Todd Nagel

Much of our philosophical understanding of concepts central to the philosophy of science was developed in a context in which assuming that space and time are fundamental concrete constituents of our world was safe. Consequently, much of our philosophical understanding relies either implicitly or explicitly on spatiotemporality. The Quantum Gravity research programs have produced well-motivated theories that seem to lack space and time fundamentally. The clash between these scientific theories and our philosophical understanding leads to a metaphysical gap problem and the problem of empirical incoherence for theories that lack space and time. I argue that adjustments are required of our conceptual understandings to ease this tension and solve these problems. Specifically, I argue for a monistic metaphysic that posits the cosmos itself as the only concrete physical object. All other physical objects are abstractions from patterns inherent in the cosmos. This monistic view streamlines the process of reduction and does not imply that a conceptual discrepancy between theories that are reduction pairs will necessarily entail a metaphysical discrepancy. Space and time are plausibly metaphysically special entities. Thus, I also adopt an idiosyncratic version of functionalism to argue that space and time are not metaphysically special in the ways that would lead to a metaphysical gap. The contents of our spatiotemporal concepts are functions that apply to many different patterns. So, these functions come apart, and I argue that we should expect a different reductive program to be associated with each function. Further, I argue that different spatiotemporal functions may emerge at different reductive “levels”. Finally, I argue that the application metaphor used to guide my research supports a satisfying scientific realist view. According to this view, patterns are the bearers of reality, and an iterative process of trial and error is essential to developing good representations of these patterns and, therefore, knowledge of the cosmos. Adopting this view can underwrite realist intuitions without committing us to the empirical incoherence of theories that lack space and time fundamentally.