Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T21:40:00.839Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A New Twist in the Conventionality of Simultaneity Debate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2022

Mark Zangari
Mark Zangari*
Affiliation:
Philosophy Department La Trobe University
*
†Send reprint requests to the author, Philosophy Department, La Trobe University, BUNDOORA, Victoria, 3083, Australia.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

To date, both sides in the conventionality of simultaneity debate grant that transformations from “standard” to “nonstandard” coordinates are possible without any empirically significant effects. However, it is argued here that the very possibility of defining nonstandard coordinates vanishes if one represents special relativity, not by real four-vectors (as has been the case so far in the debate), but by complex spinors as used in the representation of half-integer spin. Thus, in the topologically simplest representation of the Lorentz group, the transformation over which the debate has been fought does not exist and one of the most basic foundations of the conventionalist thesis is challenged.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 61 , Issue 2 , June 1994 , pp. 267 - 275
Copyright
Copyright © 1994 by the Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Coleman, R. A. and Korté, H. (1991), “An Empirical, Purely Spatial Criterion for the Planes of F-Simultaneity”, Foundations of Physics 21: 417–437.10.1007/BF00733356CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Einstein, A. ([1905] 1952), “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies”, reprinted in H. A. Lorentz, A. Einstein, H. Minkowski, and H. Weyl, The Principle of Relativity. Translated by W. Perrett and G. B. Jeffery. (Originally published as “Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper”, Annalen der Physik 17: 891–921.) New York: Dover, pp. 35–65.10.1002/andp.19053221004CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ellis, B. and Bowman, P. (1967), “Conventionality in Distant Simultaneity”, Philosophy of Science 34: 116–136.10.1086/288136CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kim, Y. and Noz, M. (1986), Theory and Applications of the Poincaré Group. Dordrecht: Reidel.10.1007/978-94-009-4558-6CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Malament, D. (1977), “Causal Theories of Time and the Conventionality of Simultaneity”, Nous 11: 293–300.10.2307/2214766CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Penrose, R. and Rindler, W. (1984), Spinors and Space-Time. vol. 1. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511564048CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reichenbach, H. ([1927] 1957), The Philosophy of Space and Time. Translated by M. Reichenbach and J. Freund. Originally published as Philosophie der Raum-Zeit-Lehre (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter). New York: Dover.Google Scholar
Winnie, J. A. (1970), “Special Relativity Without One-Way Velocity Assumptions”, Philosophy of Science 37: 81–99, 223–238.10.1086/288281CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winnie, J. A. (1977), “Introduction”, Nous 11: 207–209.10.2307/2214762CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zangari, M. (1993), Conventionalism and a Distinction Between Active and Passive Coordinate Transformations. Preprint. Victorian Centre for the History and Philosophy of Science, La Trobe University.Google Scholar