Physics
Several scholars have accorded the Tychonic System a prominent place, considering it a credible alternative to the Ptolemaic and Copernican systems. In recent years, there have even been some enthusiastic contributions in support of Brahe,…
The notion of rigour relevant to the practice of physics is an endogenous one. Theoretical physics has its own internal norms about mathematical practice and notions of legitimate derivations or formal objects. These norms are often…
Newton's laws of motion pose an apparent problem, sometimes referred to as "the independence problem": the first law seems to be a simple consequence of the second law, raising the question of why it was included as a separate law. Numerous…
It is often said that time vanishes in quantum gravity. One general approach to quantum gravity accepts this fundamental timelessness but seeks to derive time's emergence at a non-fundamental level. To better assess such approaches, I…
Recent critiques of the semantic conception of scientific theories suggest that a theory is not best formulated as a collection of models satisfying some set of kinematical or dynamical conditions. Thus it has been argued that additional…
There have been three geometrizations in history. The first one is historically due to the Pythagorean school and Plato, the second one comes from Galileo, Kepler, Descartes and Newton, and the third geometrization of nature begins with…
The application of the notion of `observable' from gauge theory to diffeomorphism-invariant theories -- most relevantly to general relativity -- has led to numerous conceptual and technical issues when interpreting classical theories with…
The energy-momentum budget of the astrophysical systems can be studied by the exact local conservation equation derived by Landau and Lifshitz. We show that a similar equation is valid for the Einstein-Cartan gravity. We reanalyze a binary…
We develop a descriptive account of scientific reward in physics based on the concept of the time-dependent Polydoxon, defined as the structured set of empirically viable theories at a given time. We argue that highly rewarded…
Many philosophers of physics maintain that a physical theory that exhibits (certain kinds of) symmetries is flawed, on the grounds that such theories posit "excess structure". In an influential paper, Dewar [2019, "Sophistication about…
This article examines, from historical and pedagogical perspectives, Alphonse Berget's anticipation of Earth-Moon travel in Le Ciel (Larousse, 1923), decades before the beginning of the space age. The discussion is triggered by Le Ciel, a…
.This article reexamines the genesis of special relativity by situating the contributions of Lorentz, Poincare, and Einstein within the scientific, documentary, and editorial context of the years 1895--1913. It emphasizes the rapid…
In this paper, the historical origins of quantum entanglement in particle physics are systematically and thoroughly investigated. 1957, Bohm and Aharonov noted that the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen correlation had been experimentally realised in…
Over the past two decades, the rapid surge in data-intensive computational techniques for statistical modeling may have had the effect of diminishing the use of applied mathematics in causal scientific inquiry. In this paper, co-authored by…
Can we infer whether all of physical reality began to exist? Several novel results are offered suggesting a negative verdict. First, a common strategy for defending a cosmic beginning involves showing that individual beginningless…
For more than half a century, dualities have been at the heart of modern physics. From quantum mechanics to statistical mechanics, condensed matter physics, quantum field theory and quantum gravity, dualities have proven useful in solving…
This entry reviews Rudolf Carnap's philosophical views on the quantum mechanics of his time. It also offers some thoughts on how Carnap might have reacted to some recent developments in the foundations of quantum mechanics.
This note examines an apparently unpublished manuscript on special relativity written by Conrad Habicht in 1914 and made available online by the ETH-Bibliothek Z\"urich in December 2024. To the best of my knowledge, no study of its content…
Experimental science usually relies on laboratory procedures that, after finitely many steps, terminate with numerical reports on physical quantities. This paper argues that such procedures can be understood as algorithmic once the…
We examine the English translation of Albert Einstein's groundbreaking 1925 paper on Bose-Einstein condensation. We guide readers to execute the calculations Einstein outlined for the specific heat above the condensation temperature,…