This book combines physics, philosophy, and history in a radical new approach to introducing the philosophy of physics. It leads the reader through several central problems in the philosophy of physics by tracing their connections to a single issue: whether a cause must be spatiotemporally local to its effect, or whether action at a distance can occur

Table of Contents:
Preface vi 1 What is Spatiotemporal Locality? 1 1 The Big Picture 1 2 Causal Relations between Events 3 3 Action by Contact 7 4 Spatial, Temporal, and Spatiotemporal Locality Defined 13 5 Intrinsic Properties and Noncausal Connections 17 Discussion Questions 23 Notes 24 2 Fields to the Rescue? 26 1 The Electric Force 26 2 The Electric Field and its Possible Interpretations 32 3 Potentials 42 4 Lines of Force 47 Discussion Questions 61 Notes 65 3 Dispositions and Causes 67 1 Introduction 67 2 Dispositions, Categorical Bases, and Subjunctive Conditionals 71 3 Are the Categorical Bases in Themselves Unknowable? 79 Discussion Questions 90 Notes 92 4 Locality and Scientific Explanation 94 1 Is Action at a Distance Impossible? 94 2 Brute Facts and Ultimate Explanations 95 3 Which Facts are Brute? 100 Discussion Questions 107 Notes 110 5 Fields, Energy, and Momentum 111 1 Introduction 111 2 The Argument from Conserved Quantities 112 3 Why Energy’s Ontological Status Matters 120 4 Energy in Classical Physics 125 5 Energy in the Fields 131 6 Energy Flow and the Poynting Vector 136 7 A Moral Regarding the Testability of Theories 153 Discussion Questions 157 Notes 162 6 Is there Nothing but Fields? 165 1 Is Electric Charge Real? 165 2 Faraday’s Picture 167 Discussion Questions 171 Notes 173 7 Relativity and the Unification of Electricity and Magnetism 175 1 Unification in Physics 175 2 How Relativity Unifies Electricity and Magnetism 180 3 Einstein’s Argument from Asymmetry 186 4 The Interdependence of Philosophy and Physics 199 Discussion Questions 201 Notes 203 8 Relativity, Energy, Mass, and the Reality of Fields 205 1 Classical Physics and the “Relativity of Motion” 206 2 Relativistic Invariants and the Unification that Relativity Achieves: Space and Time 210 3 Relativistic Invariants and the Unification that Relativity Achieves: Energy and Momentum 221 4 Mass and the Meaning of “e = mc2 ” 224 5 Fields – At Last! 240 6 Erasing the Line between Scientific Theory and its Philosophical Interpretation 249 Discussion Questions 250 Notes 252 9 Quantum Metaphysics 255 1 Is Quantum Mechanics Complete? 255 2 The Bell Inequalities 263 3 For Whom the Bell Tolls 271 4 Wrestling with Nonlocality 280 Discussion Questions 298 Notes 300 Final Exam 302 References 305 Index 316