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13 - Observability, Redundancy, and Modality for Dynamical Symmetry Transformations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2022

James Read
Affiliation:
Pembroke College, Oxford
Nicholas J. Teh
Affiliation:
University of Notre Dame, Indiana
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Summary

This chapter provides a fairly systematic analysis of when quantities that are variant under a dynamical symmetry transformation should be regarded as unobservable, or redundant, or unreal; of when models related by a dynamical symmetry transformation represent the same state of affairs; and of when mathematical structure that is variant under a dynamical symmetry transformation should be regarded as surplus. In most of these cases, the answer is ‘it depends’: that is, it depends on the details of the symmetry in question. A central feature of the analysis is that in order to draw any of these conclusions for a dynamical symmetry, it needs to be understood in terms of its possible extensions to other physical systems, in particular to measurement devices.

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The Philosophy and Physics of Noether's Theorems
A Centenary Volume
, pp. 322 - 353
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

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