Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: Elise Crull (7 January on Zoom)

On Friday, 7 January, Elise Crull (City University of New York) will give a talk titled "You're a Good Man, Harvey Brown: Quantum Rods & Clocks from Decoherence" (abstract below). The meeting will be online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CET). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT Harvey Brown's 2005 book Physical Relativity calls for the development of a constructive-theoretic (as opposed to principle-theoretic) interpretation of relativity: in short, for a quantum-dynamical description of rods and clocks. Significant issues, however, stand in…continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: Alastair Wilson (17 December on Zoom)

On Friday, 17 December, Alastair Wilson (University of Birmingham) will give a talk titled "Fundamentality and Levels in Everettian Quantum Mechanics" (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CET). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT Distinctions in fundamentality between different levels of description are central to the viability of contemporary decoherence-based Everettian quantum mechanics (EQM). This approach to quantum theory characteristically combines a determinate fundamental reality (one universal wavefunction) with an indeterminate emergent reality (multiple decoherent worlds). In this talk I explore…continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: David Albert (3 December on Zoom)

On Friday, 3 December, David Albert (Columbia University) will give a talk titled "Physical Laws and Physical Things" (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CET). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT I will consider several strategies for absorbing unwanted pieces of concrete physical ontology (for example: absolute/substantival Newtonian space, Maxwellian Electromagnetic fields, and especially and particularly quantum-mechanical wave-functions) into the metaphysical category of Laws. I will argue that these strategies work well for the case…continue reading →

New Publication by Antonio Vassallo in Metascience

We are pleased to announce that Antonio Vassallo has published a review of Emily Adlam's book "Foundations of quantum mechanics." (Cambridge University Press, 2021): Quantum foundations in a nutshell. Metascience, DOI 10.1007/s11016-021-00707-3, 2021 The review is co-authored by Albert Solé (University of Barcelona).continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: Jeremy Butterfield & Henrique Gomes (19 November on Zoom)

On Friday, 19 November, Jeremy Butterfield & Henrique Gomes (University of Cambridge) will give a talk titled “Assessing the Hole Argument” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CET). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT We assess the hole argument in general relativity, and the related topics of the definitions of symmetries and determinism. We begin by rejecting the claim made in some recent literature that the sheer mathematics of the theory makes it mandatory to…continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: Robert DiSalle (5 November on Zoom)

On Friday, 5 November, Robert DiSalle (Western University) will give a talk titled "On the epistemological foundations of space-time geometry" (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CET). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT According to Einstein, what was central to the motivating arguments for the general theory of relativity included not only the familiar arguments about generalizing the relativity of motion, but also the more complicated argument about the empirical content of space-time geometry. On…continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: Gordon Belot (22 October on Zoom)

On Friday, 22 October, Gordon Belot (University of Michigan) will give a talk titled “The Mach-Einstein Principle of 1917-1918” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so here. You can address any inquiry to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. ABSTRACT In 1917 and 1918 Einstein was working on relativistic cosmology and on promoting and explaining general relativity in correspondence. During this period, the thesis that the spacetime metric should be determined by the distribution of matter played an important role in his thought.…continue reading →

New Publication by Antonio Vassallo in Erkenntnis

We are pleased to announce that Antonio Vassallo has published a new article: The Metaphysics of Decoherence. Erkenntnis, DOI 10.1007/s10670-021-00469-8, 2021. The paper investigates the type of realism that best suits the framework of decoherence taken at face value without postulating a plurality of worlds, or additional hidden variables, or non-unitary dynamical mechanisms. It is argued that this reading of decoherence leads to an extremely radical type of perspectival realism, especially when cosmological decoherence is considered. The article is co-authored by Davide Romano (University of Lisbon).continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium 2021/2022 (online)

The Philosophy of Physics Group at the Warsaw University of Technology is happy to announce the Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium 2021-2022. The Colloquium focuses on the foundations of spacetime physics broadly construed and will be held fortnightly on Zoom. The program for the winter semester is the following: 22 October (17:00-19:00 CEST) – Gordon Belot (University of Michigan) – “The Mach-Einstein Principle of 1917-1918.” 5 November (17:00-19:00 CET) – Robert DiSalle (Western University) – TBA 19 November (17:00-19:00 CET) – Jeremy Butterfield & Henrique Gomes (University of Cambridge) - "Assessing the Hole Argument." 3…continue reading →

Warsaw Spacetime Colloquium: JB Manchak (28 May on Zoom)

On Friday, 28 May, JB Manchak (University of California, Irvine) will give a talk entitled “On the (In?)Stability of Spacetime Inextendibility” (abstract below). The meeting will take place online on Zoom (17:00-19:00 CEST). If you have not registered yet, you can do so by sending a message to antonio.vassallo@pw.edu.pl. The Colloquium is organized by the Philosophy of Physics Group at the International Center for Formal Ontology (Faculty of Administration and Social Sciences, Warsaw University of Technology). The recordings of the previous meetings are available on the ICFO's YouTube channel. ABSTRACT Within the context…continue reading →