物理学史与哲学
The earliest written reference in Indian astronomy to a total solar eclipse is in the Rig Veda where Rishi Atri is said to have demolished the asura Swarbhanu to liberate the Sun from a total solar eclipse. The Rig Veda describes the…
Preparing general relativity for quantization in the Hamiltonian approach leads to the `problem of time,' rendering the world fundamentally timeless. One proposed solution is the `thermal time hypothesis,' which defines time in terms of…
During the first few centuries CE, the centre of the known world gradually shifted from Alexandria to Constantinople. Combined with a societal shift from pagan beliefs to Christian doctrines, Antiquity gave way to the Byzantine era. While…
In this paper, I consider a recent controversy about whether first-class constraints generate gauge transformations in the case of electromagnetism. I argue that there is a notion of gauge transformation, the extended notion, which is…
We present the observations and the results of our experience from a large number of flight hours in constructing, handling, testing, studying and interacting with our Antikythera Mechanism functional reconstruction models. We constructed…
Phenomena in gauge theory are often described in the physics literature via a specific choice of gauge. In foundational and philosophical discussions this is often criticized as introducing gauge dependence, and contrasted against (often…
The persistent challenge of formulating ontic structuralism in a rigorous manner, which prioritizes structures over the entities they contain, calls for a transformation of traditional logical frameworks. I argue that Univalent Foundations…
Symmetries and isomorphisms play similar conceptual roles when we consider how models represent physical situations, but they are formally distinct, as two models related by symmetries are not typically isomorphic. I offer a rigorous…
I expound and defend the ``bare probabilism'' reading of Gibbsian (i.e. mainstream) statistical mechanics, responding to Frigg and Werndl's recent (BJPS 72 (2021), 105-129) plea: ``can somebody please say what Gibbsian statistical mechanics…
Are you, with your perceptions, memories and observational data, a Boltzmann brain, namely a fleeting statistical fluctuation out of the thermal equilibrium of the universe? Arguments are given in the literature claiming that this bizarre…
My personal recollections are presented regarding my interactions with Steven Weinberg and the impact he had in my career from when I was his graduate student until the present.
Today, the Ising model is an archetype describing collective ordering processes. And, as such, it is widely known in physics and far beyond. Less known is the fact that the thesis defended by Ernst Ising 100 years ago (in 1924) contained…
The rich experiences of an intentional, goal-oriented life emerge, in an unpredictable fashion, from the basic laws of physics. Here I argue that this unpredictability is no mirage: there are true gaps between life and non-life, mind and…
In this paper we continue our study of the scientific research carried out at the Institute of Physics of the National University of La Plata during the first half of the 20th century, and of the important role played by the physicist Ramon…
These are lectures notes prepared for a series of seminars I am invited to give at Princeton Philosophy Department in November 2024. They cover the conceptual structure of quantum gravity, the relational interpretation of quantum mechanics,…
In the History of Ideas, a succession of philosophical and scientific achievements, concerning the concept of space and its dimensionality, were essential to contribute, after a long period, to the theoretical possibility of thinking…
Teleparallel gravity shares many qualitative features with general relativity, but differs from it in the following way: whereas in general relativity, gravitation is a manifestation of space-time curvature, in teleparallel gravity,…
In recent years, criticism of the methodology of particle physics beyond the Standard Model has increased, diagnosing too much reliance on aesthetic criteria for theory development and evaluation. Faced with several decades of experimental…
How should we interpret physical theories, and especially quantum theory, if we drop the assumption that we should treat it as an exact description of the whole Universe? I expound and develop the claim that physics is about the study of…
We present a detailed analysis of Penrose's gravito-optical analogy between the focusing effects of particular families of Ricci- and Weyl-curved spacetime regions on the one hand, and anastigmatic and astigmatic optical lenses on the…