Questions tagged [physics]
Physics is the natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through space and time, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.
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Consciousness and Understanding of Physics, Mathematics and Philosophy
I just finished watching a youtube video Bernard Carr - Why Did Consciousness Emerge? on consciousness and the talkers spend a great deal of time talking about emergent aspect of consciousness and its ...
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How Can Computation Cause Consciousness?
The question of how consciousness arises and what, if any, effect it has on our behaviour is clearly both fascinating intellectually and of great practical and ethical significance. One very common ...
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Is there a need for a new field of natural-practical philosophy?
Natural philosophy is now generally known as physics. Some ancient universities still call it natural philosophy. But all of science could be included under the term, natural philosophy. There is also ...
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Is there a reason for why the wave function for a particle is the way it is?
I have read that in quantum mechanics, predicting the position of an electron, say in the double slit experiment is impossible. It is thus then implied that there is no reason for the electron to end ...
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Question about Boltzmann Brain?
If all the memories contained within a Boltzmann brain were hypothetical, so would be the physical laws that enable its very existence; therefore, a Boltzmann brain wouldn't be able to explain itself?
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Did Bell rule out all possible kinds of local determinism in the world?
From what I can understand, Bell proved that a certain particle is expected to behave a certain way if there is a hidden variable that determines its eventual state beforehand. Because this doesn’t ...
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Physics and the question of context or environment
This is a reality check type of question. I am interested in whether it's a valid distinction and whether it's been considered by others.
It occured to me the other day that the issue of 'context' or '...
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Does modern physics say that everything is technically possible?
Does modern physics state that air molecules can randomly whizz around in such a way to cause a voice emanating from the clouds that is clear and coherent?
Is this possible or not? Is this extremely ...
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Can there be certain events that would still be predictable under indeterminism?
Let’s take the example of a bird landing on a tree branch. Suppose now that one knew everything there is about the universe billions of years before the bird landed, like Laplace’s demon.
Given this, ...
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Understanding Aristotle's argument of simultaneously and sequentially actualisable potential infinities in response to Atomism
I am reading a book about Aristotle. Aristotle lays out a potential argument against infinite divisibility by the Atomists, that infinite division would leave components of zero-magnitude which could ...
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Order/disorder and complexity
What is the relation between order/disorder and complexity ? Sometimes I found the terms confusing and ambiguous.
And higher entropy implies low complexity, does not implies low entropy implies higher ...
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Causation in physics
Electromagnetic radiation phenomena exhibit a temporal asymmetry: we observe radiation coherently diverging from a radiating source, such the light emitted by a star, but we do not observe radiation ...
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Is much of theoretical physics nothing more than speculative assumptions?
Religion, spirituality, and other “pseudoscientific” theories are constantly seen as backwards and lacking of evidence. But if a lack of evidence before believing in something is considered irrational,...
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Reviewing Loschmidt’s paradox in the quantum case?
Boltzmann formulated the Stosszahlansatz :
Stosszahlansatz is the assumption that the velocities of colliding
particles are uncorrelated, and independent of position. This means
the probability that ...
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Neither Presentism nor Eternalism by Carlo Rovelli
The paper in question
Rovelli argues against both presentism and eternalism. Later he proposes third option in which the concept of "local present" is central.
The problem is I cannot ...
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Are there examples in the literature of rigorous mathematical models of libertarian free will that take the laws of physics into account?
What I'm looking for is a detailed description of the decision-making process of an agent that possesses libertarian free will, when this agent is on the verge of making a choice, at some time t.
For ...
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What is character, and what role does it play in the decision making of an agent, according to proponents of libertarian free will?
I understand libertarian free will as an agent's ability to choose otherwise, or having more than one course of action available to them, when making a choice at time t, given a fixed past up to t. ...
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Can non physical causes that lead to physical effects be imagined? How does this impact its logical possibility?
Logically impossible concepts mean that they contain a contradiction. For example, a square triangle contains a contradiction. However, logically impossible concepts are also often concepts you cannot ...
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Is all change movement?
Is there a change in the universe that cannot be reduced to movement? One counter-example should be enough. :)
Heat is a type of change that was once thought to be qualitative, but is now realized to ...
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What would happen if the universe had no global symmetries and conservation laws?
I am asking this question in this site as it involves some philosophy of physics...
I am trying to understand what would happen to the universe if it had no global symmetries (including those that ...
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Can the concept of antisets be used for a neo-mechanist causal set theory?
Background information:
"Causal Approaches to Scientific Explanation," sec. 1. My takeaway here is looking at individual existential quantifications, i.e. quantifying over individual causal ...
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Is special relativity immune to the paradox of Achilles?
According to the entry "Proper Time" in Wikipedia, for an object in a SR spacetime traveling with velocity v for a time interval Δ T
c2Δ T 2 = c2 Δτ2 + v 2 Δ T2,
where Δ T is the coordinate ...
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Special Relativity - Discussions I've seen online
I've seen some odd discussions on this forum that have stuck with me. But I've seen there are some very clever physicists and philosophers on here who actually understand relativity...
In relativity ...
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Are there concepts of laws-of-physics where the laws have a "fail rate"?
The closest to this idea I could find was talk of ceteris paribus laws, but it was hard to tell how much this concerned physics, even just potentially/speculatively. But having decided to believe that ...
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Special Relativity philosophical implications
If an observer on Andromeda moves forwards and backwards their notion of now here on Earth sways back and forth over hundreds of years
Why don't we constantly oscillate over hundreda of years whenever ...
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How meaningful is the notion of now here on Earth?
Special relativity and the lack of a now moment is causing me a bit of grief.
How meaningful is the notion of now here on Earth between each of us? Does the lack of an objective now moment in any way ...
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Can the continuum hypothesis be settled in physics?
Can the continuum hypothesis be settled in physics? In a lecture mathematician Woodin considers the possibility:
Develops the mathematical physics of a mathematical understanding of
the physical ...
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Is the design answer to fine-tuning sufficiently complete?
If the problem of "fine tuning for life" (SEP) is that the precise value of some constants (and laws) in physics seems necessary to the emergence of life in our universe but at the same time ...
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Describing the universe using symbols?
Now, for someone who wants to describe the universe using symbols.
Let's say I describe some phenomena up-to some approximation. I use some symbols to do this.
For example consider the ideal gas ...
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How does Hegel account for the laws of physics?
This is related to:
How do non-theist idealists account for laws of physics?
But I'm narrowing down this question specifically to Hegel. If reality is Geist (which is something like mind/spirit), and ...
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Dimensional constants, evolution and the anthropic principle?
If I think of a process like say evolution. I can in some sense map the process of evolution to an algorithm. But my point is that evolution in some sense yes is modelled by this but this missed out ...
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The symbol grounding problem, physicalism and 2nd law of thermodynamics?
How does a physicalist resolve this dilemma (and what is it known as)?
Consider a physicalist who wants to solve the symbol grounding problem. He postulates that a particular brain configuration ...
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Do preceding events cause subsequent ones in a four-dimensionalist world?
I feel like this question has a good chance of having been asked here before, but the first ten-odd "similar questions" listed by the site when I composed the title didn't cover what I'm ...
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Philosophical implications of entangled states (and the 2022 physics nobel prize)
FYI: For the 2022 Physics Noble Prize announcement, see here.
First, I realize the subjective nature of any potential answers or discussions regarding this question. In spite of that, I'm still ...
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How does entropy explain consciousness and the forward direction of time?
How does entropy explain consciousness and the forward direction of time? I was told that entropy is the increasing of disorderliness and that consciousness cannot exist as memory increases when ...
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What are the relational and absolute quantities in classical mechanics?
So it seems to a lot classical mechanics involves identifying fundamental quantities (like velocity) but the meaningful questions are absolute quantities like relative velocity.
I've been trying to ...
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Is human thought itself a fundamental force?
To begin with, as far as I understand, there are four well accepted forces of nature:
Gravity
Weak interaction
Strong interaction
Electromagnetism
Now, these forces are all characterized by changing ...
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The Principle of Least Action as a Theory of Everything?
Theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder views the Principle of Least Action as " the closest thing we have to a theory of everything." It works in classical physics as well as in quantum ...
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Can the laws of physics rule out disembodied minds?
In this article, philosopher Evan Fales argues that the laws of physics establish that disembodied minds (such as an immaterial God, for example) could not influence the physical world. Is it true?
(...
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Is philosophy useful in physics?
Is philosophy useful in physics? How can philosophy help physics?
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What is the most probable AI?
then I have a difficult question to ask.
Let's imagine that in the distant future of our universe, through the arrangement of atoms that move in empty space, various objects are formed, any object can ...
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We know Classical Mechanics is wrong. But can we also say every other theory is wrong except the Theory of Everything?
Classical Mechanics (CM) or Quantum Mechanics (QM) is technically wrong. That doesn't mean they are irrelevant or have less significance, but they are wrong regardless of how accurate they are. Can we ...
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Unique-ness in the languages of Math and Physics?
Background
So here's something I was pondering about:
A teacher asks a student: "what is 3+1?"
The student replies "3+1"
It's not that the student's reply is wrong. But it's not an ...
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On the connection between science and reality
My question is basically targetting various sciences that we use to understnad the real world and how we form laws in them.
For example, in physics, we first see sometthing in the real world. Let it ...
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A terrifying variant of Boltzmann's brain
I am new to this forum even though I have read a lot on the subject of boltzmann's brains and have come to a terrifying conclusion, the classic argument which for example Sean Carroll used, "The ...
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Why does the universe need an origin?
Buddhism sees the universe as uncreated, eternal. Even if the big bang were true, it could just be part an endless cycle of expansion and contraction.
I'm looking for an argument against the universe ...
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Does the equivalence principle hint at the quantization of gravity? [closed]
So I've been pondering about the equivalence principle:
"Einstein came to realise the principle of equivalence, and it states that an accelerated system is (locally) completely physically ...
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What is meant by a more "general" theory?
It is often said that special relativity is more general than Newtonian mechanics. Is there any precise meaning of what is meant by more "general"?
I would consider a theory A more general ...
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What is the physical interpretation of a Godel sentence?
If I think of the laws of physics as a system of axioms then what is the physical interpretation of a Godel sentence? I'm trying to wrap my head around what Godel's theorem means for physics?
More ...
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In the EPR paradox, what was Einstein's argument against God playing dice?
Imagine an experiment as used in formulating the EPR paradox. Say we entangle two electrons and separate them by a great distance. If we measure the z-component of spin, on one of them, sz1, we know ...
