Book contents
- Astronomy and Philosophy
- Frontispiece
- Astronomy and Philosophy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Prelude
- Part IThe Nature of Reality
- 1The Seventeenth-Century Scientific Revolution
- 2A New Metaphysics
- 3The Quantum Revolution and Its Effect on Astrophysics and Cosmology
- 4Foundational Principles and Contemporary Theorizing about Cosmology
- Part IIMetaphysical and Social Influences on Astronomy and the Cosmic Worldview
- Part IIIThe Nature and Limits of Reasoning
- Part IVThe Problematic Nature of Observation and Inference
- Part VConceptual Issues in Astronomy, Cosmology, and Astrobiology
- Part VITechnology, Policy, and Methodology
- Part VIIEmbedded History and Philosophy of Science
- Index
- References
2 - A New Metaphysics
Relativity, Time, and Causation
from Part I - The Nature of Reality
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 July 2026
Edited by
Book contents
- Astronomy and Philosophy
- Frontispiece
- Astronomy and Philosophy
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Contents
- Contributors
- Introduction
- Prelude
- Part IThe Nature of Reality
- 1The Seventeenth-Century Scientific Revolution
- 2A New Metaphysics
- 3The Quantum Revolution and Its Effect on Astrophysics and Cosmology
- 4Foundational Principles and Contemporary Theorizing about Cosmology
- Part IIMetaphysical and Social Influences on Astronomy and the Cosmic Worldview
- Part IIIThe Nature and Limits of Reasoning
- Part IVThe Problematic Nature of Observation and Inference
- Part VConceptual Issues in Astronomy, Cosmology, and Astrobiology
- Part VITechnology, Policy, and Methodology
- Part VIIEmbedded History and Philosophy of Science
- Index
- References
Summary
Before the development of Einstein’s special and general theories of relativity, astronomers and cosmologists thought of space and time as Euclidean. As described in Chapter 1, space and time were taken to be separable and fundamentally different aspects of the universe’s structure. In addition, the distances in space and the passage of time were believed to be the same for everyone. And while there was intense, and sometimes acrimonious, debate between the substantivalists, who believed space to be a background substance within which events unfold, and relationists, who took space to be nothing more than the relations between events, for all their disagreement, both the substantivalist and relationist believed that there could be no scientific disagreement about distances or durations between events. While the Euclidean framework provided an intuitively plausible picture of the universe – after all, it does quite well as an approximate model of our immediate environment – it fails spectacularly when used to model the universe at larger scales.
Information
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Astronomy and PhilosophyConceptual and Methodological Foundations and Challenges, pp. 54 - 66Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2026
References
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