Conventionality and Reality

Conventionality of simultaneity; Eternalism; Presentism; Rietdijk–Putnam argument; Special relativity; Weingard–Petkov argument; Philosophy; Physics and Astronomy (all); History and Philosophy of Science

Abstract :

[en] The debate on the conventionality of simultaneity and the debate on the dimensionality of the world have been central in the philosophy of special relativity. The link between both debates however has rarely been explored. The purpose of this paper is to gauge what implications the former debate has for the latter. I show the situation to be much more subtle than was previously argued, and explain how the ontic versus epistemic distinction in the former debate impacts the latter. Despite claims to the contrary, I conclude that special relativity leaves the debate on the dimensionality of the world underdetermined.

Disciplines :

Philosophy & ethics

Author, co-author :

Thyssen, Pieter ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Département de philosophie > Théorie de la connaissance et philosophie des sciences ; Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Language :

English

Title :

Conventionality and Reality

Publication date :

December 2019

Journal title :

Foundations of Physics

ISSN :

0015-9018

eISSN :

1572-9516

Publisher :

Springer

Volume :

Issue :

Pages :

1336 - 1354

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Additional URL :

http://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s10701-019-00294-8.pdf

Funders :

FWO - Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen

Funding text :

I owe a great debt to Dennis Dieks for his time and careful remarks, which greatly improved this paper. I also wish to thank the participants of the Fifth International Conference on the Nature and Ontology of Spacetime (Albena, Bulgaria, May 14–17, 2018) for stimulating discussions. I am also indebted to Sylvia Wenmackers and Gerard Bodifee for useful comments on earlier versions of this paper. This work was supported by the Research Foundation Flanders (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, FWO), grant number G0B8616N “Time, Causality, and Probability in Quantum Mechanics: Assessing Retrocausal Explanations in Light of Recent Experiments”.I owe a great debt to Dennis Dieks for his time and careful remarks, which greatly improved this paper. I also wish to thank the participants of the Fifth International Conference on the Nature and Ontology of Spacetime (Albena, Bulgaria, May 14–17, 2018) for stimulating discussions. I am also indebted to Sylvia Wenmackers and Gerard Bodifee for useful comments on earlier versions of this paper. This work was supported by the Research Foundation Flanders (Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, FWO), grant number G0B8616N “Time, Causality, and Probability in Quantum Mechanics: Assessing Retrocausal Explanations in Light of Recent Experiments”.

Available on ORBi :

since 30 November 2025

Statistics

Number of views

14 (0 by ULiège)

Number of downloads

11 (0 by ULiège)

More statistics

Scopus citations^®

Scopus citations^®
without self-citations

OpenCitations

OpenAlex citations

Bibliography

Ben-Yami, H.: Causal order, temporal order, and becoming in special relativity. Topoi 34, 277–281 (2015)
Black, M.: Review of G. J. Whitrow’s the natural philosophy of time. Sci. Am., CCVI(April):181–182 (1962)
Bouton, C.: Is the future already present? the special theory of relativity and the block universe view. In: Bouton, C., Huneman, P. (eds.) Time of Nature and the Nature of Time: Philosophical Perspectives of Time in Natural Sciences. Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science, Book Section 6, pp. 89–122. Springer, Switzerland (2017)
Callender, C.: Shedding light on time. Philos. Sci. 67, S587–S599 (2000)
Cohen, Y.: Why presentism cannot be refuted by special relativity. In: Dolev, Y., Roubach, M., (eds), Cosmological and Psychological Time, pp 41–51. Springer, Cham (2016). 10.1007/978-3-319-22590-6_3
Craig, W.L.: Time and the Metaphysics of Relativity, Volume 84 of Philosophical Studies Series. Springer, Dordrecht (2001)
Craig, W.L., Smith, Q.: Einstein Relativity and Absolute Simultaneity. Routledge, New York (2008)
Dieks, D.: Time, space, spacetime. Metascience 21(3), 617–619 (2012). 10.1007/s11016-012-9690-1
Dieks, D.: Time in special relativity. In: Ashtekar, A., Petkov, V. (eds.) Springer Handbook of Spacetime. Book Section 6, pp. 91–113. Springer, Berlin (2014)
Dürr, D., Goldstein, S., Norsen, T., Struyve, W., Zanghì, N.: Can bohmian mechanics be made relativistic? Proc. R. Soc. A 470, 2162 (2014). 10.1098/rspa.2013.0699
Einstein, A.: Relativity: The Special and the General Theory—A Popular Exposition. Methuen, London (1920)
Einstein, A.: On the electrodynamics of moving bodies. In: Stachel, J., Cassidy, D.C., Renn, J., Schulmann, R. (eds.) The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein-English Translations, vol. 2, pp. 140–171. Princeton University Press, Princeton (1989)
Gilmore, C., Costa, D., Calosi, C.: Relativity and three four-dimensionalisms. Philos. Compass 11(2), 102 (2016)
Godfrey-Smith, W.: Special relativity and the present. Philos. Stud.: Int. J. Philos. Anal. Trad., 36(3):233–244 (1979). ISSN 00318116, 15730883. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4319321. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Grünbaum, A.: Logical and philosophical foundations of the special theory of relativity. Am. J. Phys. 23, 450–464 (1955)
Harrington, J.: Special relativity and the future: a defense of the point present. Stud. Hist. Philos. Sci. B, 39(1):82–101 (2008). ISSN 1355-2198. 10.1016/j.shpsb.2007.06.003. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1355219807000627. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Hinchliff, M.: The puzzle of change. Philos. Persp., 10:119–136 (1996). ISSN 15208583, 17582245. 10.2307/2216239. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2216239. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Hinchliff, M.: A defense of presentism in a relativistic setting. Philosophy of Science 67, S575–S586 (2000). 10.1086/392847. http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/392847. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Jammer, M.: Concepts of Simultaneity: From Antiquity to Einstein and Beyond. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore (2006)
Malament, D.: Causal theories of time and the conventionality of simultaneity. Nous 11, 293–300 (1977)
Monton, B.: Presentism and quantum gravity. In: Dieks, D. (ed.) The Ontology of Spacetime. Book Section 14, pp. 263–280. Elsevier, Amsterdam (2006)
Norton, J.D.: Philosophy of space and time. In: Salmon, M.H., Earman, J., Glymour, C., Lennox, J.G., Machamer, P., McGuire, J.E., Norton, J.D., Salmon, W.C., Schaffner, K.F. (eds.) Introduction to the Philosophy of Science, Book Section 5. Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis (1992)
Norton, J.D.: Einstein for Everyone. Nullarbor Press, Pittsburgh (2018)
Penrose, R.: The Emperor’s New Mind. Oxford University Press, Oxford (1989)
Peterson, D., Silberstein, M.: Relativity of simultaneity and eternalism: in defense of the block universe. In: Petkov, V. (ed.) Space. Time, and Spacetime, vol. 167, pp. 209–237. Springer-Verlag, Berlin (2010)
Petkov, V.: Simultaneity, conventionality and existence. Br. J. Philos. Sci., 40(1):69–76 (1989). ISSN 00070882, 14643537. http://www.jstor.org/stable/687464. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Petkov, V.: Conventionality of simultaneity and reality. In: Dieks, D. (ed.) The Ontology of Spacetime II. Book Section 9, pp. 175–185. Elsevier, Amsterdam (2008)
Price, H.: Time’s Arrow and Archimedes’ Point. Oxford University Press, Oxford (1996)
Putnam, H.: Time and physical geometry. J. Philos. 64(8), 240–247 (1967)
Redhead, M.: The conventionality of simultaneity. In: Earman, J., Janis, A.I., Massey, G.J., Rescher, N. (eds.) Philosophical Problems in the Internal and External World: Essays in the Philosophy of Adolf Grünbaum, pp. 103–128. University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh (1993)
Reichenbach, H.: Der gegenwärtige stand der relativitätsdiskussion. Logos 10, 316–378 (1922)
Reichenbach, H.: Axiomatik der relativistischen Raum-Zeit-Lehre. Vieweg, Braunschweig (1924)
Reichenbach, H.: Philosophie der Raum-Zeit-Lehre. W. de Gruyter, Berlin (1928)
Reichenbach, H.: The Philosophy of Space and Time. Dover Publications, New York (1958)
Reichenbach, H.: On the present state of the discussion on relativity. In: Reichenbach, M. (eds), Modern Philosophy of Science—Selected Essays, vol. 2, pp. 3–47. Routledge and Kegan Paul, London (1959)
Reichenbach, H.: Axiomatization of the Theory of Relativity. Univeristy of California Press, Berkeley (1969)
Rietdijk, C. W.: A rigorous proof of determinism derived from the special theory of relativity. Philos. Sci., 33(4):341–344 (1966). ISSN 00318248, 1539767X. http://www.jstor.org/stable/186637. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Saunders, S.: How relativity contradicts presentism. R. Inst. Philos. Suppl. 50, 277 (2002)
Savitt, S.: There’s no time like the present (in Minkowski spacetime). Philos. Sci., 67:S563–S574, (2000). ISSN 00318248, 1539767X. http://www.jstor.org/stable/188695. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Savitt, S.: Being and Becoming in Modern Physics. In: Edward, N.Z. (ed.) The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Stanford University, Metaphysics Research Lab (2014). https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2017/entries/spacetime-bebecome/. Accessed 29 Aug 2019
Sklar, L.: Space, Time, and Spacetime. University of California Press, Berkeley (1974)
Sklar, L.: Time, reality and relativity. In: Healy, R. (ed.) Reduction. Time and Reality, pp. 129–142. Cambridge University Press, New York (1981)
Sklar, L.: Philosophy and Spacetime Physics. University of California Press, Berkeley (1985)
Stein, H.: On Einstein-Minkowski space-time. J. Philos. 67, 5–23 (1968)
Torretti, R.: Relativity and Geometry. Foundations and Philosophy of Science and Technology Series. Pergamon Press, Oxford (1983)
Weingard, R.: Relativity and the reality of past and future events. Br. J. Philos. Sci. 23(2), 119–121 (1972). 10.1093/bjps/23.2.119