Calamari, Martin
(2021)
The Process Metaphysics of Loop Quantum Gravity.
UNSPECIFIED.
Abstract
Dupr�e and Nicholson (2018) defend the metaphysical thesis that the `living world' is not composed of things or substances, as traditionally believed, but of processes. They advocate a process - as opposed to a substance - metaphysics and ontology, which results to be more empirically adequate to what contemporary biology suggests. Their ultimate view, however, is that there are compelling reasons to believe that contemporary physics, too, strongly suggests an analogous process-based conception as to the "physical world". Consequently, they argue that if this were the case, then the whole nature should be understood as consisting of "processes all the way down". The aim of this
paper is to provide some further reasons supporting the correctness of this view in the framework of contemporary fundamental physics. To this end, I examine the metaphysical and ontological underpinnings of Rovelli's view of loop quantum gravity. I show that it consists of a timeless yet dynamical, radically relationalist, conception ultimately
based on an event and process metaphysics and ontology according to which the "physical world" is, fundamentally, a network of interacting quantum dynamical processes. Therefore, this suggests that at least "all
the way down" to the Planck scale, nature appears indeed to be composed of processes rather than things or substances.
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