Description In this book Rickles considers several interpretative difficulties raised by gauge-type symmetries (those that correspond to no change
in physical state). The ubiquity of such symmetries in modern physics renders them an urgent topic in philosophy of physics. Rickles
focuses on spacetime physics, and in particular classical and quantum general relativity. Here the problems posed are at their most pathological,
involving the apparent disappearance of spacetime! Rickles argues that both traditional ontological positions should be replaced by a
structuralist account according to which relational structure is what the physics is about.
Audience
History and Philosophy of Science, Foundations of Physics, Philosophy, Physics
Contents 1 Interpretation and Formalism
2 Space and Time in the Leibniz-Clarke Debate
3 The Interpretation of Gauge Symmetries
4 Spacetime in General
Relativity
5 Responding to the Hole Problem
6 What is an Observable In General Relativity?
7 Time, Change, and Gauge
8 Symmetry and Ontology
9 Structuralism and Symmetry
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