Related papers: Newton On Absolute Space: A Commentary
The theory of relativity showed that several Newtonian ideas about spacetime are imperfect. We present here some relativistic concepts related to these ideas: simultaneity of events and synchronization of clocks (both along a line in the…
In teaching the physical sciences, a significant challenge lies in the student's tendency to consider the scientific world and the "real" world as separate. For example, Newton's 1st Law of Motion states that an object in motion remains in…
Newton's action at a distance gravitational law and Coulomb's action at a distance electrostatic law had to be reexamined in the light of field theories which originated from Maxwell's electrodynamics. These ideas were further modified with…
The work done by Isaac Newton more than three hundred years ago, continues being a path to increase our knowledge of Nature. To better understand all the ideas behind it, one of the finest ways is to generalize them to wider situations. In…
I point out a radical indeterminism in potential-based formulations of Newtonian gravity once we drop the condition that the potential vanishes at infinity (as is necessary, and indeed celebrated, in cosmological applications). This…
According to Aristotle "time is the number of change with respect to the before and after". That's certainly a vague concept, but at the same time it's both simple and satisfying from a philosophical point of view: things do not change…
In physics, experiments ultimately inform us as to what constitutes a good theoretical model of any physical concept: physical space should be no exception. The best picture of physical space in Newtonian physics is given by the…
We recount the successful long career of classical physics, from Newton to Einstein, which was based on the philosophy of scientific realism. Special emphasis is given to the changing status and number of ontological entitities and…
It is postulated there is not a precise static instant in time underlying a dynamical physical process at which the relative position of a body in relative motion or a specific physical magnitude would theoretically be precisely determined.…
Along with weaving together observations, experiments, and theoretical constructs into a coherent mesh of understanding of the world around us, physics over its past five centuries has continuously refined the base concepts on which the…
A generalization of metric space is presented which is shown to admit a theory strongly related to that of ordinary metric spaces. To avoid the topological effects related to dropping any of the axioms of metric space, first a new, and…
The new Process Physics provides a new explanation of space as a quantum foam system in which gravity is an inhomogeneous flow of the quantum foam into matter. An analysis of various experiments demonstrates that absolute motion relative to…
Here the 1930's work of Milne on the relationship between the universes of relativistic cosmology and those which follow from Newtonian theory is reviewed. The extension to the case of non-zero pressure is considered also. In each case, any…
We discuss here the significance of the generalization of the newtonian concept of force by that of a transformation of a certain Standard Borel Space of cardinality $\mathbf{c}$ of the continuum as the ``cause'' behind motions of material…
Newton introduced the concept of mass in his {\it Principia} and gave an intuitive explanation for what it meant. Centuries have passed and physicists as well as philosophers still argue over its meaning. Three types of mass are generally…
A description of physical reality in which wholeness is the foundation is discussed along with the motivation for such an attempt. As a possible mathematical framework within which a physical theory based on wholeness may be expressed,…
Our concept of mass has evolved considerably over the centuries, most notably from Newton to Einstein, and then even more vigorously with the establishment of the standard model and the subsequent discovery of the Higgs boson. Mass is now…
Quantum Theory, similar to Relativity Theory, requires a new concept of space-time, imposed by a universal constant. While velocity of light $c$ not being infinite calls for a redefinition of space-time on large and cosmological scales,…
Based on an identified quantum relativity symmetry the contraction of which gives the Newtonian approximation of Galilean relativity, a quantum model of the physical space can be formulated with the Newtonian space seen in a way as the…
Physics was in crisis at the beginning of the twentieth century because the newborn Maxwell's electromagnetism defied mechanistic preconceptions. Albert Einstein understood that the solution to the crisis required an audacious reworking of…