Empty black holes, firewalls, and the origin of Bekenstein-Hawking entropy.

We propose a novel solution for the endpoint of gravitational collapse, in which spacetime ends (and is orbifolded) at a microscopic distance from black hole event horizons. This model is motivated by the emergence of singular event horizons in the gravitational aether theory, a semiclassical solution to the cosmological constant problem(s) and thus suggests a catastrophic breakdown of general relativity close to black hole event horizons. A similar picture emerges in fuzzball models of black holes in string theory, as well as the recent firewall proposal to resolve the information paradox. We then demonstrate that positing a surface fluid in thermal equilibrium with Hawking radiation, with vanishing energy density (but nonvanishing pressure) at the new boundary of spacetime, which is required by Israel junction conditions, yields a thermodynamic entropy that is identical to the Bekenstein-Hawking area law, SBH, for charged rotating black holes. To our knowledge, this is the first derivation of black hole entropy that only employs local thermodynamics. Furthermore, a model for the microscopic degrees of freedom of the surface fluid (which constitute the microstates of the black hole) is suggested, which has a finite, but Lorentz-violating, quantum field theory. Finally, we comment on the effects of physical boundary on Hawking radiation and show that relaxing the assumption of equilibrium with Hawking radiation sets SBH as an upper limit for Black Hole entropy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]