Conventional wisdom holds that since the advent of the first full theories of quantum mechanics in the mid-1920s, the Copenhagen interpretation has been the default interpretation of quantum mechanics, and has enjoyed the support of a majority of physicists ever since. This is not the case. While it is indeed true that a majority of physicists have long professed that they subscribe to the Copenhagen interpretation, the plain fact of the matter is that there is no single coherent position known as the Copenhagen interpretation, nor has there ever been one. Moreover, none of the positions that go by the name “Copenhagen interpretation” do a good job of solving the measurement problem, the central interpretive problem at the heart of quantum foundations. Nor do they evade the nonlocality that is dictated by Bell’s theorem. In this talk, I will give an overview of the history of the Copenhagen interpretation from 1926 to the present, explain its multiple inconsistencies and failures, and attempt an answer at a persistent puzzle: why does the Copenhagen interpretation remain popular among physicists despite its manifest flaws and the existence of multiple superior alternatives
About the speaker: Adam Becker is the author of What is Real? The Unfinished Quest for the Meaning of Quantum Physics. He has a PhD in physics from the University of Michigan and he is the recipient of an Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Book Grant. He is currently a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley’s Office for History of Science and Technology.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: My main aim is to make a remark about the relation between (i) dualities between theories, as `duality’ is understood in physics and (ii) equivalence of theories, as `equivalence’ is understood in logic and philosophy. The remark is that in physics, two theories can be dual, and accordingly get called `the same theory’, though we interpret them as disagreeing—so that they are certainly equivalent, as `equivalent’ is normally understood. So the remark is simple: but, I shall argue, worth stressing—since often neglected.
My argument for this is based on the account of duality by De Haro and myself: which is illustrated here with several examples, from both elementary physics and string theory. Thus I argue that in some examples, including in string theory, two dual theories disagree in their claims about the world.
I also spell out how this remark implies a limitation of proposals (both traditional and recent) to understand theoretical equivalence as either logical equivalence or a weakening of it.
Abstract: TBD.
If expansion is not the best explanation for the relevant data, then one can motivate certain normative claims about methodological shifts in contemporary cosmology. To wit—more thought should be dedicated to alternate explanations for red-shifting phenomena, and to the development and careful analysis of indirect tests for expansion as against alternative cosmological models.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: My main aim is to make a remark about the relation between (i) dualities between theories, as `duality’ is understood in physics and (ii) equivalence of theories, as `equivalence’ is understood in logic and philosophy. The remark is that in physics, two theories can be dual, and accordingly get called `the same theory’, though we interpret them as disagreeing—so that they are certainly equivalent, as `equivalent’ is normally understood. So the remark is simple: but, I shall argue, worth stressing—since often neglected.
My argument for this is based on the account of duality by De Haro and myself: which is illustrated here with several examples, from both elementary physics and string theory. Thus I argue that in some examples, including in string theory, two dual theories disagree in their claims about the world.
I also spell out how this remark implies a limitation of proposals (both traditional and recent) to understand theoretical equivalence as either logical equivalence or a weakening of it.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: TBD.
Abstract: My main aim is to make a remark about the relation between (i) dualities between theories, as `duality’ is understood in physics and (ii) equivalence of theories, as `equivalence’ is understood in logic and philosophy. The remark is that in physics, two theories can be dual, and accordingly get called `the same theory’, though we interpret them as disagreeing—so that they are certainly equivalent, as `equivalent’ is normally understood. So the remark is simple: but, I shall argue, worth stressing—since often neglected.
My argument for this is based on the account of duality by De Haro and myself: which is illustrated here with several examples, from both elementary physics and string theory. Thus I argue that in some examples, including in string theory, two dual theories disagree in their claims about the world.
I also spell out how this remark implies a limitation of proposals (both traditional and recent) to understand theoretical equivalence as either logical equivalence or a weakening of it.
Abstract: TBD.
What is the metaphysical status of quantum field theory (QFT)? How should field theories be interpreted? These questions have received considerable attention over the past few decades in various research projects in physics, mathematics, and philosophy, but there is no clear consensus on any of them. One finds a variety of different approaches to understanding QFTs — Algebraic QFT, conventional QFT, Bell-type Bohmian QFT, etc. — and different interpretations — realism, instrumentalism, and structuralism. What are the advantages and disadvantages of these approaches? What is the status of the measurement problem in these theories? And more generally, how should QFT inform the metaphysics of science?
The two-day Rutgers workshop aims to bring together researchers who work on these different approaches. It will provide opportunities for in-depth discussions about metaphysical issues in QFT. As we have limited seating in the seminar room, RSVP is required; please send an email to sr3109@columbia.edu if you’d like to attend.
(Information about the previous workshop in 2017, on structural realism, can be found here.)
Organizers: Eddy Chen (Rutgers), Sebastien Rivat (Columbia), Isaac Wilhelm (Rutgers)
Sponsors: Marc Sanders Foundation, Rutgers University Philosophy Department, Columbia University Philosophy Department, Rutgers Graduate Student Association.
Conference Schedule:
Thursday, May 17
- 9:45 – 10:00. David Baker (Michigan), “Introduction to the Ontology of QFT”
- 10:00 – 11:30. David Baker (Michigan), “Interpreting Supersymmetry”
- 11:45 – 1:15 Ward Struyve (KULeuven), “Bohmian Quantum Field Theory”
- 1:15 – 2:30. Lunch
- 2:30 – 4:00. Tian Yu Cao (Boston), “What is a Quantum Field?”
- 4:15 – 5:45. Anna Ijjas (Columbia), “QFT on Curved Space-times and its Applications in Cosmology”
- 6:30. Conference Dinner
Friday, May 18
- 9.45 – 10:00. Michael Miller (Toronto), “Introduction to Major Approaches to QFT”
- 10:00 – 11:30. Porter Williams (Pittsburgh), “The Physics within Metaphysics”
- 11:45 – 1:15. Laura Ruetsche (Michigan), “Perturbing Realism”
- 1:15 – 2:30. Lunch
- 2:30 – 4:00. Michael Miller (Toronto), “Indeterminacy at Large Order”
- 4:15 – 5:45. David Wallace (USC), “Quantum Metaphysics from an Effective-Field-Theory Viewpoint”
- 6:30. Dinner
Invited Discussants:
Richard Healey (Arizona), Meinard Kuhlmann (Bremen), James Ladyman (Bristol), Jeremy Butterfield (Cambridge), Brian Pitts (Cambridge), Ryan Reece (CERN), David Albert (Columbia), Mario Hubert (Columbia), Elise Crull (CUNY), Noel Swanson (Delaware), Ned Hall (Harvard), David Glick (Ithaca), Ward Struyve (LMU), Gordon Belot (Michigan), Nina Emery (Mount Holyoke), Valia Allori (NIU), Jonathan Bain (NYU), Cian Dorr (NYU), Hartry Field (NYU), Tim Maudlin (NYU), Michael Strevens (NYU), Adam Elga (Princeton), Hans Halvorson (Princeton), Mark Johnston (Princeton), Gideon Rosen (Princeton), Bob Batterman (Pittsburgh), Natan Andrei (Rutgers), Sheldon Goldstein (Rutgers), Matthias Lienert (Rutgers), Barry Loewer (Rutgers), Jill North (Rutgers), Zee Perry (Rutgers), Jonathan Schaffer (Rutgers), Ted Sider (Rutgers), Dean Zimmerman (Rutgers), Alyssa Ney (UC Davis), Paul Teller (UC Davis), Marian Gilton (UCI), Nick Huggett (UIC), Kerry McKenzie (UCSD), Charles Sebens (UCSD), Elizabeth Miller (Yale).
Conference hotel: Hyatt Regency New Brunswick.
*This workshop is made possible through the generous support of the Marc Sanders Foundation, Rutgers University Philosophy Department, Columbia University Philosophy Department, and Rutgers Graduate Student Association. Special thanks to Professor Mark Johnston, Professor Dean Zimmerman, and the administrative staff at Rutgers and Columbia.
Inflationary cosmology’s account for the emergence of the seeds of structure in the universe out of primordial quantum fluctuations is empirically successful as far as the so called scalar modes is concerned, but not so regarding the tensor modes. On the other hand, the usual account has some serious conceptual problems, connected to the quantum macro-objectification question. In the search for an approach to resolve the latter, we find substantially modified predictions (with respect to the standard ones) for one of the observables, specifically the estimates for the amplitude and shape of the spectrum primordial gravity waves. This is an interesting example, where considerations that might have initially thought to be “just of philosophical interest” actually led to novel and (so far better) predictions for empirical facts.
There will be at least three MAPS talks this semester (I am still waiting to hear back regarding a fourth). The preliminary schedule below should convey a sense of the basic plan.
A number of invited speakers asked to visit in Spring 2019 or Fall 2019 instead of this fall. In case you are interested, I list those future speakers below.
Best,
Isaac
Upcoming Talks
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Massimo Pigliucci (CUNY)
Details: 4:30-6:30pm Tuesday Oct 16; 5307 CUNY Graduate Center (365 5th Ave.).
Title: The variety of scientism and the limits of science
Abstract: Science is by far the most powerful approach to the investigation of the natural world ever devised. Still, it has limits, and there are many areas and questions where the scientific approach is ill suited, or at best provides only pertinent information rather than full answers. The denial of this modest attitude about science is called scientism, which declares science to be the only form of human knowledge and understanding, attempting to subsume everything else, including all the humanistic disciplines, into “science” very broadly (mis-)construed. In this talk, I argue that this is a mistake, and that it moreover has the potential to undermine public trust in science itself.
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Mario Hubert (Columbia)
Details: 4:30-6:30pm Tuesday Nov20; location TBD.
Title: When Fields Are Not Degrees of Freedom (joint work with Vera Hartenstein).
Abstract: We show that in the Maxwell–Lorentz theory of classical electrodynamics most initial values for fields and particles lead to an ill-defined dynamics, as they exhibit singularities or discontinuities along light-cones. This phenomenon suggests that the Maxwell equations and the Lorentz force law ought rather to be read as a system of delay differential equations, that is, differential equations that relate a function and its derivatives at different times. This mathematical reformulation, however, leads to physical and philosophical consequences for the ontological status of the electromagnetic field. In particular, fields cannot be taken as independent degrees of freedom, which suggests that one should not add them to the ontology.
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Spring 2019
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Nina Emery (Mount Holyoke)
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Fall 2019
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Quayshawn Spencer (UPenn)
Loewer distinguishes two approaches to laws and time: Humean accounts, which deny primitive modality and explain temporal asymmetries in scientific terms, and non-Humean accounts that take temporal asymmetry and modality to be metaphysically fundamental. I’ll argue that Loewer neglects an important third approach: deny metaphysical claims about fundamentality, and explain temporal asymmetries as well as the function of modal entities in scientific terms. This pragmatist approach provides a clear ontology to science, and, and unlike the other two accounts, doesn’t use metaphysics in place of scientific explanation.
There will be dinner after the talk. If you are interested, please send an email with “Dinner” in the heading to nyphilsci@gmail.com (please note that all are welcome, but only the speaker’s dinner will be covered). If you have any other questions, please email isaac.wilhelm@rutgers.edu.
What we are hoping for is a free, open, wide-ranging and informal conversation about a number of topics that people have lately been thinking more and more about – and that seem likely to play increasingly central roles, over the next several years, in the foundations of physics. These include questions of the emergence/fundamentality of space and time, the philosophical analysis and scientific role of chance, the relationship between physics and agency, and the possibility, desirability and scientific appropriateness of a complete and fundamental theory of nature.
Location: Pupin Hall Theory Center (8th floor), Columbia University.
Directions: Pupin Hall is located at the northwest end of the campus, in between the Northwest Corner building and Schapiro (south side of 120th Street). The Center for Theoretical Physics is located on the left once you arrive on the 8th floor in Pupin Hall.
RSVP: Please send an email to sr3109@columbia.edu if you would like to attend.
Workshop schedule:
Friday October 26, First Session: “Questions of chance”
– 10:00 – 11.15: Lay-of-the-land talk by Barry Loewer (Rutgers): “The metaphysics of laws and chance in physics”
– 11.15 – 11.30: Break
– 11.30 – 1:00: Panel with Jeff Barrett (UCI), Sean Carroll (Caltech), Mario Hubert (Columbia) and Charles Sebens (UCSD)
– 1:00 – 1:30: General Discussion
– 1:30 – 3:00: Lunch in Columbia area
Friday October 26, Second Session: “Physics and agency”
– 3:00- 4:15: Lay-of-the-land talk by Jenann Ismael (Columbia): “Physics and agency: the missing piece of the puzzle”
– 4:15 – 4:30: Break
– 4:30 – 6:00: Panel with David Albert (Columbia), Thomas Blanchard (IWU), Alison Fernandes (Trinity College Dublin) and Michael Strevens (NYU).
– 6:00 – 6:30: General Discussion
– 7:00: Conference Dinner
Saturday October 27, First Session: “The future of space and time”
– 10:00 – 11.15: Lay-of-the-land talk by Carlo Rovelli (Aix-Marseille): “Do we all mean the same, when we say ‘space’ and ‘time’?”
– 11.15 – 11.30: Break
– 11.30 – 1:00: Panel with Gordon Belot (Michigan), Sean Carroll (Caltech), Nick Huggett (UIC) and Jill North (Rutgers)
– 1:00 – 1:30: General Discussion
– 1:30 – 3:00: Lunch in Columbia area
Saturday October 27, Second Session: “Fundamentality and the ultimate aspirations of physics”
– 3:00- 4:15: Lay-of-the-land talk by Kerry McKenzie (UCSD): “Delusions of a final theory: the problem of progress in physics and metaphysics”
– 4:15 – 4:30: Break
– 4:30 – 6:00: Panel with David Albert (Columbia), Michael Miller (Toronto), Rachel Rosen (Columbia) and Porter Williams (USC)
– 6:00 – 6:30: General Discussion
Sponsor: The event is jointly organized by the Department of Philosophy and the Department of Physics at Columbia University, in association with the MA programme in the Philosophical Foundations of Physics. We would like in particular to acknowledge the generous and invaluable support both to the MA programme and to the workshop from Guerman Aliev.
I introduce a sequence which I call indefinite: a sequence every element of which has a successor but whose number of elements is bounded; this is no contradiction. I then consider the possibility of space and time being indefinitely divisible. This is theoretically possible and agrees with experience. If this is space and time’s structure, then even if the laws of nature are deterministic, the behaviour of physical systems will be probabilistic. This approach might also shed light on directionality in time and other physical phenomena.
There will be dinner after the talk. If you are interested, please send an email with “Dinner” in the heading to nyphilsci@gmail.com (please note that all are welcome, but only the speaker’s dinner will be covered). If you have any other questions, please email isaac.wilhelm@rutgers.edu.
Upcoming Talks
Mario Hubert (Columbia)
4:30-6:30pm Wednesday Nov 28; location TBD.
Title: When Fields Are Not Degrees of Freedom (joint work with Vera Hartenstein).
Abstract: We show that in the Maxwell–Lorentz theory of classical electrodynamics most initial values for fields and particles lead to an ill-defined dynamics, as they exhibit singularities or discontinuities along light-cones. This phenomenon suggests that the Maxwell equations and the Lorentz force law ought rather to be read as a system of delay differential equations, that is, differential equations that relate a function and its derivatives at different times. This mathematical reformulation, however, leads to physical and philosophical consequences for the ontological status of the electromagnetic field. In particular, fields cannot be taken as independent degrees of freedom, which suggests that one should not add them to the ontology.
We show that in the Maxwell–Lorentz theory of classical electrodynamics most initial values for fields and particles lead to an ill-defined dynamics, as they exhibit singularities or discontinuities along light-cones. This phenomenon suggests that the Maxwell equations and the Lorentz force law ought rather to be read as a system of delay differential equations, that is, differential equations that relate a function and its derivatives at different times. This mathematical reformulation, however, leads to physical and philosophical consequences for the ontological status of the electromagnetic field. In particular, fields cannot be taken as independent degrees of freedom, which suggests that one should not add them to the ontology.
(joint work with Vera Hartenstein)
There will be dinner after the talk. If you are interested, please send an email with “Dinner” in the heading to nyphilsci@gmail.com (please note that all are welcome, but only the speaker’s dinner will be covered). If you have any other questions, please email isaac.wilhelm@rutgers.edu.
MAPS is supported by Rutgers, Columbia, NYU, and most recently, a generous gift from member Dan Pinkel.
I argue that we do not understand gauge theory as well as we think we do, when boundaries are present. I will briefly explain the conceptual and technical issues that arise at the boundary. I will then propose a tentative resolution, which requires us to think of theories not in space-time, but in field-space.