Related papers: Against Pointillisme about Geometry
In this paper I argue that the fundamental aspect of our notion of time is that it defines an order relation, be it a total order relation between configurations of the world or just a partial order relation between events. This position is…
The phenomenon of local dynamical inhomogeneity of time is predicted, which implies that the course of time along the trajectory of motion of a particle in the inertial reference frames moving relative to each other depends on the state of…
We propose a deepening of the relativity principle according to which the invariant arena for non-quantum physics is a phase space rather than spacetime. Descriptions of particles propagating and interacting in spacetimes are constructed by…
It is argued that the three main quantum interpretations, Copenhagen, de Broglie-Bohm, and Many-Worlds, support the Principle Q (Quantum): Not all what matters for physical phenomena is contained in space-time. This principle underpins…
Classical, Quantum and Relativistic mechanics elect time and space as fundamentals, extracting the measure of motion -velocity- from this static space-time platform. Conversely, the timelessness of Statistical mechanics computes the…
This article explores the overall geometric manner in which human beings make sense of the world around them by means of their physical theories; in particular, in what are nowadays called pregeometric pictures of Nature. In these, the…
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…
This essay examines our fundamental conceptions of time, spacetime, the asymmetry of time, and the motion of a quantum mechanical particle. The concept of time has multiple meanings and these are often confused in the literature and must be…
Space-time symmetries are a crucial ingredient of any theoretical model in physics. Unlike internal symmetries, which may or may not be gauged and/or spontaneously broken, space-time symmetries do not admit any ambiguity: they are gauged by…
The nature of the physical space seems the most important subject in physics. A present paper proceeds from the assumption of physical reality of space contrary to the standard view of the space as a purely relational nonexistence - void.…
Prominently, Norton (2008) argues against constructivism about spacetime theories, the doctrine that spatiotemporal structure in the dynamics only has derivative status. Among other things, he accuses Brown and Pooley's dynamical approach…
Physical time intervals are attributes of single physical object whereas physical space intervals are a relational attribute of two physical objects. Some consequences of the breaking of the space-time exchange symmetry inherent in the…
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…
The paper puts forward a conceptual framework in which the phenomenon of time can be presented and discussed in a proper way. We argue that change is ontologically and epistemologically a more basic phenomenon than time. Time is an abstract…
This paper investigates the mathematical representation of time in physics. In existing theories time is represented by the real numbers, hence their formal properties represent properties of time: these are surveyed. The central question…
The law of balance of angular momentum is shown to imply the existence of absolute time, a fundamental physical quantity that is independent of the motion or position of the observer. Absolute time implies the notion of absolute…
On the base of years of experience of working on the problem of the physical foundation of quantum mechanics the author offers principles of solving it. Under certain pressure of mathematical formalism there has raised a hypothesis of…
Quantum gravity (or quantum spacetime) is to unify general relativity and quantum mechanics into a single theoretical framework and presented as the most important open puzzle in fundamental physics. The development of a microscopic theory…
The paper concerns the fictitious entanglement of the so-called ``singularities'' in problems, pertaining to quantum gravity, due, in point of fact, to the way we try to employ, in that context, differential geometry, the latter being…
Quantum theory and relativity are the pillar theories on which our understanding of physics is based. Poincar\'e invariance is a fundamental physical principle stating that the experimental results must be the same in all inertial reference…