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  1. Compendium of the foundations of classical statistical physics.Jos Uffink - 2006 - In J. Butterfield & J. Earman (eds.), Handbook of the philosophy of physics. Kluwer Academic Publishers.
    Roughly speaking, classical statistical physics is the branch of theoretical physics that aims to account for the thermal behaviour of macroscopic bodies in terms of a classical mechanical model of their microscopic constituents, with the help of probabilistic assumptions. In the last century and a half, a fair number of approaches have been developed to meet this aim. This study of their foundations assesses their coherence and analyzes the motivations for their basic assumptions, and the interpretations of their central concepts. (...)
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  • On the definition of equilibrium.Itamar Pitowsky - 2006 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 37 (3):431-438.
    Boltzmann’s approach to statistical mechanics is widely believed to be conceptually superior to Gibbs’ formulation. However, the microcanonical distribution often fails to behave as expected: The ergodicity of the motion relative to it can rarely be established for realistic systems; worse, it can often be proved to fail. Also, the approach involves idealizations that have little physical basis. Here we take Khinchin’s advice and propose a de…nition of equilibrium that is more realistic: The de…nition re‡ects the fact that the system (...)
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