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  1. (1 other version)A precipice below which lies absurdity? Theories without a spacetime and scientific understanding.Henk W. de Regt & Sebastian De Haro - 2020 - Synthese 197 (7):3121-3149.
    While the relation between visualization and scientific understanding has been a topic of long-standing discussion, recent developments in physics have pushed the boundaries of this debate to new and still unexplored realms. For it is claimed that, in certain theories of quantum gravity, spacetime ‘disappears’: and this suggests that one may have sensible physical theories in which spacetime is completely absent. This makes the philosophical question whether such theories are intelligible, even more pressing. And if such theories are intelligible, the (...)
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  • Motivating dualities.James Read & Thomas Møller-Nielsen - 2020 - Synthese 197 (1):263-291.
    There exists a common view that for theories related by a ‘duality’, dual models typically may be taken ab initio to represent the same physical state of affairs, i.e. to correspond to the same possible world. We question this view, by drawing a parallel with the distinction between ‘interpretational’ and ‘motivational’ approaches to symmetries.
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  • Galileo’s Gauge: Understanding the Empirical Significance of Gauge Symmetry.Nicholas J. Teh - 2016 - Philosophy of Science 83 (1):93-118.
    This article investigates and resolves the question whether gauge symmetry can display analogs of the famous Galileo’s ship scenario. In doing so, it builds on and clarifies the work of Greaves and Wallace on this subject.
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  • Gauge Symmetries, Symmetry Breaking, and Gauge-Invariant Approaches.Philipp Berghofer, Jordan François, Simon Friederich, Henrique Gomes, Guy Hetzroni, Axel Maas & René Sondenheimer - 2023 - Cambridge University Press.
    Gauge symmetries play a central role, both in the mathematical foundations as well as the conceptual construction of modern (particle) physics theories. However, it is yet unclear whether they form a necessary component of theories, or whether they can be eliminated. It is also unclear whether they are merely an auxiliary tool to simplify (and possibly localize) calculations or whether they contain independent information. Therefore their status, both in physics and philosophy of physics, remains to be fully clarified. In this (...)
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  • (1 other version)Part 2: Theoretical equivalence in physics.James Owen Weatherall - 2019 - Philosophy Compass 14 (5):e12591.
    I review the philosophical literature on the question of when two physical theories are equivalent. This includes a discussion of empirical equivalence, which is often taken to be necessary, and sometimes taken to be sufficient, for theoretical equivalence; and “interpretational” equivalence, which is the idea that two theories are equivalent just in case they have the same interpretation. It also includes a discussion of several formal notions of equivalence that have been considered in the recent philosophical literature, including (generalized) definitional (...)
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  • On symmetry and duality.Sebastian De Haro & Jeremy Butterfield - 2021 - Synthese 198 (4):2973-3013.
    We advocate an account of dualities between physical theories: the basic idea is that dual theories are isomorphic representations of a common core. We defend and illustrate this account, which we call a Schema, in relation to symmetries. Overall, the account meshes well with standard treatments of symmetries. But the distinction between the common core and the dual theories prompts a distinction between three kinds of symmetry: which we call ‘stipulated’, ‘accidental’ and ‘proper’.
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  • Duality, Fundamentality, and Emergence.Elena Castellani & Sebastian De Haro - unknown
    We argue that dualities offer new possibilities for relating fundamentality, levels, and emergence. Namely, dualities often relate two theories whose hierarchies of levels are inverted relative to each other, and so allow for new fundamentality relations, as well as for epistemic emergence. We find that the direction of emergence typically found in these cases is opposite to the direction of emergence followed in the standard accounts. Namely, the standard emergence direction is that of decreasing fundamentality: there is emergence of less (...)
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  • A Schema for Duality, Illustrated by Bosonization.Sebastian De Haro & Jeremy Butterfield - unknown
    In this paper we present a schema for describing dualities between physical theories, and illustrate it in detail with the example of bosonization: a boson-fermion duality in two-dimensional quantum field theory. The schema develops proposals in De Haro : these proposals include construals of notions related to duality, like representation, model, symmetry and interpretation. The aim of the schema is to give a more precise criterion for duality than has so far been considered. The bosonization example, or boson-fermion duality, has (...)
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  • Duality, Underdetermination, and the Uncommon Common Core.Daniel Grimmer, Enrico Cinti & Rasmus Jaksland - forthcoming - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science.
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  • Theoretical equivalence and duality.Sebastian De Haro - 2019 - Synthese 198 (6):5139-5177.
    Theoretical equivalence and duality are two closely related notions: but their interconnection has so far not been well understood. In this paper I explicate the contribution of a recent schema for duality to discussions of theoretical equivalence. I argue that duality suggests a construal of theoretical equivalence in the physical sciences. The construal is in terms of the isomorphism of models, as defined by the schema. This construal gives interpretative constraints that should be useful for discussions of theoretical equivalence more (...)
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  • (1 other version)The heuristic function of duality.Sebastian De Haro - 2018 - Synthese:1-35.
    I conceptualise the role of dualities in quantum gravity, in terms of their functions for theory construction. I distinguish between two functions of duality in physical practice: namely, discovering and describing ‘equivalent physics’, versus suggesting ‘new physics’. I dub these the ‘theoretical’ versus the ‘heuristic’ functions of dualities. The distinction seems to have gone largely unnoticed in the philosophical literature: and it exists both for dualities, and for the more general relation of theoretical equivalence. The paper develops the heuristic function (...)
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  • Conceptual Aspects of Gauge/Gravity Duality.Sebastian De Haro, Daniel R. Mayerson & Jeremy N. Butterfield - 2016 - Foundations of Physics 46 (11):1381-1425.
    We give an introductory review of gauge/gravity duality, and associated ideas of holography, emphasising the conceptual aspects. The opening sections gather the ingredients, viz. anti-de Sitter spacetime, conformal field theory and string theory, that we need for presenting, in Sect. 5, the central and original example: Maldacena’s AdS/CFT correspondence. Sections 6 and 7 develop the ideas of this example, also in applications to condensed matter systems, QCD, and hydrodynamics. Sections 8 and 9 discuss the possible extensions of holographic ideas to (...)
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  • The Invisibility of Diffeomorphisms.Sebastian De Haro - 2017 - Foundations of Physics 47 (11):1464-1497.
    I examine the relationship between \\)-dimensional Poincaré metrics and d-dimensional conformal manifolds, from both mathematical and physical perspectives. The results have a bearing on several conceptual issues relating to asymptotic symmetries in general relativity and in gauge–gravity duality, as follows: I draw from the remarkable work by Fefferman and Graham on conformal geometry, in order to prove two propositions and a theorem that characterise which classes of diffeomorphisms qualify as gravity-invisible. I define natural notions of gravity-invisibility that apply to the (...)
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  • Spacetime and Physical Equivalence.Sebastian De Haro - unknown
    In this essay I begin to lay out a conceptual scheme for: analysing dualities as cases of theoretical equivalence; assessing when cases of theoretical equivalence are also cases of physical equivalence. The scheme is applied to gauge/gravity dualities. I expound what I argue to be their contribution to questions about: the nature of spacetime in quantum gravity; broader philosophical and physical discussions of spacetime. - proceed by analysing duality through four contrasts. A duality will be a suitable isomorphism between models: (...)
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  • The RT formula and its discontents: spacetime and entanglement.Jonathan Bain - 2020 - Synthese 198 (12):11833-11860.
    This essay is concerned with a number of related proposals that claim there is a link between spacetime topology and quantum entanglement. I indicate the extent to which these proposals can be understood as stating a duality, and then consider two general approaches to articulating such a duality: a “state-based” approach, under which one attempts to identify relevant topological states as dual to quantum entangled states; and an “observable-based” approach, under which one attempts to identify relevant topological observables as dual (...)
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  • On the Relation between Dualities and Gauge Symmetries.Sebastian de Haro, Nicholas Teh & Jeremy Butterfield - 2016 - Philosophy of Science 83 (5):1059-1069.
    We make two points about dualities in string theory. The first point is that the conception of duality, which we will discuss, meshes with two dual theories being ‘gauge related’ in the general philosophical sense of being physically equivalent. The second point is a result about gauge/gravity duality that shows its relation to gauge symmetries to be subtler than one might expect: each of a certain class of gauge symmetries in the gravity theory, that is, diffeomorphisms, is related to a (...)
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  • Theoretical Equivalence in Physics.James Owen Weatherall - unknown
    I review the philosophical literature on the question of when two physical theories are equivalent. This includes a discussion of empirical equivalence, which is often taken to be necessary, and sometimes taken to be sufficient, for theoretical equivalence; and "interpretational" equivalence, which is the idea that two theories are equivalent just in case they have the same interpretation. It also includes a discussion of several formal notions of equivalence that have been considered in the recent philosophical literature, including definitional equivalence (...)
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  • On Dualities and Equivalences Between Physical Theories.Jeremy Butterfield - 2021 - In Christian Wüthrich, Baptiste Le Bihan & Nick Huggett (eds.), Philosophy Beyond Spacetime: Implications From Quantum Gravity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
    The main aim of this paper is to make a remark about the relation between dualities between theories, as `duality' is understood in physics and equivalence of theories, as `equivalence' is understood in logic and philosophy. The remark is that in physics, two theories can be dual, and accordingly get called `the same theory', though we interpret them as disagreeing---so that they are certainly not equivalent, as `equivalent' is normally understood. So the remark is simple: but, I shall argue, worth (...)
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  • Spacetime as a quantum error-correcting code?Jonathan Bain - 2020 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 71:26-36.
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  • String theory, Einstein, and the identity of physics: Theory assessment in absence of the empirical.Jeroen van Dongen - 2021 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 89:164-176.
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  • (1 other version)A precipice below which lies absurdity? Theories without a spacetime and scientific understanding.Sebastian De Haro & Henk W. de Regt - 2018 - Synthese:1-29.
    While the relation between visualization and scientific understanding has been a topic of long-standing discussion, recent developments in physics have pushed the boundaries of this debate to new and still unexplored realms. For it is claimed that, in certain theories of quantum gravity, spacetime ‘disappears’: and this suggests that one may have sensible physical theories in which spacetime is completely absent. This makes the philosophical question whether such theories are intelligible, even more pressing. And if such theories are intelligible, the (...)
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