.Lastly, we study the interrelation between the logical properties and physical properties along the causal ladder.

Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer ScienceVol. 447
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), Université Paris-Saclay (FR), CentraleSupélec (FR)
Agence Nationale de la Recherche
Openalex Percentile: Top 7%
Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories
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