Time Remains

Gryb, Sean and Thebault, Karim P. Y. (2016): Time Remains. In: British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Vol. 67, No. 3: pp. 663-705

Abstract

Onone popular view, the general covariance of gravity implies that change is relational in a strong sense, such that all it is for a physical degree of freedom to change is for it to vary with regard to a second physical degree of freedom. At a quantum level, this view of change as relative variation leads to a fundamentally timeless formalism for quantum gravity. Here, we will show how one may avoid this acute 'problem of time'. Under our view, duration is still regarded as relative, but temporal succession is taken to be absolute. Following our approach, which is presented in more formal terms in (Gryb and The 'bault [2014]), it is possible to conceive of a genuinely dynamical theory of quantum gravity within which time, in a substantive sense, remains.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Faculties: Philosophy, Philosophy of Science and Religious Science > Munich Center for Mathematical Philosophy (MCMP)
• ISSN: 0007-0882
• Language: English