Related papers: The Constructivist's Programme and the Problem of …
A classical theory of Desarguesian geometry, originating with D. Hilbert in his 1899 treatise, Grundlagen der Geometrie, leads from axioms to the construction of a division ring from which coordinates may be assigned to points, and…
In the present study we attempt to incorporate the philosophical dialogue about physical reality into the instructional process of quantum mechanics. Taking into account that both scientific realism and constructivism represent, on the…
The P versus NP problem is addressed in a context of provability and limitations on the possibility of finding sound axioms for formal theories. It is shown that if the term "constructible theory" is defined in a way which satisfies certain…
A underlying dynamical structure for both relativity and quantum theory-``superrelativity'' has been proposed in order to overcome the well known incompatibility between these theories. The relationship between curvature of spacetime…
A new approach to the dynamics of the universe based on work by O Murchadha, Foster, Anderson and the author is presented. The only kinematics presupposed is the spatial geometry needed to define configuration spaces in purely relational…
It is often said that the relativistic fusion of time with space rules out genuine change or ``becoming''. I offer the classical sequential growth models of causal set theory as counterexamples.
I defend algebraicism, according to which physical fields can be understood in terms of their structural relations without reference to a spacetime manifold, as a genuine relationalist view against the conventional wisdom that it is…
As Harvey Brown emphasizes in his book Physical Relativity, inertial motion in general relativity is best understood as a theorem, and not a postulate. Here I discuss the status of the "conservation condition", which states that the…
We investigate an `assumption of projectivity' that is appropriate to the self-dual axiomatic formulation of three-dimensional projective space.
We propose a step-by-step manual for the construction of alternative theories of gravity, perturbatively as well as nonperturbatively. The construction is guided by no more than two fundamental principles that we impose on the gravitational…
In this first paper we present a Lagrangian framework for the description of structure formation in general relativity, restricting attention to irrotational dust matter. As an application we present a self-contained derivation of a…
The notion of shape space was introduced in the second half of the 20th Century as a useful analytical tool for tackling problems related to the intrinsic spatial configuration of material systems. In recent years, the geometrical…
We present current theories about the structure of space and time, where the building blocks are some fundamental entities (yes-no experiment, quantum processes, spin net-work, preparticles) that do not presuppose the existence of space and…
The role of global topology in the dynamics of the Universe is poorly understood. Along with observational programmes for determining the topology of the Universe, some small theoretical steps have recently been made. Heuristic…
I present an analysis of the physical assumptions needed to obtain the metric structure of space-time. For this purpose I combine the axiomatic approach pioneered by Robb with ideas drawn from works on Weyl's "Raumproblem". The concept of a…
Constructor theory is a meta-theoretic approach that seeks to characterise concrete theories of physics in terms of the (im)possibility to implement certain abstract "tasks" by means of physical processes. Process theory, on the other hand,…
Constructivists (and intuitionists in general) asked what kind of mental construction is needed to convince ourselves (and others) that some mathematical statement is true. This question has a much more practical (and even cynical)…
After reviewing various interpretations of structural realism, I adopt here a definition that allows both relations between things that are already individuated (which I call ``relations between things'') and relations that individuate…
The goal of this paper is to employ a "preclusion principle" originally suggested by Rafael Sorkin in order to come up with a relativistically covariant model of quantum mechanics and gravity. Space-time is viewed as geometry as opposed to…
Relativistic Newtonian Dynamics, the simple model used previously for predicting accurately the anomalous precession of Mercury, is now applied to predict the periastron advance of a binary. The classical treatment of a binary as a two-body…