Diederik Bots

The Einstein Field Equations by themselves are somewhat vacuous, in the sense that for any specific metric they will always spit out a specific stress-energy tensor regardless of whether it is physically realistic. Much of the physics only comes in when restricting stress-energy tensors by imposing various so-called energy conditions—a significant part of the success of general relativity stems from various theorems which have some energy conditions as a premise. Diederik's bachelor thesis in physics critically evaluates the motivation and justification for the four main classical energy conditions, and analyses various violations of these energy conditions. His thesis concludes that although complete abandonment is not necessary, the classical energy conditions can no longer be seen as fundamental parts of general relativity and their consequences should come with substantial asterisks.