Abstract
Spacetime realism requires that it is not hidden and not a cause. Its style of explanation is geometrical. It is argued that causal explanation is unworkable for cases of pure gravitation. Non-causal explanation is geometrical and exploits several identities where one might expect causal explanation. Thus a realist understanding of General Relativity is to be preferred.
“Spacetime acts on matter, telling it how to move” (Misner et al. 1970, p. 5; Taylor et al. 1991 p. 275).
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Notes
- 1.
- 2.
And not hidden either; see Nerlich 1994, 38–43.
- 3.
Compare Buridan and Benedetti. See Wikipedia: the free encyclopedia article ‘The Principle of Inertia’ 2.1.1.
- 4.
- 5.
If all that is sound, then there is a classical non-causal process, a changing of spatial distance between two suitably inertially moving things. The motion of neither is an effect, since it vanishes under frame swaps. The changing distance between them is a covariant quantity of the Galilean (Lorentz) group: it is a real change. The change is uncaused. If so, it is odd that this was never cited (at any rate it never caught on) as an obvious exception to the rule that all changes are caused.
- 6.
I write ‘straight’ where you might expect ‘geodesic’. Geodesics just are straights of whatever space they are in The shorter term reminds us of what matters about them for this paper.
- 7.
It’s not so satisfactory that I assume that we will never find a deeper explanation for it or that the deeper explanation will be consistent with the one made out here. There is no explanation within General Relativity.
- 8.
Not an inertial frame, since spacetime is curved and lacks parallels. Only in the limit is spacetime flat and inertial frames locally available.
- 9.
- 10.
Compare (Brown 2005, p.24) that “… world-lines [of test ‘particles’] follow geodesics approximately and then for quite different reasons” from anything to do with the nature of test particles (his italics). Apart, of course from their natural tendency to persist. That leaves the story told here untouched.
- 11.
I do quarrel with their ascribing the view to me on the basis of a three-sentence quotation from my 1976 book in which I said (in terms of a familiar metaphor about antennae) that action at distance plays no role in GR. There is no hint of nudges, gutters, grooves or causes, There are seven index items in the book under ‘Geometric explanation’. Not one of them is mentioned by Brown or Pooley; all of them argue for, state or imply a rejection of the story pinned on me. No item refers readers to the passage they cite; it is about GR’s being a local theory. I question whether any theory like the one parodied “has become very popular”, and their citing a mere three sentences about something entirely different suggests some desperation in the search to find any that does; it also suggests that Brown’s “it is one of the aims of this [his] book to rebut this and related views” is not an aim supported by significant research. Having trod what seems to me a solitary missionary path for 32 years, it is disappointing to find oneself cited as a leading spokesman for a supposedly widespread view that one has always opposed. Brown 2005 p. 23 includes the relevant claims.
After an amicable discussion, I can report that the authors have withdrawn the attribution to me.
References
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Nerlich, G. (2010). Why Spacetime Is Not a Hidden Cause: A Realist Story. In: Petkov, V. (eds) Space, Time, and Spacetime. Fundamental Theories of Physics, vol 167. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-13538-5_8
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