Item

Abstract

Maximum entropy principle and Souriau's symplectic generalization of Gibbs
states have provided crucial insights leading to extensions of standard
equilibrium statistical mechanics and thermodynamics. In this brief
contribution, we show how such extensions are instrumental in the setting of
discrete quantum gravity, towards providing a covariant statistical framework
for the emergence of continuum spacetime. We discuss the significant role
played by information-theoretic characterizations of equilibrium. We present
the Gibbs state description of the geometry of a tetrahedron and its
quantization, thereby providing a statistical description of the characterizing
quanta of space in quantum gravity. We use field coherent states for a
generalized Gibbs state to write an effective statistical field theory that
perturbatively generates 2-complexes, which are discrete spacetime histories in
several quantum gravity approaches.