This may be of interest to some. Hope you are all keeping well. -Mike -------- Forwarded Message -------- Subject: Zoom seminars in Bonn Date: Sun, 19 Apr 2020 12:21:27 +0000 From: Bacciagaluppi, G. (Guido) <g.bacciagaluppi@uu.nl> Dear All, Here is Dennis Lehmkuhl's announcement of the Zoom seminars in (?) Bonn. Best, Guido --------------------------------------------- Dear friends and colleagues, next week the summer semester starts at the University of Bonn, and like in most places in the world, all teaching and research meetings will take place online. This is also true for the Bonn History and Philosophy of Physics Research Seminar, which will take place via Zoom at least (!) during the first 4-6 weeks. The first speaker is Tushar Menon; you can find the title and abstract of his talk below. Since it’s taking place via zoom anyhow, we wondered if you or someone from your local groups would like to attend this and/or some of the other research talks in the forthcoming weeks. If so, you would be very welcome to join us! Please also feel free to forward this email to other historians, philosophers, and physicists, whoever you think might be interested. I will not send out any more emails like this for the talks in the next few weeks (many of which are still to be confirmed), but if you would like to hear about more zoom-talks like this then please feel free to subscribe to our local HPP email list by sending an email with empty subject line and only “subscribe hpp” in the main body of the email to sympa@listen.uni-bonn.de <mailto:sympa@listen.uni-bonn.de>. I hope you are all well, and that we can see each other again soon in person! All the best, Dennis Event: Bonn History and Philosophy of Physics Research Seminar Speaker: Tushar Menon (Cambridge and Bonn) Time: 21 April, 4:15pm CET 21.4.: Tushar Menon (Cambridge): “Settlers of Cartan—how to be a true relationalist about General Relativity” Abstract: Oliver Pooley reads the dynamical approach to special relativity (SR), an approach he developed with Harvey Brown, as a form of relationalism, since it seeks to offer an explanation of physical geometry by ontologically reducing it to facts about the symmetries of laws governing material bodies. In particular, Brown describes the Minkowski metric as nothing but the Kleinian geometry associated with the quantum theory of non-gravitational physics. Pooley’s own proposal for how to cash this out is in Humean terms, as a form of `regularity relationalism’ developed in the context of Newtonian mechanics by Nick Huggett. For technical reasons that I will outline in this talk, the prospects for a generalisation of this proposal to general relativity (GR) have appeared bleak; indeed, Brown’s own approach to the metric in GR is non-reductive. In this talk, I argue that an understanding of GR in terms of Cartan geometry, a generalisation of Klein geometry, solves the problem, and allows for an ontological reduction of the metric of GR along the same lines as the regularity relationalist account of SR. (This talk is based on joint work with James Read) Zoom link: https://uni-bonn.zoom.us/j/343765054?pwd=T00yNk1xb1E0N2dKZUY3bW9oTDg1dz09 Meeting Password: 665670 -------------------- Dennis Lehmkuhl Lichtenberg Professor for History and Philosophy of Physics, Institute of Philosophy, University of Bonn history-and-philosophy-of-physics.com <http://history-and-philosophy-of-physics.com/> ------------------ Guido Bacciagaluppi Descartes Centre for the History and Philosophy of Science and the Humanities Web:http://www.uu.nl/en/research/history-and-philosophy-of-science HPS The Movie: https://youtu.be/EpUNLCo6C8Q Visiting address: Buys Ballotgebouw room 311 Princetonplein 5 3584 CC Utrecht Netherlands Postal address: Freudenthal Instituut Postbus 85.170 3508 AD Utrecht Netherlands Email: g.bacciagaluppi@uu.nl Tel.: +31 (0)30 253 5621 Fax: +31 (0)30 253 7494 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *From:* Bacciagaluppi, G. (Guido) <g.bacciagaluppi@uu.nl> *Sent:* Monday, April 13, 2020 12:06 *To:* Muller, F.A. (Frederik) <F.A.Muller@uu.nl> *Cc:* Michiel P. Seevinck <m.p.seevinck@gmail.com>; Dieks, D.G.B.J. (Dennis) <d.dieks@uu.nl>; Geurt Sengers <geurtsengers@gmail.com>; Beernaert, R. (Raoul) <R.Beernaert@students.uu.nl>; s.deharo@uva.nl <s.deharo@uva.nl>; maurits.moeys@gmail.com <maurits.moeys@gmail.com>; S.M. Rijken <rijken@esphil.eur.nl>; Lange, O.A. (Otto) <o.a.lange@uu.nl>; J. de Swart <jacobusgdeswart@gmail.com>; Jeroen van Dongen <J.A.E.F.vanDongen@uva.nl>; Moley, D.E. (Damon) <d.e.moley@students.uu.nl>; Hermens, R. (Ronnie) <r.hermens@uu.nl>; Sean Gryb <sean.gryb@gmail.com>; Jorna, T.F.K. (Thomas) <t.f.k.jorna@students.uu.nl>; m.t.hemme@student.rug.nl <m.t.hemme@student.rug.nl>; Petit, F.M. (Fleur) <f.m.petit@uu.nl>; Burke, M.C. (Maura) <m.c.burke@students.uu.nl>; s.m.friederich@rug.nl <s.m.friederich@rug.nl>; Michele Ginammi <mginammi@gmail.com>; Fuente, S. de la (Soscha) <s.fuente@students.uu.nl>; ruwardarthur@gmail.com <ruwardarthur@gmail.com>; Vergouwen, S.H. (Sanne) <s.h.vergouwen@students.uu.nl>; Schmitz-Justen, P.H.W. (Philipp) <p.h.w.schmitz-justen@students.uu.nl>; Klein Douwel, M. (Mon) <m.kleindouwel@students.uu.nl>; Allen, G.S. (Geoff) <g.s.allen@students.uu.nl>; Wouter van Soest <wouthoorn@hotmail.com>; Gijs Leegwater <leegwater@esphil.eur.nl>; mike@michaelcuffaro.com <mike@michaelcuffaro.com>; Tagliani, E. (Edoardo) <e.tagliani@students.uu.nl>; Baanders, P.H.L. (Pauline) <p.h.l.baanders@students.uu.nl>; Buonocore, G. (Giovanni) <g.buonocore@uu.nl>; Marc Holman <m.holman@kpnmail.nl>; Niels Martens <martensniels@gmail.com>; dincorcevik@gmail.com <dincorcevik@gmail.com>; Aarts, J.E.C.M. (Jos) <j.e.c.m.aarts@students.uu.nl> *Subject:* John Conway Dear All, A prominent victim of the virus: John Conway at Princeton (https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2020/04/12/wiskundige-conway-was-een-speels-genie-... - funnily enough I have found this only in Dutch). I have heard of a few of our colleagues in the States who have had it, but they are all on the mend. I hope you are all safe and well. (Marc: yours was just precautionary self-isolation I hope!) Keep safe! Guido ------------------ Guido Bacciagaluppi Descartes Centre for the History and Philosophy of Science and the Humanities Web:http://www.uu.nl/en/research/history-and-philosophy-of-science HPS The Movie: https://youtu.be/EpUNLCo6C8Q Visiting address: Buys Ballotgebouw room 311 Princetonplein 5 3584 CC Utrecht Netherlands Postal address: Freudenthal Instituut Postbus 85.170 3508 AD Utrecht Netherlands Email: g.bacciagaluppi@uu.nl Tel.: +31 (0)30 253 5621 Fax: +31 (0)30 253 7494