The Little Book of Time

ISBN-13: 9781441929396 / Angielski / Miękka / 2010 / 176 str.

Klaus Mainzer; J. Eisinger

Opis

chapter 1 Time in the Classical and Medieval Worldviews From the Beginnings to the Pre-Socratic School Zeno's Time Arrow and Aristotle's Continuum 6 Time and Creation According to Saint Augustine 15 Time and Medieval Astronomy 18 20 Calendars and Clocks chapter 2 Time in the Worldview of Classical Physics 25 Absolute Time According to Newton 26 Relational Time According to Leibniz 30 Time in Classical Mechanics 31 Time in Kant's Epistemology 35 chapter 3 Relativistic Spacetime 43 Time in Special Relativity Theory 44 Time in General Relativity Theory 50 Time in Relativistic Cosmology 54 chapter 4 Time and the Quantum World 61 Time in Quantum Mechanics 62 Time in Quantum Field Theories 70 Time, Black Holes, and the Anthropic Principle 78 Time and Thermodynamics chapter 5 83 Time in Equilibrium Thermodynamics 84 Time in Nonequilibrium Thermodynamics 2 9 Time, Irreversibility, and Self-Organization 100 chapter 6 Time and Life 107 Time in Darwin's Theory of Evolution 108 Time in Molecular Evolution 111 Time Hierarchies and Biological Rhythms 117 chapter 7 Time and Consciousness 121 Temporal Rhythms and Brain Physiology 122 The Experience of Time and the Emergence of Consciousness 124 Computation Time and Artificial Intelligence 128 chapter 8 Time in History and Culture 137 Time in Historical Cultures 138 Time in Technological-Industrial Cultures 144 The Time Horizon of the Technological World and the Philosophy of Time 152 Further Reading 161 Index 167 Acknowledgments The Little Book of Time was inspired by my research in

Recenzje

From the reviews:

"In this philosophical rumination on time, Mainzer delves rigorously into time's logical constructs as they have been devised over the history of occidental science." Booklist

"Klaus Mainzer ... provides a brief overview of the concept of time from antiquity to the present. ... The Little Book of Time succinctly and clearly covers human concepts of time, from the ancients to Newton to Einstein's theory of relativity and the conceptions of time in quantum mechanics, with its profound consequences for modern cosmology." (Science in Africa, October, 2002)

"Time is a big subject ... . The book will probably be interesting to enthusiasts ... . The flavor is philosophical, which is not surprising since Mainzer is a philosopher. ... the book is a nice summary." (Thomas R. Berger, MathDL, January, 2004)

Spis treści

Preface; 1. Time in Prehistoric Societies; 2. Time in the Eyes of Early Astronomers; 3. Classic Philosophers View Time; 4. Western and Eastern Religious Interpretations; 5. Newton and Time; 6. Darwin and Time; 7. Einstein and Time; 8. Modern Physics and Time; 9. The Future of Time

O autorze

Prof. Dr. Klaus Mainzer, geboren 1947, hat einen Lehrstuhl für Philosophie und Wissenschaftstheorie inne und ist Direktor des Instituts für Interdisziplinäre Informatik an der Universität Augsburg. Zahlreiche Fachpublikationen.