Absolute vs. Relational Theories of Space and Time

时空的绝对理论与关系理论

• 批准号: 8701534
• 负责人: John Earman
• 金额: $ 0.9万
• 依托单位: University of Pittsburgh
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1987
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1987-11-15 至 1988-10-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=8701534&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Absolute; vs.; Relational; Theories; Space

The time is ripe for significant progress to be made on a cluster of issues that goes under the label of absolute versus relational conceptions of space and time. We are now in a position to provide a separation and classification of the issues and to see where linkages do and do not exist. In some cases, we can settle an issue, and in other cases we can say with more precision what the issue is, what is at stake, and what it would take to bring a resolution. Professor Earman under this grant, will show that an empirically adequate theory of motion, whether classical or relativistic, must be based on a space-time structure that is incompatible with a relational conception of motion. He argues, however, that the absolutenes of motion does not entail absoluteness of space-time in the sense of substantivalism. He will show the issue of substantivalism, first raised in the Leibnitz-Clarke correspondence, to be crucial to an understanding both of the genesis of Einstein's general theory of relativity and of the foundations of the completed theory. Further, he will show that the demand for the possibility of determinism in a theory like general relativity to force the abandonment of substantivalism with respect to the space-time manifold. In turn, the abandonment of a manifold of space-time points as a substratum to support fields leads to a conception of space-time that lies outside of the ambit of the traditional absolute versus relational debate.

在一组问题上取得重大进展的时机已经成熟， 绝对与关系标签下的问题 空间和时间的概念。 我们现在可以提供一个 问题的分离和分类， 存在和不存在。 在某些情况下，我们可以解决一个问题， 在其他情况下，我们可以更精确地说，问题是什么， 以及如何才能达成决议。 教授 厄尔曼根据这项赠款，将表明，经验充分， 运动理论，无论是经典的还是相对论的，都必须基于 一种与关系型时空结构不相容的时空结构 运动的概念。 然而，他认为， 运动并不意味着时空的绝对性 实体主义他将首先展示实体论的问题 在莱布尼茨-克拉克通信中提出，对一个 理解爱因斯坦的一般理论的起源， 相对论和完整理论的基础。 此外，本发明还 他将表明，在一个决定论的可能性的要求， 像广义相对论这样的理论， 关于时空流形的实体论。 反过来， 放弃了作为底层的时空点的流形， 支撑场导致了一种时空概念， 传统的绝对与关系之争的界限。