物理学史与哲学

This memoire covers my life history starting with my family's background and their immigration to the US. It continues with my childhood, my early education, and my introduction to science. It then covers my professional research included a…

I recount here my association with Prof. Detlef D\"urr leading to our memorable research collaboration on arrival-time distributions in quantum mechanics. He influenced my life, both personally and professionally, as few others have or ever…

An analysis of contemporary Cosmology is presented, with the aim of identifying the elements present in it according to the scientific program structure created by I. Lakatos. We look at some modern controversies from this point of view and…

The epistemic arrow of time is the fact that our knowledge of the past seems to be both of a different kind and more detailed than our knowledge of the future. Just like with the other arrows of time, it has often been speculated that the…

In the late 1960s, a young physicist was sailing along the coast of California towards Berkeley, where he got a post-doc position in astronomy. But his real goal was not astronomy, at least not immediately. First, John Clauser eagerly…

This special feature, dedicated to Michael J. Duff FRS on the occasion of his 70th birthday, concerns topics in 'Quantum gravity, branes and M-theory'. These three intertwining subjects have been central to Duff's work; indeed many of his…

According to \textit{effective realism}, scientific theories give us knowledge about the unobservable world, but not at the fundamental level. This view is justified by the well-received \textit{effective-field-theory} (EFT) approach to…

Problems with uniform probabilities on an infinite support show up in contemporary cosmology. This paper focuses on the context of inflation theory, where it complicates the assignment of a probability measure over pocket universes. The…

Despite its apparent complexity, our world seems to be governed by simple laws of physics. This volume provides a philosophical introduction to such laws. I explain how they are connected to some of the central issues in philosophy, such as…

An alternative approach towards quantum theory is described, and tentative attempts to connect his approach to special and general relativity are discussed. Important concepts are gauge groups and information/entropy connected to some…

Albert Einstein visited Spain only once, precisely one hundred years ago. The circumstances, of a very different kind, of this visit will be explained here. In special, some important events happened to Einstein during that period, which,…

In this paper, I advance an original view of the structure of space called \textit{Infinitesimal Gunk}. This view says that every region of space can be further divided and some regions have infinitesimal size, where infinitesimals are…

I develop a new view of the structure of space--called infinitesimal atomism--as a reply to Zeno's paradox of measure. According to this view, space is composed of ultimate parts with infinitesimal size, where infinitesimals are understood…

Stephen Wolfram has recently outlined an unorthodox, multicomputational approach to fundamental theory, encompassing not only physics but also mathematics in a structure he calls The Ruliad, understood to be the entangled limit of all…

According to Peter Galison, the coordination of different ``subcultures'' within a scientific field happens through local exchanges within ``trading zones''. In his view, the workability of such trading zones is not guaranteed, and science…

I propose a theory of space with infinitesimal regions called \textit{smooth infinitesimal geometry} (SIG) based on certain algebraic objects (i.e., rings), which regiments a mode of reasoning heuristically used by geometricists and…

Weyl famously argued that if space were discrete, then Euclidean geometry could not hold even approximately. Since then, many philosophers have responded to this argument by advancing alternative accounts of discrete geometry that recover…

Weyl's tile argument purports to show that there are no natural distance functions in atomistic space that approximate Euclidean geometry. I advance a response to this argument that relies on a new account of distance in atomistic space,…

This paper explores the ER bridges theory and its relationship with quantum phenomena. An argument can be made that the ER bridges theory does not explicitly address quantum phenomena and implies that Einstein intended to differentiate…

Jos\'e D\'iaz Bejarano (1933-2019) was born in Puebla de la Calzada (Badajoz, Spain). He studied Chemistry in the University of Seville and Physics in the University of Madrid. Later, he developed a successful research career in several…