Country United States Subject Space and time ISBN 978-9027703583 | Language English Pages 884 (second edition) Originally published 1963 Page count 884 (second edition) | |
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Philosophical Problems of Space and Time is a 1963 book about the nature of space and time by philosopher Adolf Grünbaum. It is recognized as a major work in the philosophy of the natural sciences.
Contents
Summary
Grünbaum argues that physical geometry and chronometry are in part matters of convention because continuous physical space and time are metrically amorphous. He criticizes the views of a number of other philosophers, including Ernest Nagel and Jacques Maritain, arguing that the former misinterprets the philosopher of science Henri Poincaré and that in The Degrees of Knowledge (1932) the latter presents an unsound and incorrect interpretation of the nature of geometry.
Scholarly reception
Philosophical Problems of Space and Time was "promptly recognized to be one of the few major works in the philosophy of the natural sciences of this generation" upon its publication in 1963, according to Robert S. Cohen and Marx W. Wartofsky.
Philosopher Philip L. Quinn, writing in The Oxford Companion to Philosophy (1995), called Grünbaum's thesis about physical geometry and chronometry "striking".