Download or read book The Philosophical Impact of Contemporary Physics written by Milič Čapek and published by Princeton, N.J. : Van Nostrand. This book was released on 1961 with total page 444 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The general character of classical physics - The concept of time - The concept of matter - The concept of motion - The main features of the corpuscular-kinetic view of nature - Some collateral trends : dynamism, energetism, fluid theories - The implicit elimination of time in classical physics - The negation of instantaneous space - The modification of the concept of time - The evolution of the concept of matter - The end of the laplacian illusion - The reinstatement of becoming in the physical world.
Download or read book Bergson and Modern Physics written by M. Capek and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 431 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Milic Capek has devoted his scholarship to the history and philosophy of modern physics. With impeccable care, he has mastered the epistemologi cal and scientific developments by working through the papers, treatises, correspondence of physicists since Kant, and likewise he has put his learning and critical skill into the related philosophical literature. Coming from his original scientific career with a philosophy doctorate from the Charles University in Prague, Capek has ranged beyond a narrowly defined philosophy of physics into general epistemology of the natural sciences and to the full historical evolution of these matters. He has ex pounded his views on these matters in a number of articles and, systema tically, in his book The Philosophical Impact of Contemporary PhYSiCS, published in 1961 and reprinted with two new appendices in 1969. His particular gift for many of his readers and students lies in the great period from the mid-nineteenth century through the foundations of the physics and philosophy of the twentieth, and within this spectacular time, Profes sor Capek has become a principal expositor and sympathetic critic of the philosophy of Henri Bergson. He joins a distinguished group of scholars -physicists and philosophers -who have been stimulated to some of their most profound and imaginative thought by Bergson's metaphysical and psychological work: Cassirer, Meyerson, de Broglie, Metz, Jankelevitch, Zawirski, and in recent years, Costa de Beauregard, Watanabe, Blanche, and others.
Download or read book Philosophy of Physics written by Tim Maudlin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-05-26 with total page 199 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Philosophical foundations of the physics of space-time This concise book introduces nonphysicists to the core philosophical issues surrounding the nature and structure of space and time, and is also an ideal resource for physicists interested in the conceptual foundations of space-time theory. Tim Maudlin's broad historical overview examines Aristotelian and Newtonian accounts of space and time, and traces how Galileo's conceptions of relativity and space-time led to Einstein's special and general theories of relativity. Maudlin explains special relativity with enough detail to solve concrete physical problems while presenting general relativity in more qualitative terms. Additional topics include the Twins Paradox, the physical aspects of the Lorentz-FitzGerald contraction, the constancy of the speed of light, time travel, the direction of time, and more. Introduces nonphysicists to the philosophical foundations of space-time theory Provides a broad historical overview, from Aristotle to Einstein Explains special relativity geometrically, emphasizing the intrinsic structure of space-time Covers the Twins Paradox, Galilean relativity, time travel, and more Requires only basic algebra and no formal knowledge of physics
Download or read book New Proofs for the Existence of God written by Robert J. Spitzer and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2010-04-15 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Responding to contemporary popular atheism, Robert J. Spitzer's New Proofs for the Existence of God examines the considerable evidence for God and creation that has come to light from physics and philosophy during the last forty years. --from publisher description.
Download or read book Thinking about Causes written by Peter Machamer and published by University of Pittsburgh Pre. This book was released on 2010-06-15 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Emerging as a hot topic in the mid-twentieth century, causality is one of the most frequently discussed issues in contemporary philosophy. Causality has been a central concept in philosophy as well as in the sciences, especially the natural sciences, dating back to its beginning in Greek thought. David Hume famously claimed that causality is the cement of the universe. In general terms, it links eventualities, predicts the consequences of action, and is the cognitive basis for the acquisition and the use of categories and concepts in the child. Indeed, how could one answer why-questions, around which early rational thought begins to revolve, without hitting on the relationships between reason and consequence, cause and effect, or without drawing these distinctions? But a comprehensive definition of causality has been notoriously hard to provide, and virtually every aspect of causation has been subject to much debate and analysis.Thinking About Causes brings together top philosophers from the United States and Europe to focus on causality as a major force in philosophical and scientific thought. Topics addressed include: ancient Stoicism and moral philosophy; the case of sacramental causality; traditional causal concepts in Descartes; Kant on transcendental laws; the influence of J. S. Mill's politics on his concept of causation; plurality in causality; causality in modern physics; causality in economics; and the concept of free will.Taken together, the essays in this collection from the Pittsburgh -Konstanz series provide the best current thinking about causality, especially as it relates to the philosophy of science.
Download or read book Philosophy of Physics written by Tim Maudlin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-03-19 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A sophisticated and original introduction to the philosophy of quantum mechanics from one of the world’s leading philosophers of physics In this book, Tim Maudlin, one of the world’s leading philosophers of physics, offers a sophisticated, original introduction to the philosophy of quantum mechanics. The briefest, clearest, and most refined account of his influential approach to the subject, the book will be invaluable to all students of philosophy and physics. Quantum mechanics holds a unique place in the history of physics. It has produced the most accurate predictions of any scientific theory, but, more astonishing, there has never been any agreement about what the theory implies about physical reality. Maudlin argues that the very term “quantum theory” is a misnomer. A proper physical theory should clearly describe what is there and what it does—yet standard textbooks present quantum mechanics as a predictive recipe in search of a physical theory. In contrast, Maudlin explores three proper theories that recover the quantum predictions: the indeterministic wavefunction collapse theory of Ghirardi, Rimini, and Weber; the deterministic particle theory of deBroglie and Bohm; and the conceptually challenging Many Worlds theory of Everett. Each offers a radically different proposal for the nature of physical reality, but Maudlin shows that none of them are what they are generally taken to be.
Download or read book Physics and Philosophy written by Werner Heisenberg and published by Penguin Books, Limited (UK). This book was released on 2000 with total page 143 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Heisenberg explains the central ideas of the quantum revolution, and his uncertainty principle. He reveals how words can lose their meaning in the world of relativity and quantum physics, with philosophical implications for the nature of reality.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Physics written by Robert Batterman and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2013-03-14 with total page 701 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Oxford Handbook provides an overview of many of the topics that currently engage philosophers of physics. It surveys new issues and the problems that have become a focus of attention in recent years. It also provides up-to-date discussions of the still very important problems that dominated the field in the past. In the late 20th Century, the philosophy of physics was largely focused on orthodox Quantum Mechanics and Relativity Theory. The measurement problem, the question of the possibility of hidden variables, and the nature of quantum locality dominated the literature on the quantum mechanics, whereas questions about relationalism vs. substantivalism, and issues about underdetermination of theories dominated the literature on spacetime. These issues still receive considerable attention from philosophers, but many have shifted their attentions to other questions related to quantum mechanics and to spacetime theories. Quantum field theory has become a major focus, particularly from the point of view of algebraic foundations. Concurrent with these trends, there has been a focus on understanding gauge invariance and symmetries. The philosophy of physics has evolved even further in recent years with attention being paid to theories that, for the most part, were largely ignored in the past. For example, the relationship between thermodynamics and statistical mechanics—-once thought to be a paradigm instance of unproblematic theory reduction—-is now a hotly debated topic. The implicit, and sometimes explicit, reductionist methodology of both philosophers and physicists has been severely criticized and attention has now turned to the explanatory and descriptive roles of "non-fundamental,'' phenomenological theories. This shift of attention includes "old'' theories such as classical mechanics, once deemed to be of little philosophical interest. Furthermore, some philosophers have become more interested in "less fundamental'' contemporary physics such as condensed matter theory. Questions abound with implications for the nature of models, idealizations, and explanation in physics. This Handbook showcases all these aspects of this complex and dynamic discipline.
Download or read book The Order of Time written by Carlo Rovelli and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2019-12-10 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of TIME’s Ten Best Nonfiction Books of the Decade "Meet the new Stephen Hawking . . . The Order of Time is a dazzling book." --The Sunday Times From the bestselling author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics, Reality Is Not What It Seems, Helgoland, and Anaximander comes a concise, elegant exploration of time. Why do we remember the past and not the future? What does it mean for time to "flow"? Do we exist in time or does time exist in us? In lyric, accessible prose, Carlo Rovelli invites us to consider questions about the nature of time that continue to puzzle physicists and philosophers alike. For most readers this is unfamiliar terrain. We all experience time, but the more scientists learn about it, the more mysterious it remains. We think of it as uniform and universal, moving steadily from past to future, measured by clocks. Rovelli tears down these assumptions one by one, revealing a strange universe where at the most fundamental level time disappears. He explains how the theory of quantum gravity attempts to understand and give meaning to the resulting extreme landscape of this timeless world. Weaving together ideas from philosophy, science and literature, he suggests that our perception of the flow of time depends on our perspective, better understood starting from the structure of our brain and emotions than from the physical universe. Already a bestseller in Italy, and written with the poetic vitality that made Seven Brief Lessons on Physics so appealing, The Order of Time offers a profoundly intelligent, culturally rich, novel appreciation of the mysteries of time.
Download or read book Event Universe written by Leemon B. McHenry and published by Edinburgh University Press. This book was released on 2015-07-01 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Leemon McHenry argues that Whitehead's metaphysics provides a better basis for achieving a unification of physical theory than a traditional substance metaphysics. He investigates the influence of Maxwell's electromagnetic field, Einstein's theory of relativity and quantum mechanics on the development of the ontology of events and compares Whitehead's theory to his contemporaries, C. D. Broad and Bertrand Russell, as well as W. V. Quine. In this way, McHenry defends the naturalised and speculative approach to metaphysics as opposed to analytical and linguistic methods that arose in the 20th century.
Download or read book Philosophy of Time written by Sean Enda Power and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-05-26 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As a growing area of research, the philosophy of time is increasingly relevant to different areas of philosophy and even other disciplines. This book describes and evaluates the most important debates in philosophy of time, under several subject areas: metaphysics, epistemology, physics, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, cognitive science, rationality, and art. Questions this book investigates include the following. Can we know what time really is? Is time possible, especially given modern physics? Must there be time because we cannot think without it? What do we experience of time? How might philosophy of time be relevant to understanding the mind–body relationship or evidence in cognitive science? Can the philosophy of time help us understand biases toward the future and the fear of death? How is time relevant to art—and is art relevant to philosophical debates about time? Finally, what exactly could time travel be? And could time travel satisfy emotions such as nostalgia and regret? Through asking such questions, and showing how they might be best answered, the book demonstrates the importance philosophy of time has in contemporary thought. Each of the book’s ten chapters begins with a helpful introduction and ends with study questions and an annotated list of further reading. This and a comprehensive bibliography at the end of the book prepare the reader to go further in their study of the philosophy of time.
Download or read book Compendium of Quantum Physics written by Daniel Greenberger and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-07-25 with total page 901 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With contributions by leading quantum physicists, philosophers and historians, this comprehensive A-to-Z of quantum physics provides a lucid understanding of key concepts of quantum theory and experiment. It covers technical and interpretational aspects alike, and includes both traditional and new concepts, making it an indispensable resource for concise, up-to-date information about the many facets of quantum physics.
Download or read book Every Thing Must Go written by James Ladyman and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2007-07-05 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Every Thing Must Go argues that the only kind of metaphysics that can contribute to objective knowledge is one based specifically on contemporary science as it really is, and not on philosophers' a priori intuitions, common sense, or simplifications of science. In addition to showing how recent metaphysics has drifted away from connection with all other serious scholarly inquiry as a result of not heeding this restriction, they demonstrate how to build a metaphysics compatible with current fundamental physics ('ontic structural realism'), which, when combined with their metaphysics of the special sciences ('rainforest realism'), can be used to unify physics with the other sciences without reducing these sciences to physics itself. Taking science metaphysically seriously, Ladyman and Ross argue, means that metaphysicians must abandon the picture of the world as composed of self-subsistent individual objects, and the paradigm of causation as the collision of such objects. Every Thing Must Go also assesses the role of information theory and complex systems theory in attempts to explain the relationship between the special sciences and physics, treading a middle road between the grand synthesis of thermodynamics and information, and eliminativism about information. The consequences of the author's metaphysical theory for central issues in the philosophy of science are explored, including the implications for the realism vs. empiricism debate, the role of causation in scientific explanations, the nature of causation and laws, the status of abstract and virtual objects, and the objective reality of natural kinds.
Download or read book Niels Bohr and the Philosophy of Physics written by Jan Faye and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2017-10-19 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The sixteen contributions in this collection by some of the best contemporary philosophers and physicists writing on Bohr's philosophy today all carefully distinguish his subtle and unique interpretation of quantum mechanics from views often imputed to him under the banner of the "Copenhagen Interpretation.""--Page 4 de la couverture.
Download or read book Understanding Space Time written by Robert DiSalle and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2006-04-27 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presenting the history of space-time physics, from Newton to Einstein, as a philosophical development DiSalle reflects our increasing understanding of the connections between ideas of space and time and our physical knowledge. He suggests that philosophy's greatest impact on physics has come about, less by the influence of philosophical hypotheses, than by the philosophical analysis of concepts of space, time and motion, and the roles they play in our assumptions about physical objects and physical measurements. This way of thinking leads to interpretations of the work of Newton and Einstein and the connections between them. It also offers ways of looking at old questions about a priori knowledge, the physical interpretation of mathematics, and the nature of conceptual change. Understanding Space-Time will interest readers in philosophy, history and philosophy of science, and physics, as well as readers interested in the relations between physics and philosophy.
Download or read book Foundations of Space Time Theories written by Michael Friedman and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-07-14 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, explores the conceptual foundations of Einstein's theory of relativity: the fascinating, yet tangled, web of philosophical, mathematical, and physical ideas that is the source of the theory's enduring philosophical interest. Originally published in 1983. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.
Download or read book The World View of Contemporary Physics written by Richard F. Kitchener and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 1988-07-08 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although early twentieth century physics produced two revolutionary new conceptions of the nature of the physical universerelativity theory and quantum theorymore recent developments in the physical sciences have made it imperative for physicists to re-examine the older world view of physics and the assumptions upon which it was based. However, theorizing about the nature and status of reality has been the province of philosophers for centuries. Philosophers, trained in metaphysics, provided a different perspective for viewing and a unique method for solving some of these problems. Ideally, therefore, both philosophers and physicists should work together in dialogue fashion on this important issue. These two groups come together for the first time in this book to examine the questions: What is the world view of contemporary physics? Does it need a new metaphysics? If so, what kind of metaphysics does it need? Internationally known scholars, including Ilya Prigogine and Fritjof Capra, who are recognized as experts in this interdisciplinary field, address such related topics as the nature of the mind, our place in society, and the nature of ethics.
