Some Results on Causal Modalities in General Spacetimes

Marco Lewis
(Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS, CentraleSupélec, ENS Paris-Saclay, Inria, Laboratoire Méthodes Formelles)
Nesta van der Schaaf
(Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS, CentraleSupélec, ENS Paris-Saclay, Inria, Laboratoire Méthodes Formelles)

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.

In Marta Bílková, Malvin Gattinger, Iris van der Giessen, Marianna Girlando and Yanjing Wang: Proceedings of the Sixteenth International Conference on Advances in Modal Logic (AiML 2026), Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 29-06-2026, Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science 447, pp. 584–602.
AiML 2026 proceedings version of arXiv.2601.14029
Published: 29th June 2026.

ArXived at: https://dx.doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.447.33 bibtex PDF
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