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On the Cartesian Ontology of General Relativity: Or, Conventionalism in the History of the Substantival-Relational Debate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Edward Slowik
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Abstract

Using Einstein's comparison of General Relativity and Descartes’ physics, this investigation explores the alleged conventionalism that pervades the ontology of substantival and relationist conceptions of spacetime. Although previously discussed, namely by Rynasiewicz and Hoefer, it will be argued that the close similarities between General Relativity and Cartesian physics have not been adequately treated in the literature—and that the disclosure of these similarities bolsters the case for a conventionalist interpretation of spacetime ontology.

Type
General Relativity
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 72 , Issue 5: Proceedings of the 2004 Biennial Meeting of The Philosophy of Science Association. Part I: Contributed Papers , December 2005 , pp. 1312 - 1323
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

I would like to thank Carl Hoefer, Robert Rynasiewicz, and John Norton for helpful comments and suggestions in the development of this essay.

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