The Philosophy of Cosmology

Cambridge University Press, 4/13/2017
EAN 9781107145399, ISBN10: 1107145392

Hardcover, 526 pages, 25.3 x 17.8 x 2.7 cm
Language: English

Following a long-term international collaboration between leaders in cosmology and the philosophy of science, this volume addresses foundational questions at the limit of science across these disciplines, questions raised by observational and theoretical progress in modern cosmology. Space missions have mapped the Universe up to its early instants, opening up questions on what came before the Big Bang, the nature of space and time, and the quantum origin of the Universe. As the foundational volume of an emerging academic discipline, experts from relevant fields lay out the fundamental problems of contemporary cosmology and explore the routes toward finding possible solutions. Written for graduates and researchers in physics and philosophy, particular efforts are made to inform academics from other fields, as well as the educated public, who wish to understand our modern vision of the Universe, related philosophical questions, and the significant impacts on scientific methodology.

Part I. Issues in the Philosophy of Cosmology
1. The domain of cosmology and the testing of cosmological theories George F. R. Ellis
2. Black holes, cosmology and the passage of time
three problems at the limits of science Bernard Carr
3. Moving boundaries? – comments on the relationship between philosophy and cosmology Claus Beisbart
4. On the question why there exists something rather than nothing Roderich Tumulka
Part II. Structures in the Universe and the Structure of Modern Cosmology
5. Some generalities about generality John D. Barrow
6. Emergent structures of effective field theories Jean-Philippe Uzan
7. Cosmological structure formation Joel R. Primack
8. Formation of galaxies Joseph Silk
Part III. Foundations of Cosmology
Gravity and the Quantum
9. The observer strikes back James Hartle and Thomas Hertog
10. Testing inflation Chris Smeenk
11. Why Boltzmann brains do not fluctuate into existence from the de Sitter vacuum Kimberly K. Boddy, Sean M. Carroll and Jason Pollack
12. Holographic inflation revised Tom Banks
13. Progress and gravity
overcoming divisions between general relativity and particle physics and between physics and HPS J. Brian Pitts
Part IV. Quantum Foundations and Quantum Gravity
14. Is time's arrow perspectival? Carlo Rovelli
15. Relational quantum cosmology Francesca Vidotto
16. Cosmological ontology and epistemology Don N. Page
17. Quantum origin of cosmological structure and dynamical reduction theories Daniel Sudarsky
18. Towards a novel approach to semi-classical gravity Ward Struyve
Part V. Methodological and Philosophical Issues
19. Limits of time in cosmology Svend E. Rugh and Henrik Zinkernagel
20. Self-locating priors and cosmological measures Cian Dorr and Frank Arntzenius
21. On probability and cosmology
inference beyond data? Martin Sahlén
22. Testing the multiverse
Bayes, fine-tuning and typicality Luke A. Barnes
23. A new perspective on Einstein's philosophy of cosmology Cormac O'Raifeartaigh
24. The nature of the past hypothesis David Wallace
25. Big and small David Albert.