History of Physics

In 1957, Feyerabend delivered a paper titled ‘On the Quantum-Theory of Measurement’ at the Colston Research Symposium in Bristol to sketch a completion of von Neumann's measurement scheme without collapse, using only unitary quantum dynamics and well-motivated statistical assumptions about macroscopic quantum systems. Feyerabend's paper has been recognised as an early contribution to quantum measurement, anticipating certain aspects of decoherence. Our paper reassesses the physical and philosophical content of Feyerabend's contribution, detailing the technical steps as well as its overall philosophical (...) motivations and consequences. Summarising our results, Feyerabend interpreted collapse as a positivist assumption in quantum mechanics leading to a strict distinction between the uninterpreted formalism of unitary evolution in quantum mechanics and the classically interpreted observational language describing post-measurement outcomes. Thus Feyerabend took the no-collapse completion of the von Neumann measurement scheme to show the dispensability of the positivist assumption, leading the way to a realistic interpretation of quantum theory. We note, however, that there are substantial problems with his account of measurement that bring into question its viability as a legitimate foil to the orthodox view. We further argue that his dissatisfaction with the von Neumann measurement scheme is indicative of early views on theoretical pluralism. (shrink)

In recent years, the hope to confirm the existence of dark matter by experimentally detecting it has diminished significantly. After more than 30 years of experimental searches, many of the most promising candidates have since been ruled out, leaving the epistemic and scientific condition of dark matter in a state of suspension. In efforts to improve the epistemic justification for the dark-matter hypothesis, physicists have turned to philosophical arguments and historical narratives. In this paper, I explicate two such strategies -- (...) explanatory unification and historical continuity -- applied in the context of dark matter. I argue that greater care and attention should be invested in the explanatory arguments to increase their strength, and that a survey of primary historical sources in astronomy renders the historical evidence for the continuity of dark matter substantially weaker. The quality and rigor of the philosophical and historical arguments which physicists are constructing could be substantially improved by increasing interdisciplinary practices. (shrink)

What constitutes a scientific discovery? What role do discoveries play in science, its dynamics and social practices? Must every discovery be attributed to an individual discoverer (or a small number of discoverers)? The paper explores these questions by first critically examining extant philosophical explications of scientific discovery—the models of scientific discovery, propounded by Kuhn, McArthur, Hudson, and Schindler. As a simple, natural and powerful alternative, we proffer the “change-driver model”: in a nutshell, it takes discoveries to be cognitive scientific results (...) that have epistemically advanced science. The model overcomes the shortcomings of its precursors, whilst preserving their insights. We demonstrate its intensional and extensional superiority, especially with respect to the link between scientific discoveries and the dynamics of science, as well as the award system of science. Both as an illustration, and as an application to a recent scientific and political controversy, we apply the considered models of discovery to one of the most momentous discoveries of science: the expansion of the universe. We oppose the 2018 proposal of the International Astronomers’ Union as too simplistic vis-`a-vis the historical complexity of the episode. The change- driver model yields a more nuanced and circumspect verdict: (i) The redshift-distance relation shouldn’t be named the “Hubble-Lemaître Law”, but “Slipher-Lundmark-Hubble-Humason Law”; (ii) Its interpretation in terms of an expanding universe, however, Lemaître ought to be given credit for; but (iii) The establishment of the expansion of the universe, as an evidentially sufficiently warranted result, is a communal achievement, emerging in the 1950s or 1960s. (shrink)

As is well known, Einstein was dissatisfied with the foundation of quantum theory and sought to find a basis for it that would have satisfied his need for a causal explanation. In this paper this abandoned idea is investigated. It is found that it is mathematically not dead at all. More in particular: a quantum mechanical U(1) gauge invariant Dirac equation can be derived from Einstein's gravity field equations. We ask ourselves what it means for physics, the history of physics (...) and for the actual discussion on foundations. (shrink)

We leave in a beautiful and uniform world, a world where everything probable is possible. Since the epic theory of relativity many scientists have embarked in a pursuit of astonishing theoretical fantasies, abandoning the prudent and logical path to scientific inquiry. The theory is a complex theoretical framework that facilitates the understanding of the universal laws of physics. It is based on the space-time continuum fabric abstract concept, and it is well suited for interpreting cosmic events. However, it is not (...) well suited for handling of small, local topics as global warming, local energy issues, and overall common humanity matters. We now forward may fancy theories and spend unimaginable effort to validate them, even when we are perhaps headed in a wrong direction. For example, in our times matters of climate changes are debated by politicians based on economical considerations that are as illogical as they come. The venerable paths of scientific method developed during centuries by prominent scientists and philosophers has been willingly ignored and abandoned for various and prejudiced purpose. Contact email: [email protected] . (shrink)

For two reasons, physics occupies a preeminent position among the sciences. On the one hand, due to its recognized position as a fundamental science, and on the other hand, due to the characteristic of its obvious certainty of knowledge. For both reasons it is regarded as the paradigm of scientificity par excellence. With its focus on the issue of epistemic certainty, philosophy of science follows in the footsteps of classical epistemology, and this is also the basis of its 'judicial' pretension (...) vis-à-vis physics. Whereas physics is in a strong competitive relationship to philosophy and epistemology with respect to its position as a fundamental science - even on the subject of cognition, as the pretension of 'reductionism' shows. It is the thematic focus on epistemic certainty itself, however, that becomes the root of a profound epistemological misunderstanding of physics. The reason for this is twofold: first, the idea of epistemic certainty as a criterion of 'demarcation' between physics and metaphysics obscures the view of the much deeper heuristic differences between the two kinds of knowledge. The second, related, reason is that epistemology does not ask the question of the reason for the epistemic certainty of physics; instead, it sets itself the task of 'legitimating' physical knowledge, and this, crucially, with reference to the interpretation of the process of cognition. Thus, as a matter of course, all epistemological assumptions about this process – including the common descriptive understanding of knowledge and its ontological premises – flow into the interpretation of physics as a science. Consequently, this undertaking is not only doubtful from the ground up, because it presupposes for its meaningfulness nothing less than certainty of knowledge concerning (the interpretation of) the process of knowledge, thereby relying on mere convictions; moreover, by projecting the descriptive, 'metaphysical' concept of knowledge onto physics, it leads to unsolvable epistemological problems and corresponding resignative conclusions concerning the claim of knowledge of physics. In other words, epistemology itself builds, due to its basic assumptions, a major obstacle for an adequate understanding of physics. Physics' cross-object, deconstructive approach to knowledge implies a completely different, non-descriptive understanding of its concepts, with consequences that extend far beyond itself due to its status as a basic science. (shrink)

Here we discuss and hope to solve a problem rooted in the necessity of the study of historical science, the slow deviation of physics education over the past century, and how the loss of crucial contextual tool has debilitated discussion of a very important yet specialized physics sub-topic: the isotropy of the one-way speed of light. Most notably, the information that appears to be most commonly missing is not simply the knowledge of the historical fact that Poincare and Lorentz presented (...) a mathematically equivalent representation of relativity theory contemporary with Einstein’s publication, but the most deleterious outcome is a lack of understanding of how that theory worked within a mechanical wave system to give the same results in all known experiments via an instrumentation-based illusion. Unfortunately those well educated in relativity theory, often haven’t been granted the advantage of contrast this history of development of the theory gives and thus some of the most direct and critical implications of modern theory are often lost on even graduate students. Chief among the implications that should be trivial to a student of relativity is the incompatibility of a mechanical wave concept of light with the modern assumptions of relativity. However, one should also be able to expect a graduate student to also easily comprehend the mathematical necessity of conjoining space with time is only descended from the presumption of isotropic constancy specifically, and further that the mechanics are one and the same as the relativity of simultaneity. However, many published papers appear to lack this understanding. The result is that the modern consensus appears to have arrived at the conclusion that the one-way speed of light is intrinsically untestable and therefore the physics community has accidentally pushed Minkowski spacetime, and most directly, the relativity of simultaneity, into the domain of pseudoscience, leaving only the historical relativistic “ether” described by Mansouri-Sexl test theory (AKA Lorentz Ether Theory) as the only workable alternative. This situation must be re-examined at the lowest possible level to arrive at an appropriate experimental regime. (shrink)

تحمل قصة وفاة آينشتين، والصور الملتقة له قبل وبعد وفاته مباشرةً، عدة رسائل: الأولى هي صدمة المجتمع العلمي والدولي إزاء فقدان كلماته الأخيرة، فلربما كانت أهم كلماته على الإطلاق؛ والثانية مسحة الحُزن التي كست وجهه، والتي اجتهد كثير من الباحثين في تفسيرها؛ والثالثة هي صورة مجلة الفلسفة على مكتبه، وأراها مُوجهة بصفة خاصة إلى كثرة من العلماء الذين استغرقتهم بحوثهم النظرية والعملية ونتائجها دون فهم أو تأمل لأبعادها الفلسفية.

We have been accustomed at least since Kant and mainstream history of philosophy to distinguish between the ‘mechanical’ and the ‘teleological’; between a fully mechanistic, quantitative science of Nature exemplified by Newton and a teleological, qualitative approach to living beings ultimately expressed in the concept of ‘organism’ – a purposive entity, or at least an entity possessed of functions. The beauty of this distinction is that it seems to make intuitive sense and to map onto historical and conceptual constellations in (...) medicine, physiology and the related natural -philosophical discussions on the status of the body versus that of the machine. In this presentation I argue that the distinction between mechanism and teleology is imprecise and flawed, on the basis of a series of examples: the presence of ‘functional’ or ‘purposive’ features even in Cartesian physiology; work such as that of Richard Lower’s on animal respiration; the fact that the model of the ‘body-machine’ is not at all a mechanistic reduction of organismic properties to basic physical properties but on the contrary a way of emphasizing the uniqueness of organic life; and the concept of ‘animal economy’ in vitalist medical theory, which I present as a kind of ‘teleo-mechanistic’ concept of organism – neither mechanical nor teleological. (shrink)

I praise Franklin's full descriptions of important and exemplary experiments, and wish that he had said more about why they are exemplary.

I argue for two main points in historiography of physics regarding the significance of Du Châtelet's Foundations of Physics in the development of mechanics. The first is that, despite Du Châtelet calling it a textbook in the Preface, it should not be understood as 'merely' a textbook. Instead, it fits in a tradition of women involved in natural philosophy in that era using liminal publication opportunities, and to reduce some of the resistance to their publication. Even these liminal opportunities were (...) rare and mostly available to women of very high social standing and wealth, who also happened to have supportive families or spouses, and were usually associated with some other well-known male thinker. The second point is that, even if we treat Foundations as a textbook, the way in which it synthesizes and refines work by Newton, Leibniz, Descartes, and others, meets the criteria given by Kuhn for the establishment of a first paradigm, which is not complete without such a definitive statement that enables the mop-up work characteristic of normal science. I conclude that by Kuhn's own criteria, he ought to have identified Du Châtelet as a key part of establishing the first paradigm in physics. She blazed a trail for others to follow. (shrink)

The self-interaction spin-2 approach to GR has been extremely influential in the particle physics community. Leaving no doubt regarding its heuristic value, we argue that any view of the metric field of GR as nothing but a stand-in for a self-coupling field in at spacetime runs into a dilemma: either the view is physically incomplete in so far as it requires recourse to GR after all, or it leads to an absurd multiplication of alternative viewpoints on GR rendering any understanding (...) of the metric field as nothing but a spin-2 field in at spacetime unjustified. (shrink)

It is widely acknowledged that the Galilean Relativity Principle, according to which the laws of classical systems are the same in all inertial frames in relative motion, has played an important role in the development of modern physics. It is also commonly believed that this principle holds the key to answering why, for example, we do not notice the orbital velocity of the Earth as we go about our day. And yet, I argue in this paper that the precise content (...) of this principle is ambiguous: standard presentations, in both physics and philosophy, fail to distinguish between two principles that are ultimately inequivalent, the “External Galilean Relativity Principle” (EGRP) and the “Internal Galilean Relativity Principle” (IGRP). I demonstrate that EGRP and IGRP play distinct roles in physics practice (e.g., EGRP is connected to the concept of Galilean invariance, but IGRP is not) and that many classical systems that satisfy IGRP fail to satisfy EGRP. I further show that the Relativity Principle introduced by Einstein in 1905—which is not restricted to classical systems—also leads to two inequivalent principles, an external one analogous to EGRP, and an internal one analogous to IGRP. I conclude by noting that the phenomenon originally captured by Galileo’s famous ship passage is much more general than contemporary discussions in the philosophy of symmetries suggest. (shrink)

Scientific realists with traditional semantic inclinations are often pressed to explain away the distinguished series of referential failures that seem to plague our best past science. As recent debates make it particularly vivid, a central challenge is to find a reliable and principled way to assess referential success at the time a theory is still a live concern. In this paper, I argue that this is best done in the case of physics by examining whether the putative referent of a (...) term is specifiable within the limited domain delineated by the range of parameters over which the theory at stake is empirically accurate. I first implement this selective principle into a general account of reference, building on Stathis Psillos's works. Then, I show that this account offers a remarkably reliable basis to assess referential success before theory change in the case of effective theories. Finally, I briefly show that this account still works well with other physical examples and explain how it helps us to handle problematic cases in the history of physical sciences. (shrink)

Renormalisation Group (RG) methods are one of the theoretical masterpieces of postwar physics whose historical development still remains largely unexplored. This article traces the origins of Kenneth Wilson's RG from 1956 to 1965, with a particular focus on its relationship to Murray Gell-Mann and Francis Low's RG published in 1954. I argue that there is ultimately little methodological and conceptual continuity between their respective versions. The article briefly concludes with the evolution of the Wilsonian RG from 1965 to the early (...) 1970s. (shrink)

Boris Hessen’s 1931 paper, The Socio-Economic Roots of Newton’s Principia, has often been pointed out as a precursor to externalist approaches to history of science, yet a more systematic approach to Hessen and his overall oeuvre has been missing. Sean Winkler seeks to provide a systematic introduction to the work of Hessen, emphasizing his contributions to Marxist history and philosophy of science. The book is composed of four chapters and an appendix of translations of Hessen’s entries on physics in the (...) Great Soviet Encyclopedia. In the first chapter, we get a reconstruction of some of the basic concepts that Hessen deployed, namely, the concepts of ideology and practice. Winkler situates Hessen’s work in the context of debates in Soviet philosophy in the 1920s between the mechanists and the Deborinites over how to interpret the relationship between dialectical materialism and the natural sciences. Both parties to the debate accepted that Marxist philosophy must base itself on science. The debate was over what it means to say that philosophy must base itself on science. The mechanists thought that to base philosophy on science was to liquidate philosophy. The Deborinites, by contrast, thought that philosophy was inescapable and that it cannot be liquidated in the name of science without burdening science with inadequate and unexamined philosophical assumptions. Hessen sided with the Deborinites. (shrink)

Les conceptions que les étudiants en sciences ont de la nature des modèles scientifiques conduisent à une image inexacte de ceux-ci, notamment lorsque les modèles sont vus comme de simples copies de la réalité. Outre le fait qu’elle en-tretient une conception fausse de la nature de la science, cette façon de se figurer les modèles peut constituer un obstacle pédagogique à l’apprentissage. Objec-tifs : Nous évaluons l’épistémologie de Mario Bunge afin de déterminer si elle peut contribuer à résoudre les problèmes (...) liés à la nature des modèles dans un contexte d’enseignement des sciences. Approche : Après avoir identifié les principales ca-tégories des modèles chez Bunge, nous les employons pour examiner divers as-pects du développement historique des modèles atomiques, puis nous appli-quons le cadre théorique ainsi obtenu aux problèmes liés aux diverses concep-tions des modèles en enseignement des sciences. Participants : En raison de la nature théorique de cette recherche, cette étude ne fait pas appel à des partici-pants autres que les chercheurs des recherches mentionnées. Collecte et analyse des données : Nous avons effectué une analyse comparative constante afin d’identifier les schémas de signification communs au cas historique et au cadre théorique. Résultats : Les caractéristiques attribuées aux modèles par Bunge ont été identifiées dans le cas des modèles atomiques. Ces caractéristiques forment un point de vue cohérent et permettent d’aborder, dans le contexte de l’enseignement des sciences, plusieurs questions liées aux diverses conceptions des modèles. (shrink)

This article reconstructs the history of the personal archives of Galileo and his followers, from their creation until they became public property with the establishment of the Galileo Collection at the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale in Florence. It shows how the motives of their curators reflected changing attitudes to the role of scientific culture in Italy.

Special issue: "Henri Bergson. Creative Evolution and Philosophy of Life." -/- I read the genealogy of the concept of energy through Bergson's Creative Evolution to argue that, historically, energy and its proto-concepts are grounded in spatialized notions of time. Bergson's work not only demands that we rethink energy and its relation to time, it also allows us to see that the concept of energy as we know it depicts time and materiality as a numerical multiplicity, which effaces the differences in (...) kind which are characteristic of energy transformations and real duration. To make this case, I first provide an analysis of Bergson’s concept of the cinematographical mechanism of thought, which splits duration into a composition of distinct states strung together by the idea of an impersonal becoming. Bergson claimed that this is the epistemological model for both ancient philosophy and modern science, meaning that it is also the epistemological ground within which energy concepts in western philosophy and science have been theorized. I then show how Bergson offers a way to overcome this model of theorizing through his method of intuition, and how these conclusions might be extended to future energy concepts. Thus, I argue that 1) Bergson’s work on duration allow us to interpret the genealogy of energy as the history of attempts to provide an account of change in terms of spatialized notions of time; 2) that his work offers a way of incorporating historicity into our understanding of energy; and 3) that thinking energy in the context of duration offers the possibility of conceptualizing energy as change. (shrink)

This paper recovers an important, century-old debate regarding the methodological and metaphysical foundations of dimensional analysis. Consideration of Richard Tolman's failed attempt to install the principle of similitude---the relativity of size---as the founding principle of dimensional analysis both clarifies the method of dimensional analysis and articulates two metaphysical positions regarding quantity dimensions. Tolman's position is quantity dimension fundamentalism. This is a commitment to dimensional realism and a set of fundamental dimensions which ground all further dimensions. The opposing position, developed primarily (...) by Bridgman, is quantity dimension conventionalism. Conventionalism is an anti-realism regarding dimensional structure, holding our non-representational dimensional systems have basic quantity dimensions fixed only by convention. This metaphysical dispute was left somewhat unsettled. It is shown here that both of these positions face serious problems: fundamentalists are committed to surplus dimensional structure; conventionalists cannot account for empirical constraints on our dimensional systems nor the empirical success of dimensional analysis. It is shown that an alternative position is available which saves what is right in both: quantity dimension functionalism. (shrink)

A supplement to "Metaphysics and Convention in Dimensional Analysis, 1914-1917" in HOPOS. Includes a transcription of the correspondence along with an editorial introduction and expository notes.

Physicist Percy Bridgman has been taken by Heather Douglas to be an exemplar defender of an untenable value-free ideal for science. This picture is complicated by a detailed study of Bridgman's philosophical views of the relation between science and society. The normative autonomy of science, a version of the value-free ideal, is defended. This restriction on the provenance of permissible values in science is given a basis in Bridgman's broader philosophical commitments, most importantly, his view that science is primarily an (...) individual commitment to a set of epistemic norms and values. Considerations of external moral or social values are not, on this view, intrinsic to scientific practice, though they have a broader pragmatic significance. What Bridgman takes as the proper relation between science and society is shown through analysis of his many writings on the topic and consideration of his rarely remarked upon involvement in the most problematic example of "Big Science" of his day: the atomic bomb. A reevaluation of Bridgman's views provides a unique characterization of what is at stake in the values in science debate: the normative autonomy of science. (shrink)

The early history of string theory is marked by a shift from strong interaction physics to quantum gravity. The first string models and associated theoretical framework were formulated in the late 1960s and early 1970s in the context of the S-matrix program for the strong interactions. In the mid-1970s, the models were reinterpreted as a potential theory unifying the four fundamental forces. This paper provides a historical analysis of how string theory was developed out of S-matrix physics, aiming to clarify (...) how modern string theory, as a theory detached from experimental data, grew out of an S-matrix program that was strongly dependent upon observable quantities. Surprisingly, the theoretical practice of physicists already turned away from experiment before string theory was recast as a potential unified quantum gravity theory. With the formulation of dual resonance models (the “hadronic string theory”), physicists were able to determine almost all of the models' parameters on the basis of theoretical reasoning. It was this commitment to “non-arbitrariness”, i.e., a lack of free parameters in the theory, that initially drove string theorists away from experimental input, and not the practical inaccessibility of experimental data in the context of quantum gravity physics. This is an important observation when assessing the role of experimental data in string theory. (shrink)

Aristotle argues that time depends on soul to count it, but adds that motion, which makes time what it is, may be independent of soul. The claim that time depends on soul or mind implies that there is at least one measurable property of natural beings that exists because of the mind’s activity. This paper argues that for Aristotle time depends partly on soul, but more importantly on motion, which defines a continuum. This argument offers a robust metaphysics of time. (...) In contrast to modern philosophy of physics, for Aristotle the continuum of motion is prior in being to time, while time is a hybrid of the real continuum of motion and the activity of mind. (shrink)

Neste livro reunimos alguns dos trabalhos apresentados no GT Filosofia, História e Sociologia da Ciência e da Tecnologia, durante o XIX Encontro Nacional da ANPOF, realizado em Goiânia, de 10 a 14 de outubro de 2022. Agradecemos aos autores e às autoras que contribuíram com seus textos para a realização deste projeto. Esperamos que os leitores e as leitoras aproveitem o rico material filosófico presente neste livro.

We present an epistemological schema of natural sciences inspired by Peirce's pragmaticist view, stressing the role of the \emph{phenomenological map}, that connects reality and our ideas about it. The schema has a recognisable mathematical/logical structure which allows to explore some of its consequences. We show that seemingly independent principles as the requirement of reproducibility of experiments and the Principle of Sufficient Reason are both implied by the schema, as well as Popper's concept of falsifiability. We show that the schema has (...) some power in demarcating science by first comparing with an alternative schema advanced during the first part of the 20th century which has its roots in Hertz and has been developed by Einstein and Popper. Further, the identified differences allow us to focus in the construction of Special Relativity, showing that it uses an intuited concept of velocity that does not satisfy the requirements of reality in Peirce. While the main mathematical observation connected with this issue has been known for more than a century, it has not been investigated from an epistemological point of view. A probable reason could be that the socially dominating epistemology in physics does not encourage such line of work. We briefly discuss the relation of the abduction process presented in this work with discussions regarding ``abduction'' in the literature and its relation with ``analogy''. (shrink)

In this paper, we analyse conceptions of induction and certainty in Wolff and Crusius, highlighting their competing conceptions of physics. We discuss (i) the perspective of Wolff, who assigned induction an important role in physics, but argued that physics should be an axiomatic science containing certain statements, and (ii) the perspective of Crusius, who adopted parts of the ideal of axiomatic physics but criticized the scope of Wolff’s ideal of certain science. Against interpretations that take Wolff’s proofs in physics to (...) be based on empirical statements that are probable, we show how inductively established statements, coupled with assumptions concerning the uniformity of nature, can be certain according to Wolff. We examine Crusius’ little known work on physics and show that he attacked Wolff, arguing that many statements of physics are probable. We provide a discussion of the reception of methodological rules similar to Newton’s Regulae Philosophandi, discussing different interpretations of such rules. We conclude by briefly hinting at how the debate between Wolff and Crusius provides historical context for understanding Kant’s philosophy of natural science. (shrink)

I examine Du Châtelet’s methodology for physics and metaphysics through the lens of her engagement with Newton’s Rules for Reasoning in Natural Philosophy. I first show that her early manuscript writings discuss and endorse these Rules. Then, I argue that her famous published account of hypotheses continues to invoke close analogues of Rules 3 and 4, despite various developments in her position. Once relevant experimental evidence and some basic constraints are met, it is legitimate to inductively generalize from observations; general (...) hypotheses can thereafter be assumed as true until contrary experiments show otherwise. I conclude by arguing that this account of induction plays an essential role in her metaphysics, both in an argument for simple substances—which has an inductive premise—and in her attempt to distinguish acceptable and unacceptable metaphysical commitments. (shrink)

From classical mechanics, in particular the motion in a straight line, together set theory and ordinal number theory, we prove a not-classical behaviour, a discontinuous motion and emission.

Taking the formal analogies between black holes and classical thermodynamics seriously seems to first require that classical thermodynamics applies in relativistic regimes. Yet, by scrutinizing how classical temperature is extended into special relativity, I argue that the concept falls apart. I examine four consilient procedures for establishing the classical temperature: the Carnot process, the thermometer, kinetic theory, and black-body radiation. I argue that their relativistic counterparts demonstrate no such consilience in defining the relativistic temperature. As such, classical temperature doesn’t appear (...) to survive a relativistic extension. I suggest two interpretations for this situation: eliminativism akin to simultaneity, or pluralism akin to rotation. (shrink)

According to Peter Galison, the coordination of different “subcultures” within a scientific field happens through local exchanges within “trading zones.” In his view, the workability of such trading zones is not guaranteed, and science is not necessarily driven towards further integration. In this paper, we develop and apply quantitative methods (using semantic, authorship, and citation data from scientific literature), inspired by Galison’s framework, to the case of the disunity of high-energy physics. We give prominence to supersymmetry, a concept that has (...) given rise to several major but distinct research programs in the field, such as the formulation of a consistent theory of quantum gravity or the search for new particles. We show that “theory” and “phenomenology” in high-energy physics should be regarded as distinct theoretical subcultures, between which supersymmetry has helped sustain scientific “trades.” However, as we demonstrate using a topic model, the phenomenological component of supersymmetry research has lost traction and the ability of supersymmetry to tie these subcultures together is now compromised. Our work supports that even fields with an initially strong sentiment of unity may eventually generate diverging research programs and demonstrates the fruitfulness of the notion of trading zones for informing quantitative approaches to scientific pluralism. (shrink)

The book's purpose is to provide readers with a comprehensive understanding of the interplay between physics and philosophy in the historical context of the 19th century. Through an elaborate examination of the influence of mechanistic philosophy, the evolution of ontology, and the emergence of energy, the author aims to explain the phenomenological laws of thermodynamics in the framework of the mechanical approach. Additionally, the book delves into the introduction of field theory and the beginning decline of the mechanical approach. In (...) essence, this book is a journey that takes you through the most significant milestones of the 19th century in the realm of physics. It illuminates a theoretical framework, i.e., critical rationalism, that facilitates examining the interaction between physics and metaphysics. With the unraveling of history and the preparation of philosophical thought, the book prepares the reader for the eventual abandonment of the 'ether' and paves the way for the birth of the theories of relativity and quantum mechanics. (shrink)

The paper discusses this year’s Nobel Prize in physics for experiments of entanglement “establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science” in a much wider, including philosophical context legitimizing by the authority of the Nobel Prize a new scientific area out of “classical” quantum mechanics relevant to Pauli’s “particle” paradigm of energy conservation and thus to the Standard model obeying it. One justifies the eventual future theory of quantum gravitation as belonging to the newly established quantum information (...) science. Entanglement, involving non-Hermitian operators for its rigorous description, non-unitarity as well as nonlocal and superluminal physical signals “spookily” (by Einstein’s flowery epithet) synchronizing and transferring some nonzero action at a distance, can be considered to be quantum gravity so that its local counterpart to be Einstein’s gravitation according to general relativity therefore pioneering an alternative pathway to quantum gravitation different from the “secondary quantization” of the Standard model. So, the experiments of entanglement once they have been awarded by the Nobel Prize launch particularly the relevant theory of quantum gravitation grounded on “quantum information science” thus granted to be nonclassical quantum mechanics in the shared framework of the generalized quantum mechanics obeying rather quantum-information conservation than only energy conservation. The concept of “dark phase” of the universe naturally linked to the very well confirmed “dark matter” and “dark energy” and opposed to its “light phase” inherent to classical quantum mechanics and the Standard model obeys quantum-information conservation, after which reversible causality or the mutual transformation of energy and information are valid. The mythical Big Bang after which energy conservation holds universally is to be replaced by an omnipresent and omnitemporal medium of decoherence of the dark and nonlocal phase into the light and local phase. The former is only an integral image of the latter and borrowed in fact rather from religion than from science. Physical, methodological and proper philosophical conclusions follow from that paradigm shift heralded by this year’s Nobel Prize in physics. For example, the scientific theory of thinking should originate from the dark phase of the universe, as well: probably only approximately modeled by neural networks physically belonging to the light phase thoroughly. A few crucial philosophical sequences follow from the break of Pauli’s paradigm: (1) the establishment of the “dark” phase of the universe as opposed to its “light” phase, only to which the Cartesian dichotomy of “body” and “mind” is valid; (2) quantum information conservation as relevant to the dark phase, furthermore generalizing energy conservation as to its light phase, productively allowing for physical entities to appear “ex nihilo”, i.e., from the dark phase, in which energy and time are yet inseparable from each other; (3) reversible causality as inherent to the dark phase; (4) the interpretation of gravitation only mathematically: as an interpretation of the incompleteness of finiteness to infinity, for example, following the Gödel dichotomy (“either contradiction or incompleteness”) about the relation of arithmetic to set theory; (5) the restriction of the concept of hierarchy only to the light phase; (6) the commensurability of both physical extremes of a quantum and the universe as a whole in the dark phase obeying quantum information conservation and akin to Nicholas of Cusa’s philosophical and theological worldview. (shrink)

Bohm’s interpretation of quantum mechanics has generally been received as an attempt to restore the determinism of classical physics. However, although this interpretation, as Bohm initially proposed it in 1952, does indeed have the feature of being deterministic, for Bohm this was never the main point. In fact, in other publications and in correspondence from this period, he argued that the assumption that nature is deterministic is unjustified and should be abandoned. Whereas it has been argued before that Bohm’s commitment (...) to determinism was connected to his interest in Marxism, I argue for the opposite: Bohm found resources in Marxist philosophy for developing a nondeterministic notion of causality, which is based on the idea of infinite complexity and an infinite number of levels of nature. From ca. 1954 onwards, Bohm’s conception of causality further weakened, as he developed the idea of a dialectical relation between causality and chance. (shrink)

[Accepted for publication in Lakatos's Undone Work: The Practical Turn and the Division of Philosophy of Mathematics and Philosophy of Science, special issue of Kriterion: Journal of Philosophy. Edited by S. Nagler, H. Pilin, and D. Sarikaya.] Lakatos’s analysis of progress and degeneration in the Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes is well-known. Less known, however, are his thoughts on degeneration in Proofs and Refutations. I propose and motivate two new criteria for degeneration based on the discussion in Proofs and Refutations (...) – superfluity and authoritarianism. I show how these criteria augment the account in Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes, providing a generalized Lakatosian account of progress and degeneration. I then apply this generalized account to a key transition point in the history of entropy – the transition to an information-theoretic interpretation of entropy – by assessing Jaynes’s 1957 paper on information theory and statistical mechanics. (shrink)

The concept of inertial frame of reference in classical physics and special theory of relativity is analysed. It has been shown that this fundamental concept of physics is not clear enough. A definition of inertial frame of reference is proposed which expresses its key inherent property. The definition is operational and powerful. Many other properties of inertial frames follow from the definition, or it makes them plausible. In particular, the definition shows why physical laws obey space and time symmetries and (...) the principle of relativity, it resolves the problem of clock synchronization and the role of light in it, as well as the problem of the geometry of inertial frames. (shrink)

In this paper I reconstruct and discuss Antonio Rubio (1546-1615)’s theory of the composition of the continuum, as set out in his Tractatus de compositione continui, a part of his influential commentary on Aristotle’s Physics, published in 1605 but rewritten in 1606. Here I attempt especially to show that Rubio’s is a significant case of Scholastic overlapping between Aristotle’s theory of infinitely divisible parts and indivisibilism or ‘Zenonism’, i.e. the theory that allows for indivisibles, extensionless points, lines, and surfaces, which (...) are supposed to take part in the composition of the continuum. Even if such a syncretic tendency was, in many different ways, already developing in the medieval period and then at the end of the sixteenth century, Rubio’s position is indeed peculiar. He maintains that indivisibles are real and actual, infinite in act, really distinct from each other, and that, although they indwell in substance, indivisibles do not contribute directly to the constitution of the continuum. In this reconstruction, I emphasize notably Rubio’s usage of mereological notions like those of part, whole, completeness and incompleteness. (shrink)

Discovering laws of nature was a way to worship a law-giving God, during the Scientific Revolution. So why should we consider it worthwhile now, in our own more secularized science? For historical perspective, I examine two competing early modern theological traditions that related laws of nature to different divine attributes, and their secular legacy in views ranging from Kant and Nietzsche to Humean and ‘governing’ accounts in recent analytic metaphysics. Tracing these branching offshoots of ethically charged God-concepts sheds light on (...) how our ethical ideals and ideas of natural order can still be valuably integrated. Early modern intellectualists valued the law-governed order of nature as a sign of divine Reason. In turn, Reason traditionally ascribed to God has now been partly reclaimed for humans, reframing the value of natural order anthropocentrically, in terms of the value of our own intelligence. Alternatively, Reason may be reclaimed for nature itself, as in an ‘objective’ idealism or metaphysical rationalism. However, beyond divine Reason, an influential voluntarist tradition in theology stressed a connection between laws of nature and God’s Power or free Will. Tracking how divine Power has been reinvested in human beings provides a broader context for instrumentalism and related lineages of empiricism. But secularization can also transfer Power from God to the impersonal natural world. In this light, current scientific interest in lawlike order may also reflect the inherent value of brute necessity or inhuman causal power in nature: this is a deeper way to reject anthropocentrism and to show our respect for the environment. (shrink)

Hermann Weyl was one of the most important figures involved in the early elaboration of the general theory of relativity and its fundamentally geometrical spacetime picture of the world. Weyl’s development of “pure infinitesimal geometry” out of relativity theory was the basis of his remarkable attempt at unifying gravitation and electromagnetism. Many interpreters have focused primarily on Weyl’s philosophical influences, especially the influence of Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology, as the motivation for these efforts. In this article, I argue both that these (...) efforts are most naturally understood as an outgrowth of the distinctive mathematical-physical tradition in Göttingen and also that phenomenology has little to no constructive role to play in them. (shrink)

This paper is on Descartes’ account of modality and, in particular, his account of the necessity of the laws of nature. He famously argues that the necessity of the “eternal truths” of logic and mathematics depends on God’s will. Here I suggest he has the same view about the necessity of the laws of nature. Further, I argue, this is a plausible theory of laws. For philosophers often talk about something being nomologically or physically necessary because of the laws of (...) nature, but this necessity is thought to be metaphysically contingent. However, they struggle to explain how the laws could be genuinely necessary while being metaphysically contingent. The chief advantage of Descartes view, I argue, is that God’s will can plausibly explain both the necessity of the laws and the contingency of the laws. So, Descartes’ theistic account of laws provides a plausible explanation, perhaps the best explanation, of the contingent-necessity of laws of nature. (shrink)

This essay explores Kaila's interpretation of the special theory of relativity. Although the relevance of his work to logical empiricism is well-known, not much has been written on what Kaila calls the ‘Einstein-Minkowski invariance theory’. Kaila's interpretation focuses on two salient features. First, he emphasizes the importance of the invariance of the spacetime interval. The general point about spacetime invariance has been known at least since Minkowski, yet Kaila applies his overall tripartite theory of invariances to space, time and spacetime (...) in an original way. Second, Kaila provides a non-conventionalist argument for the isotropic speed of electromagnetic signals. The standard Einstein synchrony is not a mere convention but a part of a larger empirical theory. According to Kaila's holistic principle of testability, which stands in contrast to the theses of translatability and verification, different items in the theory cannot be sharply divided into conventional and empirical. Kaila's invariantism/non-conventionalism about relativity reflects an interesting case in the gradual transition from positivism to realism within the philosophy of science. (shrink)

The model of a closed linear measure space, which can be used to model Aristotle’s treatment of motion (kinesis), can be analogically extended to the qualitative ‘spaces’ implied by his theory of contraries in Physics I and in Metaphysics Iota, and to the dimensionless ‘space’ of the unity of matter and form discussed in book Eta of the Metaphysics. By examining Aristotle’s remarks on contraries, the subject of change, continuity, and the unity of matter and form, Aristotle’s thoughts on motion, (...) on contraries, and on the unity of substance can be brought together under a single interpretive framework, which can provide an approach to interpreting his ontology. (shrink)

Conventional wisdom holds that the von Neumann entropy corresponds to thermodynamic entropy, but Hemmo and Shenker (2006) have recently argued against this view by attacking von Neumann's (1955) argument. I argue that Hemmo and Shenker's arguments fail due to several misunderstandings: about statistical-mechanical and thermodynamic domains of applicability, about the nature of mixed states, and about the role of approximations in physics. As a result, their arguments fail in all cases: in the single-particle case, the finite particles case, and the (...) infinite particles case. (shrink)

Hermann von Helmholtz hat als Naturforscher sowohl die Physik als auch die Physiologie um eine beeindruckende Anzahl grundlegender Erkenntnisse bereichert, ihr heutiges Selbstverständnis entscheidend mitgeprägt, ihre Verfahren auf neue Gegenstandsbereiche angewendet und war führend an ihrem institutionellen Ausbau zu Laborwissenschaften beteiligt.

The main objective of this dissertation is to philosophically assess how the use of informational concepts in the field of classical thermostatistical physics has historically evolved from the late 1940s to the present day. I will first analyze in depth the main notions that form the conceptual basis on which 'informational physics' historically unfolded, encompassing (i) different entropy, probability and information notions, (ii) their multiple interpretative variations, and (iii) the formal, numerical and semantic-interpretative relationships among them. In the following, I (...) will assess the history of informational thermophysics during the second half of the twentieth century. Firstly, I analyse the intellectual factors that gave rise to this current in the late forties (i.e., popularization of Shannon's theory, interest in a naturalized epistemology of science, etc.), then study its consolidation in the Brillouinian and Jaynesian programs, and finally claim how Carnap (1977) and his disciples tried to criticize this tendency within the scientific community. Then, I evaluate how informational physics became a predominant intellectual current in the scientific community in the nineties, made possible by the convergence of Jaynesianism and Brillouinism in proposals such as that of Tribus and McIrvine (1971) or Bekenstein (1973) and the application of algorithmic information theory into the thermophysical domain. As a sign of its radicality at this historical stage, I explore the main proposals to include information as part of our physical reality, such as Wheeler’s (1990), Stonier’s (1990) or Landauer’s (1991), detailing the main philosophical arguments (e.g., Timpson, 2013; Lombardi et al. 2016a) against those inflationary attitudes towards information. Following this historical assessment, I systematically analyze whether the descriptive exploitation of informational concepts has historically contributed to providing us with knowledge of thermophysical reality via (i) explaining thermal processes such as equilibrium approximation, (ii) advantageously predicting thermal phenomena, or (iii) enabling understanding of thermal property such as thermodynamic entropy. I argue that these epistemic shortcomings would make it impossible to draw ontological conclusions in a justified way about the physical nature of information. In conclusion, I will argue that the historical exploitation of informational concepts has not contributed significantly to the epistemic progress of thermophysics. This would lead to characterize informational proposals as 'degenerate science' (à la Lakatos 1978a) regarding classical thermostatistical physics or as theoretically underdeveloped regarding the study of the cognitive dynamics of scientists in this physical domain. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to show that a comprehensive account of the role of representations in science should reconsider some neglected theses of the classical philosophy of science proposed in the first decades of the 20th century. More precisely, it is argued that the accounts of Helmholtz and Hertz may be taken as prototypes of representational accounts in which structure preservation plays an essential role. Following Reichenbach, structure-preserving representations provide a useful device for formulating an up-to-date version of (...) a (relativized) Kantian a priori. An essential feature of modern scientific representations is their mathematical character. That is, representations can be conceived as (partially) structure-preserving maps or functions. This observation suggests an interesting but neglected perspective on the history and philosophy of this concept, namely, that structure-preserving representations are closely related to a priori elements of scientific knowledge. Reichenbach’s early theory of a relativized constitutive but non-apodictic a priori component of scientific knowledge provides a further elaboration of Kantian aspects of scientific representation. To cope with the dynamic aspects of the evolution of scientific knowledge, Cassirer proposed a re-interpretation of the concept of representation that conceived of a particular representation as only one phase in a continuous process determined by pragmatic considerations. Pragmatic aspects of representations are further elaborated in the classical account of C.I. Lewis and the more modern of Hasok Chang. (shrink)

The paper investigates the understanding of quantum indistinguishability after quantum information in comparison with the “classical” quantum mechanics based on the separable complex Hilbert space. The two oppositions, correspondingly “distinguishability / indistinguishability” and “classical / quantum”, available implicitly in the concept of quantum indistinguishability can be interpreted as two “missing” bits of classical information, which are to be added after teleportation of quantum information to be restored the initial state unambiguously. That new understanding of quantum indistinguishability is linked to the (...) distinction of classical (Maxwell-Boltzmann) versus quantum (either Fermi-Dirac or Bose-Einstein) statistics. The latter can be generalized to classes of wave functions (“empty” qubits) and represented exhaustively in Hilbert arithmetic therefore connectible to the foundations of mathematics, more precisely, to the interrelations of propositional logic and set theory sharing the structure of Boolean algebra and two anti-isometric copies of Peano arithmetic. (shrink)