Is spacetime curved? Assessing the underdetermination of general relativity and teleparallel gravity.

Realism about general relativity (GR) seems to imply realism about spacetime curvature. The existence of the teleparallel equivalent of general relativity (TEGR) calls this into question, for (a) TEGR is set in a torsionful but flat spacetime, and (b) TEGR is empirically equivalent to GR. Knox (Stud...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Publicado en:Synthese Vol. 204; no. 4; pp. 1 - 30
Autores principales: Mulder, Ruward, Read, James
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Springer Nature Oct2024
Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
fields @attributes:
  recordID: 1
pdfLink:
plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=179979504&site=ehost-live
header:
  @attributes:
    shortDbName: hlh
    uiTerm: 179979504
    longDbName: Humanities International Complete
    uiTag: AN
  controlInfo:
    bkinfo:
    jinfo:
      jid:
        00397857
        4LI
      jtl: Synthese
      issn: 00397857
      maglogo: N
    pubinfo:
      dt: Oct2024
      vid: 204
      iid: 4
      pid: 237
      pub: Springer Nature
    artinfo:
      ui:
        179979504
        10.1007/s11229-024-04773-y
      ppf: 1
      ppct: 29
      formats:
        fmt:
          – @attributes:
              type: T
          – @attributes:
              type: P
              size: 575KB
      tig:
        atl: Is spacetime curved? Assessing the underdetermination of general relativity and teleparallel gravity.
      aug:
        au:
          Mulder, Ruward
          Read, James
        affil:
          https://ror.org/013meh722 Trinity College, University of Cambridge, CB2 1TQ, Cambridge, UK
          https://ror.org/052gg0110 Pembroke College, University of Oxford, OX1 1DW, Oxford, UK
      sug:
      keyword:
        Curvature
        Functionalism
        Inertial frames
        Intertranslatability
        Operationalisability
        Reichenbach
        Surplus structure
        Teleparallel gravity
        Tetrads
        Torsion
        Underdetermination
        Visualisability
      ab: Realism about general relativity (GR) seems to imply realism about spacetime curvature. The existence of the teleparallel equivalent of general relativity (TEGR) calls this into question, for (a) TEGR is set in a torsionful but flat spacetime, and (b) TEGR is empirically equivalent to GR. Knox (Stud Hist Philos Sci Part B Stud Hist Philos Mod Phys 42(4):264–275, 2011) claims that there is no genuine underdetermination between GR and TEGR; we call this verdict into question by isolating and addressing her individual arguments. In addition, we anticipate and evaluate two further worries for realism about the torsionful spacetimes of TEGR, which we call the ‘problem of operationalisability’ and the ‘problem of visualisability’.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
    refInfo:
    copyright:
      @attributes:
        flag: Y
      custom: Synthese is a copyright of Springer, 2024. All Rights Reserved.
      item: Synthese
      holder: Springer Nature
      dt:
        @attributes:
          year: 2024
    holdings:
      @attributes:
        islocal: N