The Philosophy of Vacuum

ISBN-13: 9780198244493 / Angielski / Twarda / 1991 / 304 str.

Simon W. Saunders; Jr. Harvey R. Brown

Opis

The vacuum is fast emerging as the central structure of modern physics. This collection brings together philosophically-minded specialists who engage these issues in the context of classical gravity, quantum electrodynamics, and the grand unification program. The vacuum emerges as the synthesis of concepts of space, time, and matter; in the context of relativity and the quantum this new synthesis represents a structure of the most intricate and novel complexity. This book is a work in modern metaphysics, in which the concepts of substance and space interweave in the most intangible of forms, the background and context of our physical experience: vacuum, void, or nothingness.

Recenzje

useful collection ... This collection is a valuable one because it contains, in addition to what is implied by the title, readable discussions of the ideas behind much of the frontier of physics as the twentieth century draws to a close.

Spis treści

Simon Saunders: Introduction; Albert Einstein: On the ether; R. Penrose: The mass of the classical vacuum; Simon Saunders & Harvey R. Brown: Reflections on ether; Simon Saunders: The negative-energy sea; Gordon N. Fleming: The vacuum on null planes; D.W. Sciama: The physical significance of the vacuum state of a quantum field; I.J.R. Aitchison: The vacuum and unification; Robert Weingard: Making everything out of nothing; B.J. Hiley: Vacuum or holomovement; David Finklestein: Theory of vacuum; Michael Atiyah: Topology of the vacuum; Peter J. Braam: How empty is the vacuum?; Index.