Christian Wüthrich: ‌Laws beyond spacetime

Oxford Philosophy of Physics Seminars, Michaelmas term 2022
27 October - Christian Wüthrich (Geneva)
Title: Laws beyond spacetime
Abstract: Quantum gravity's suggestion that spacetime may be emergent and so only exist contingently would force a radical reconception of extant analyses of laws of nature. Humeanism presupposes a spatiotemporal mosaic of particular matters of fact on which laws supervene; primitivism and dispositionalism conceive of the action of primitive laws or of dispositions as a process of `nomic production' unfolding over time. We show how the Humean supervenience basis of non-modal facts and primitivist or dispositionalist accounts of nomic production can be reconceived, avoiding a reliance on fundamental spacetime. However, it is unclear that naturalistic forms of Humeanism can maintain their commitment to there being no necessary connections among distinct entities. Furthermore, non-temporal conceptions of production render this central concept more elusive than before. In fact, the challenges run so deep that the survival of the investigated analyses into the era of quantum gravity is questionable.
This talk is based on joint work with Vincent Lam.

[@palfers1]

Discussing a world devoid of spacetime at least achieves an acute awareness of our use of language: that most of it implicitly assumes an embedding in spacetime! For example, the discussion of quantum nonlocality in a world devoid of spacetime is simply a category error - akin to discussing horses in a world devoid of animals.

[@jimmyfaulkner1855]

Hi 👋. I am currently a Philosophy MA student and I am interested in doing a PhD in the philosophy of science - especially in either the ‘philosophy of physics’ or in the ‘history of philosophy and science’. I am in the beginning stages of thinking about what I should do exactly for my PhD and I was therefore wondering (and hoping for some advice) are there any unique areas of research in these areas of philosophy that could be interesting to do my future PhD in? Thank you.

[@marlowbosville4454]

pr໐๓໐Ş๓ 😔