Time Remains

Abstract

On one popular view, the general covariance of gravity implies that change is relational in a strong sense, such that all it is for a physical degree of freedom to change is for it to vary with regard to a second physical degree of freedom. At a quantum level, this view of "change as relative variation" leads to a "fundamentally timeless" formalism for quantum gravity. Here, we will show how one may avoid this acute `problem of time'. Under our view, duration is still regarded as relative, but temporal succession is taken to be absolute. Following our approach, which is presented in more formal terms in arXiv:1303.7139, it is possible to conceive of a genuinely dynamical theory of quantum gravity within which time, in a substantive sense, remains.

arXiv comment30 pages, 1 figure. Version accepted for publication in the British Journal for the Philosophy of Science

References in corpus (27)

• The Dynamics of General Relativity
• Partial observables
• Partial and Complete Observables for Hamiltonian Constrained Systems
• Making the Case for Conformal Gravity
• Partial and Complete Observables for Canonical General Relativity
• Problem of Time in Quantum Gravity
• Gauge transformations in the Lagrangian and Hamiltonian formalisms of generally covariant theories
• Einstein gravity as a 3D conformally invariant theory
• An effective approach to the problem of time
• The Problem of Time in Quantum Gravity
• The Link between General Relativity and Shape Dynamics
• The physical gravitational degrees of freedom
• Scale-Invariant Gravity: Particle Dynamics
• Scale-Invariant Gravity: Geometrodynamics
• Constraints and gauge transformations: Dirac's theorem is not always valid
• Beables/Observables in Classical and Quantum Gravity
• Change in Hamiltonian General Relativity from the Lack of a Time-like Killing Vector Field
• A First Class Constraint Generates Not a Gauge Transformation, But a Bad Physical Change: The Case of Electromagnetism
• The issue of time in generally covariant theories and the Komar-Bergmann approach to observables in general relativity
• A Birkhoff theorem for Shape Dynamics
• The Conformal Constraint in Canonical Quantum Gravity
• The role of time in relational quantum theories
• Symmetry and Evolution in Quantum Gravity
• The Definition of Mach's Principle
• Scale Anomaly as the Origin of Time
• Extending Hamilton's principle to quantize classical fields
• A construction principle for ADM-type theories in maximal slicing gauge

Cited by in corpus (19)

• Dynamical Similarity
• Schrodinger Evolution for the Universe: Reparametrization
• Reassessing the problem of time of quantum gravity
• Leibnizian relationalism for general relativistic physics
• What is matter? The fundamental ontology of atomism and structural realism
• Relationalism about mechanics based on a minimalist ontology of matter
• On the Conceptual Issues Surrounding the Notion of Relational Bohmian Dynamics
• Geometrogenesis in GFT: An Analysis
• GPS Observables in Newtonian Spacetime or Why We Do Not Need 'Physical' Coordinate Systems
• $\Psi$-Epistemic Quantum Cosmology?
• Against Radical Relationalism: in Defense of the Ordinal Structure of Time
• Does Quantum Cosmology Predict the Age of the Universe?
• Change in Hamiltonian General Relativity with Spinors
• Foundational Issues in Group Field Theory
• Quantum Cosmology and the Age of the Universe
• The Limitations of the Notion of `Observable' in Diffeomorphism-Invariant Models
• Against the disappearance of spacetime in quantum gravity
• Diffeomorphism-Invariant Quantities in Phase Space: More than Correlations
• Gauge and Metaphysics of Spacetime