Elucidations : Prev Next
Action at a distance §
Action at a distance
E.g. Gravity/EM, something in one place can affect something far away
without anything passing in between
Example §
Trying to explain how a magic trick (making a match levitate) works.
1. The magician has the power to make things levitate with their mind
This would be disturbing because it can’t be generalized / doesn’t fit
into a universal scientific model
2. The magician has magnets in the walls and controls them with a small
computer
Would alleviate the disturbance.
3. The magician can send out ‘levitator particles’ from the eyes. There’s a
‘levitator particle’ detector which is triggered, shows they have energy
and can do work.
Would also alleviate the concern, the particles would become the new
normal, a feature of the world.
Action at a distance would be like having no such explanation (though there
is regularity/predictability).
Consequence of action at a distance §
Fear: if we allow action at a distance, then anything is permitted anywhere
Billiard ball motion could be determined by huge (far away) bodies of motion
rather than anything local.
in 17th century, “mechanistic philosophy” (e.g. Boyle)
All explanations should be given by just matter and motion
Magnets thought to emit something similar to levitator particles
in 19th century, get the development of a field.
Newton’s gravity is action at a distance is already well-established
action at a distance now tolerated widely
Faraday/Maxwell are able to reform E&M that doesn’t require action at a
distance, have nothing to say about gravity.
Einstein then gets rid of it for gravity
Quantum mechanics reintroduced action at a distance §
Einstein has methodological complaint. Science is impossible if objects aren’t
independent of each other.
Leibniz Principle of Sufficient Reason: for everything that happens, there is
a reason why it (in particular) happened.
Paramenides: nothing comes from nothing (apple comes from the tree, apple’s
redness came from the seed (DNA))
Change is impossible follows from this
In some sense, something coming from nothing would violate the principle
of sufficient reason.
Prior §
Many arguments for and against.
Philosophically, one must have a framework to do science.
P.S.R. is really hard to do without.
There were never historically people who lamented loss of action at a distance when an equally predictive theory becomes available.
Site Explorer A Hegelian Concept of Legal Determination Aesthetic Problems of Modern Philosophy American Pragmatism and Indispensability Arguments An Apology for Raymond Sebond Antirepresentationalism, Ethnocentrism, and Liberalism Appearance and reality: A metaphysical essay Consequences of Pragmatism Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity Counterfactuals, Dispositions, and the Causal Modalities Critique of Pure Reason Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind Ethics (Spinoza) Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Experience and Nature Fact, Fiction, and Forecast General Semantics Grammar and Existence Incorrigibility as the mark of the mental Inference and Meaning Intention Kantian Lessons about Mind, Meaning, and Rationality Language, Rules and Behavior Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories Law's Empire Legal formalism and legal realism: What is the issue? Mind and the World Order Mind and World Must We Mean What We Say Naming and Necessity Naming and Saying Nineteenth Century Idealism and Twentieth Century Textualism On the logic of attributions of self-knowledge to others On truth and lie in an extra-moral sense One Cheer for Representationalism Ought to believe Phenomenalism Phenomenology of Spirit Philosophical Investigations Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man Pragmatism - A View Pragmatism - All or Some or All and Some Pragmatism as Anti-Authoritarianism Pragmatism as Romantic Polytheism Pragmatism, Relativism, and Irrationalism Principia Mathematica Reference and Description Rorty, Pragmatism, and Analytic Philosophy Solidarity or Objectivity Some reflections on language games Symposium The Blue and Brown books The Centrality of Sellars' Two-Ply Account of Observation The Myth of the Subjective Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus Truth as Convenient Friction Two Dogmas of Empiricism Varieties of pragmatism What is Enlightenment What the Tortoise said to Achilles Wilfrid Sellars’ Anti-Descriptivism Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language -ing vs -ed distinction A children's game A priori Agrippan Trilemma Alethic modality Alienation Analytic philosophy Ancient philosophy Anti-descriptivism Anti-representationalism Arthur Schopenhauer Auction Autonomous discursive practice Bee Waggle Behaviorism Bifurcation Thesis Bradley's Problem Canberra plan Classical logic Concepts Continental philosophy Coping Declarative sentences Declarativism Demonstratives Deontology Description Descriptivism Dilthey distinction Disjunctivitis Distinctions Doxastic modality Dualisms Duhem-Quine thesis E-Representation and I-Representation Ed Witherspoon Argument Emotivism Empiricism Epistemological skepticism Epistemology Essentialism Examples of defective concepts Explanation Expressivism Expressivism for Two Voices Fetishism Formal logic Foundationalism Frege-Geach argument Functionalism Hesperus and Phosphorus Humean expressivism Indexicals Instrumentalism Interpretivism Intuitionistic logic Is-ought problem Jürgen Habermas Kant-Sellars thesis Labeling Language as tool Language game Law of the excluded middle Left and right wing Sellarsians Lincoln's horse Logical consequence Logical empiricism Lost Keys Making it Explicit Maps Material Conditional Meaning and truth Medieval philosophy Mind-body dualism Modal logic Modality Montaigne's dog Myth of the Given Myth of the Museum Natural kinds Naturalism Neokantianism Neurath's boat Nonmonotonic logic Normative character of representation Notes Nothing-but-ism Novel sentences Object naturalism and subject naturalism Objective and subjective facts Ontology Ordinary descriptive vocabulary Ought to be vs ought to do Peter Strawson Philosophy Philosophy of language Pia's Maple Tree Pluto Pointing at a plate Possible worlds semantics Post-kantian philosophy Pragmatics Pragmatism Predicates Private language argument Proper names Quasirealism Rationalism Real properties vs Cambridge properties Redescription Redundancy theory of facts Reference Referring to witches Regress of rules Representation Representation is socially determined Representation regress Representationalism Rigid designator Rules Scientific image and manifest image Semantic nominalism Semantic skepticism Semantics Sense data and concepts Shopping list Sign vs piece of wood Skepticism Socrates Sortals Sour acid Subjunctive vs counterfactual conditionals Success semantics Successor concept Superassertibility Teleosemantics The Enlightenment The Frege-Geach problem The War Hero Tooth pain Truth Truth as the limit of inquiry Two Expressivist Programmes, Two Bifurcations Understanding Universals Vienna Circle Vocabulary