•  13
    What is the link between the discovery of the relativistic expanding Universe and British imperialism? A public panel debate in the early days of relativistic cosmology shows how fundamental scientific research, whether there are obvious political stakeholders (like biosecurity and climate) or not, runs real-time risks of being repurposed for political ends.
  •  10
    The Big Bang singularity in standard model cosmology suggests a program of study in ‘early universe’ quantum gravity phenomenology. Inflation is usually thought to undermine this program’s prospects by means of a dynamical diluting argument, but such a view has recently been disputed within inflationary cosmology, in the form of a ‘trans-Planckian censorship’ conjecture. Meanwhile, trans-Planckian censorship has been used outside of inflationary cosmology to motivate alternative early universe s…Read more
  •  36
    The Next Generation Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration: History, Philosophy, and Culture
    with Peter Galison, Juliusz Doboszewski, Jamee Elder, Niels C. M. Martens, Abhay Ashtekar, Jonas Enander, Marie Gueguen, Elizabeth A. Kessler, Roberto Lalli, Martin Lesourd, Alexandru Marcoci, Sebastián Murgueitio Ramírez, Priyamvada Natarajan, James Nguyen, Luis Reyes-Galindo, Sophie Ritson, Emilie Skulberg, Helene Sorgner, Matthew Stanley, Ann C. Thresher, Jeroen van Dongen, James Owen Weatherall, Jingyi Wu, and Adrian Wüthrich
    Galaxies 11 (1): 32. 2023.
    This white paper outlines the plans of the History Philosophy Culture Working Group of the Next Generation Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration.
  •  11
    Empty space and the (positive) cosmological constant
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 100 (C): 12-21. 2023.
  •  4
    Trans-Planckian philosophy of cosmology
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 90 (C): 184-193. 2021.
  •  16
    Trans-Planckian Philosophy of Cosmology
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 90 184-193. 2021.
    I provide some philosophical groundwork for the recently proposed ‘trans-Planckian censorship’ conjecture in theoretical physics. In particular, I argue that structure formation in early universe cosmology is, at least as we typically understand it, autonomous with regards to quantum gravity, the high energy physics that governs the Planck regime in our universe. Trans-Planckian censorship is then seen as a means of rendering this autonomy an empirical constraint within ongoing quantum gravity r…Read more
  •  10
    Trans-Planckian Philosophy of Cosmology
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 90 184-193. 2021.
    I provide some philosophical groundwork for the recently proposed ‘trans-Planckian censorship’ conjecture in theoretical physics. In particular, I argue that structure formation in early universe cosmology is, at least as we typically understand it, autonomous with regards to quantum gravity, the high energy physics that governs the Planck regime in our universe. Trans-Planckian censorship is then seen as a means of rendering this autonomy an empirical constraint within ongoing quantum gravity r…Read more
  •  10
    A (Strictly) Contemporary Perspective on Trans-Planckian Censorship
    Foundations of Physics 52 (4): 1-21. 2022.
    I critically discuss a controversial ‘trans-Planckian censorship’ conjecture, which has recently been introduced to researchers working at the intersection of fundamental physics and cosmology. My focus explicitly avoids any appeals to contingent research within string theory or regarding the more general gravitational ‘swampland’. Rather, I concern myself with the conjecture’s foundations in our current, well-trodden physics of quantized fields, spacetime, and gravity. In doing so, I locate wha…Read more
  •  245
    It has long been thought that observing distinctive traces of quantum gravity in a laboratory setting is effectively impossible, since gravity is so much weaker than all the other familiar forces in particle physics. But the quantum gravity phenomenology community today seeks to do the (effectively) impossible, using a challenging novel class of `tabletop' Gravitationally Induced Entanglement (GIE) experiments, surveyed here. The hypothesized outcomes of the GIE experiments are claimed by some (…Read more
  •  21
    Better Appreciating the Scale of It: Lemaître and de Sitter at the BAAS Centenary
    with Siska De Baerdemaeker
    Hopos: The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science 12 (1): 170-188. 2022.
    In September 1931, a panel discussion was convened at Central Hall Westminsteron the subject of the ‘Evolution of the Universe’, at the centenary meeting of theBritish Association for the Advancement of Science. Center stage was what todo about the evolving universe being younger than the stars, evidently a paradoxin the relativistic study of the evolving universe, at the time. Here, we discusstwo diametrically opposed reactions to the paradox, which were each broadcastat the meeting by Lemaˆı…Read more
  •  31
    Creativity in the Social Epistemology of Science
    Philosophy of Science 88 (5): 882-893. 2021.
    Currie (2019) has introduced a novel account of creativity within the social epistemology of science. The account is intended to capture how conservatism can be detrimental to the health of inquiry within certain scientific communities, given the aims of research there. I argue that recent remarks by Rovelli (2018) put pressure on the applicability of the account. Altogether, it seems we do not yet well understand the relationship between creativity, conservatism, and the health of inquiry in sc…Read more
  •  32
    Priority and privilege in scientific discovery
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 89 (C): 202-211. 2021.
    The priority rule in science has been interpreted as a behavior regulator for the scientific community, which benefits society by adequately structuring the distribution of intellectual labor across pre-existing research programs. Further, it has been lauded as part of society's "grand reward scheme" because it fairly rewards people for the benefits they produce. But considerations about how news of scientific developments spreads throughout a scientific community at large suggest that the prior…Read more
  •  33
    Betting on Future Physics
    British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 73 (1): 161-183. 2022.
    The ‘cosmological constant problem’ has historically been understood as describing a conflict between cosmological observations in the framework of general relativity and theoretical predictions from quantum field theory, which a future theory of quantum gravity ought to resolve. I argue that this view of the CCP is best understood in terms of a bet about future physics made on the basis of particular interpretational choices in GR and QFT, respectively. Crucially, each of these choices must be …Read more
  •  42
    What’s the Problem with the Cosmological Constant?
    Philosophy of Science 87 (1): 1-20. 2020.
    The “Cosmological Constant Problem” is widely considered a crisis in contemporary theoretical physics. Unfortunately, the search for its resolution is hampered by open disagreement about what is, strictly, the problem. This disagreement stems from the observation that the CCP is not a problem within any of our current theories, and nearly all of the details of those future theories for which the CCP could be made a problem are up for grabs. Given this state of affairs, I discuss how one ought to…Read more
  •  45
    Would two dimensions be world enough for spacetime?
    Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics 63 100-113. 2018.
    We consider various curious features of general relativity, and relativistic field theory, in two spacetime dimensions. In particular, we discuss: the vanishing of the Einstein tensor; the failure of an initial-value formulation for vacuum spacetimes; the status of singularity theorems; the non-existence of a Newtonian limit; the status of the cosmological constant; and the character of matter fields, including perfect fluids and electromagnetic fields. We conclude with a discussion of what cons…Read more