Murgueitio Ramírez, Sebastián (2024) Galileo's Ship and the Relativity Principle. [Preprint]

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Abstract

It is widely acknowledged that the Galilean Relativity Principle, according to which the laws of classical systems are the same in all inertial frames in relative motion, has played an important role in the development of modern physics. It is also commonly believed that this principle holds the key to answering why, for example, we do not notice the orbital velocity of the Earth as we go about our day. And yet, I argue in this paper that the precise content of this principle is ambiguous: standard presentations fail to distinguish between two principles that are ultimately inequivalent, the "External Galilean Relativity Principle" (EGRP) and the "Internal Galilean Relativity Principle" (IGRP). I demonstrate that EGRP and IGRP play distinct roles in physics and that many classical systems that satisfy IGRP fail to satisfy EGRP. I further show that the Relativity Principle introduced by Einstein in 1905–which is not restricted to classical systems–also leads to two inequivalent principles. I conclude by noting that the phenomenon originally captured by Galileo's famous ship passage is much more general than contemporary discussions in the philosophy of symmetries suggest.

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Item Type:	Preprint
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID Murgueitio Ramírez, Sebastián smurguei@purdue.edu 0000-0003-0035-0150
Additional Information:	Forthcoming in Nous
Keywords:	Galilean Relativity Principle Relativity Principle Galileo's Ship Boosts Symmetries
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Physics > Classical Physics General Issues > History of Science Case Studies General Issues > Laws of Nature Specific Sciences > Physics > Relativity Theory Specific Sciences > Physics > Symmetries/Invariances
Depositing User:	Dr. Sebastián Murgueitio Ramírez
Date Deposited:	13 Aug 2024 14:15
Last Modified:	13 Aug 2024 14:15
Item ID:	23792
Subjects:	Specific Sciences > Physics > Classical Physics General Issues > History of Science Case Studies General Issues > Laws of Nature Specific Sciences > Physics > Relativity Theory Specific Sciences > Physics > Symmetries/Invariances
Date:	9 August 2024
URI:	https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/23792

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• Galileo's Ship and the Relativity Principle. (deposited 13 Aug 2024 14:15) [Currently Displayed]
  • Galileo's Ship and the Relativity Principle. (deposited 09 Oct 2024 13:39)

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