Related papers: On Dualities and Equivalences Between Physical The…
Aspects of duality and mirror symmetry in string theory are discussed. We emphasize, through examples, the importance of loop spaces for a deeper understanding of the geometrical origin of dualities in string theory. Moreover we show that…
Paradoxes are a very frequent phenomenon in processes of thought which strive towards the intelectual and cognitive shifts. They occur in all areas of human spiritual activites. What we are interested here in, are the paradoxes in physics.…
I argue that, contrary to the standard view, one cannot understand the structure and nature of our knowledge in physics without an analysis of the way that observers (and, more generally, measuring instruments and experimental arrangements)…
Lectures presented at the 33rd Karpacz Winter School ``Duality: Strings and Fields'' briefly introducing dualities in four-dimensional quantum field theory, and summarizing results found in supersymmetric field theories. The first lecture…
This is a talk given at YKIS '95, primarily to non-string theorists. I review the evidence for string duality, the principle that any string theory at strong coupling looks like another string theory at weak coupling. A postscript…
In some recent theories including Quantum SuperString theory we encounter duality - it arises due to a non commutative geometry which in effect adds an extra term to the Heiserberg Uncertainity Principle. The result is that the micro world…
String theory is the leading candidate for a unified theory of the standard model and gravity. In the last few years theorists have realized that there is a unique structure underlying string theory. In this unification a prominent role is…
With an eye on developing a quantum theory of gravity, many physicists have recently searched for quantum challenges to the equivalence principle of general relativity. However, as historians and philosophers of science are well aware, the…
The relationship that is widely presumed to hold between physical theories and their successors, in which the successors in some sense explain the success of the theories they replace, is known commonly as 'reduction.' I argue that one…
The concept of duality reflects a link between two seemingly different physical objects. An example in quantum mechanics is a situation where the spectra (or their parts) of two Hamiltonians go into each other under a certain…
A dual action is obtained for a general non-abelian and non-supersymmetric gauge theory at the classical level. The construction follows steps similar to those used in pure abelian gauge theory. As an example we study the spontaneously…
We study the question of whether two frames of a given physical theory are equivalent or not in the presence of quantum corrections. By using field theory arguments we claim that equivalence is broken in the presence of anomalous symmetries…
By means of a thought-experiment, consisting of an interference experiment with two interfering beams, it is shown that it can be demonstrated experimentally that with one single particle a wave can be associated which propagates in space…
Being mathematics a natural language to Mankind and to physics, it must be constantly adapted to our necessities and our natural perception. Then, mathematical concepts are not absolute to reality. Although mathematical theories are…
We revisit the standard axioms of domain theory with emphasis on their relation to the concept of partiality, explain how this idea arises naturally in probability theory and quantum mechanics, and then search for a mathematical setting…
In this paper, it is argued that theoretical physics is more akin to an organism than to a rigid structure.It is in this sense that the epithet, "sick", applies to it. It is argued that classical physics is a model of a healthy science, and…
This paper explores the options available to the anti-realist to defend a Quinean empirical under-determination thesis using examples of dualities. I first explicate a version of the empirical under-determination thesis that can be brought…
The distinction between a theory's kinematics and its dynamics, that is, between the space of physical states it posits and its law of evolution, is central to the conceptual framework of many physicists. A change to the kinematics of a…
General relativity and quantum mechanics have both revealed the relativity of certain notions that were previously thought to be absolute. I clarify the precise sense in which these theories are relational, and I argue that the various…
We comment on one of the earliest derivations of the so-called wave-particle duality relation. Our aim is to point out a slight technical flaw in the proof, fixing it. Neither the physical content of the duality relation nor its validity is…