The Spacetime View of the Information Paradox

Understand

In semiclassical gravity, the final state of black-hole evaporation cannot be described by a pure state.

• Nevertheless, we point out that the system can be described by a generalized pure state, which is not defined on a 3-dimensional hypersurface but on the 4-dimensional spacetime describing the whole Universe at all times.
• Unlike the conventional quantum state, such a generalized state treats time on an equal footing with space, which makes it well suited for systems that are both quantum and relativistic.
• In particular, such a generalized state contains a novel type of information encoded in the correlations between future and past, which avoids the black-hole information paradox.