Singh, Kyle (2024) On Change and Constraint. [Preprint]

Text Prepared_for_Submission-3 (1).pdf Download (261kB)

Abstract

Traditional arguments against or in favor of continuity rely upon the presupposition that sci- entific theories can serve as markers of descriptive truth. I argue that such a notion of the term is misguided if we are concerned with the question of how our scientific schemes ought to develop. Instead, a reconstruction of the term involves identifying those concepts which guide the develop- ment from one successive scheme to the next and labelling those concepts with the status that they are continuous. I explicitly construct an example of this kind of continuity utilizing two formula- tions of Quantum Field Theory (QFT) and identify what persists from the standard formulation, beginning with an action, to the successive one, making use of spinor helicity variables. Three con- cepts persist which are responsible for supplying explicit constraints on our expressions which serve to match onto empirical predictions: Lorentz invariance, locality and unitarity. Further extensions of this kind of analysis to models beyond the physical sciences are proposed.

---

Export/Citation:

EndNote | BibTeX | Dublin Core | ASCII/Text Citation (Chicago) | HTML Citation | OpenURL

Social Networking:

Share |

---

Item Type:	Preprint
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID Singh, Kyle kylesingh000@gmail.com
Keywords:	Quantum Field Theory, Metaphysics, Conceptual Engineering, Neo-Pragmatism
Subjects:	General Issues > Scientific Metaphysics Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Field Theory
Depositing User:	Mr. Kyle Singh
Date Deposited:	21 Feb 2025 15:09
Last Modified:	21 Feb 2025 15:09
Item ID:	24781
Subjects:	General Issues > Scientific Metaphysics Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Field Theory
Date:	10 September 2024
URI:	https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/24781

Monthly Views for the past 3 years

Monthly Downloads for the past 3 years

Plum Analytics

Actions (login required)

View Item