Skip to content

History and Philosophy of Physics papers — page 97

physics.hist-phBrowse archive

Many Worlds? Everett, Quantum Theory and Reality
An assessment of the anthology, 'Many Worlds? Everett, Quantum Theory and Reality', edited by Simon Saunders, Jonathan Barrett, Adrian Kent and David Wallace.
Jeremy ButterfieldJun 17, 2014
Learn
Are There Many Worlds?
It is often thought that the existence of other worlds cannot be scientifically verified and therefore should be treated as philosophical speculation. In this article, I describe several methods for…
Austin GerigJun 16, 2014
Learn
Astronomy of two Indian tribes: Banjaras and Kolams
We report field studies of the astronomical beliefs of two Indian tribes: the Banjaras and the Kolams. The Banjaras are an ancient tribe connected with the gypsies of Europe while the Kolams have…
Mayank N Vahia, Ganesh Halkare, Kishore Menon et al.Jun 10, 2014
Learn
Change in Hamiltonian General Relativity from the Lack of a Time-like Killing Vector Field
In General Relativity in Hamiltonian form, change has seemed to be missing, defined only asymptotically, or otherwise obscured at best, because the Hamiltonian is a sum of first-class constraints and…
J. Brian PittsJun 7, 2014
Learn
The ontology of Bohmian mechanics
The paper points out that the modern formulation of Bohm's quantum theory known as Bohmian mechanics is committed only to particles' positions and a law of motion. We explain how this view…
Michael Esfeld, Dustin Lazarovici, Mario Hubert et al.Jun 5, 2014
Learn
Less trouble with orbits: The semi-classical hydrogen problem in parabolic and spherical coordinates
Historically, the eccentricity of Sommerfeld orbits from quantization conditions in either parabolic or spherical coordinates was found to differ in almost all cases. To do the orbit comparison…
Manfred BucherJun 3, 2014
Learn
David Elijah Packer: cluster variables, meteors and the solar corona
David Elijah Packer (1862-1936), a librarian by profession, was an enthusiastic amateur astronomer who observed from London and Birmingham. He first came to the attention of the astronomical…
Jeremy ShearsMay 29, 2014
Learn
The controversial pen of Edwin Holmes
Edwin Alfred Holmes (1839 -1919) is best remembered for his discovery of a bright comet in 1892, now known as Comet 17P/Holmes. An amateur astronomer and authority on optics, he was an original…
Jeremy ShearsMay 29, 2014
Learn
What is Quantum? Unifying Its Micro-Physical and Structural Appearance
We can recognize two modes in which 'quantum appears' in macro domains: (i) a 'micro-physical appearance', where quantum laws are assumed to be universal and they are transferred from…
Diederik Aerts, Sandro SozzoMay 29, 2014
Learn
The Australian Aboriginal People: How to Misunderstand Their Science
Just one generation ago, schoolkids were taught that Aboriginal people couldn't count beyond five, wandered the desert scavenging for food, had no civilization or religion, had no agriculture,…
Ray P. NorrisMay 28, 2014
Learn
Ken Wilson: Solving the Strong Interactions
Ken Wilson's ideas on the renormalization group were shaped by his attempts to build a theory of the strong interactions based on the concepts of quantum field theory. I describe the development…
Michael E. PeskinMay 27, 2014
Learn
Philosophical roots of the "eternal" questions in the XX-century theoretical physics
The evolution of theoretical physics in the XX century differs significantly from that in XVII-XIX centuries. While continuous progress is observed for theoretical physics in XVII-XIX centuries,…
V. IhnatovychMay 27, 2014
Learn
Bonaparte and the astronomers of Brera Observatory
In Northern Italy, between 1796 and 1814, Napoleon Bonaparte formed a Republic, and then a Kingdom, controlled by France. Milan was the capital of the State, and the Brera Palace was the main…
E. AntonelloMay 27, 2014
Learn
A Note on the Rapanui Lunar Calendar
This paper is dedicated to the research of secrets of Easter Island (Rapa Nui), a remote plot of land in the Pacific; the article contains not only ethnological data, but also some results on the…
Sergei RjabchikovMay 22, 2014
Learn
Physics at the University of Lviv: the first two centuries in the bibliographic aspect
A detailed bibliography related to physics at the University of Lviv (Leopolis, Lemberg, Lw\'ow) in 18th-19th centuries is presented. Over ninety works of various types are listed with a large share…
Andrij RovenchakMay 22, 2014
Learn
Fundamental Dilemmas in Theoretical Physics
In this paper, we argue that there are foundational dilemmas in theoretical physics related to the concept of reality and the nature of mathematics in physics. Physical theory is treated as a…
Hisham GhassibMay 22, 2014
Learn
A quantum-information-theoretic complement to a general-relativistic implementation of a beyond-Turing computer
There exists a growing literature on the so-called physical Church-Turing thesis in a relativistic spacetime setting. The physical Church-Turing thesis is the conjecture that no computing device that…
Christian WuthrichMay 21, 2014
Learn
Dimensionalidade do espaco ou da extens\~ao: nota sobre a contribuic\~ao do jovem Kant
In this article, we present new comments to the article On Kant's First Insight Into The Problem of Space Dimensionality and Its Physical Foundations. In particular, we discuss how the space concept…
Francisco Caruso, Zulena dos Santos SilvaMay 21, 2014
Learn
Raiders of the lost spacetime
Spacetime as we know and love it is lost in most approaches to quantum gravity. For many of these approaches, as inchoate and incomplete as they may be, one of the main challenges is to relate what…
Christian WuthrichMay 21, 2014
Learn
A Life of Fun Playing With Solar Magnetic Fields (Special Historical Review)
This invited memoire describes my fortunate life, which has been enriched by meeting many wonderful people. The story starts at home and university, and continues with accounts of St Andrews and…
E. R. PriestMay 14, 2014
Learn
Obituary: Dr Dianne Johnson (1947-2012)
It is with great sadness that I report the passing of Dr Dianne Johnson in May 2012. Dr Johnson was a pivotal and important figure in the field of Australian cultural astronomy and in the campaign…
Duane W. HamacherMay 12, 2014
Learn
The Legacy of M. P. Bronstein: on relativistic wave equations for spin 2 fields and some comments
We briefly give a very simple picture about one of the most remarkable results of Matvej Petrovich Bronstein concerning the quantization of the gravitational waves showing also that the linearized…
Diego Julio Cirilo-LombardoMay 9, 2014
Learn
Ensaio sobre a unidimensionalidade do tempo
Some ideas aimed to understand that time is one-dimensional are briefly reviewed. Some attempts to construct theories in varieties with more spatial and temporal components are presented. It is…
Francisco CarusoMay 7, 2014
Learn
Locating possible sources of physical indeterminism
Some possible (re)sources of indeterminism and randomness encountered in physics are enumerated. These gaps in the physical laws, if they exist, could possibly be exploited for dualistic interfaces.…
Karl SvozilMay 6, 2014
Learn
Time and the river of existence
Time is one of those issues about which many thinkers and scientists have tried to pronounce their finest thoughts, but the discourse about time has remained vague and often inconsistent. In this…
Mario RadovanMay 6, 2014
Learn
← PreviousPage 97Next →