相关论文: Against Pointillisme about Geometry

A deformation of special relativistic kinematics (possible signal of a theory of quantum gravity at low energies) leads to a modification of the notion of spacetime. At the classical level, this modification is required when one considers a…

Some authors in the quantum gravity community endorse, explicitly or implicitly, a radical relationalist view of time which states that the ordinal structure of time is not needed even in our classical theories, especially in general…

In Minkowski spacetime, we consider an isolated system made of two pointlike bodies interacting at a distance, in the nonradiative approximation. Our framework is the covariant and a priori Hamiltonian formalism of "predictive relativistic…

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…

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…

No quantitative theory describing all physical phenomena can be made if any arbitrary standard spacetime structure is assumed. This statement is a consequence of transforming the Peano arithmetic axioms into sentences with a physical…

Our main purpose here is to study some qualitative aspects of space and time. These include the notion of space and time regarded as the containers of respectively bodies and events, the divisibility of space, and the unrepeatability of…

The definition of a reference frame in General Relativity is achieved through the construction of a congruence of time-like world-lines. In this framework, splitting techniques enable us to express physical phenomena in analogy with Special…

The idea that possible configurations of a physical system can be represented as points in a multidimensional configuration space ${\cal C}$ is explored. The notion of spacetime, without ${\cal C}$, does not exist in this theory. Spacetime…

In this two-part essay, we distinguish several senses in which general relativity has been regarded as "locally special relativistic". Here, in Part 1, we focus on senses in which a relativistic spacetime has been said to be "locally…

General relativity is a background-independent theory of a dynamical classical spacetime geometry. Quantum theory is formulated in a classical spacetime, as an intrinsically probabilistic, contextual theory of non-classical, interfering…

Spacetime and internal symmetries can be used to severely restrict the form of the equations for the fundamental laws of physics. The success of this approach in the context of general relativity and particle physics motivates the…

Development of the contemporary theory of physical phenomena in the microcosm is considered to be a result of development of Einstein's ideas on a possibility of the event space modification and on a possibility of stochastic (Brownian)…

The theory of measurement is employed to elucidate the physical basis of general relativity. For measurements involving phenomena with intrinsic length or time scales, such scales must in general be negligible compared to the (translational…

Physical quantities and physical dimensions are among the first concepts encountered by students in their undergraduate career. In this pedagogical review, I will start from these concepts and, using the powerful tool of dimensional…

Mathematics and its relation to the physical universe have been the topic of speculation since the days of Pythagoras. Several different views of the nature of mathematics have been considered: Realism - mathematics exists and is…

The fundamental physical theories that interpret and explain behaviour of matter in nature are dependent on several unobservables and insensibles in their construction. While a rigorous natural philosophy cannot take them for granted, there…

This study addresses the often underestimated importance of physical dimensions and units in the formal reconstruction of physical theories, focusing on structuralist approaches that use the concept of ``species of structure" as a…

Classical gravity can be described as a relational dynamical system without ever appealing to spacetime or its geometry. This description is the so-called shape dynamics description of gravity. The existence of relational first principles…

Understanding quantum theory in terms of a geometric picture sounds great. There are different approaches to this idea. Here we shall present a geometric picture of quantum theory using the de-Broglie--Bohm causal interpretation of quantum…