This seminar is co-taught by Annica Vieser, Baptiste Le Bihan, and Christian Wüthrich.

The philosophy of physics deals with methodological, epistemological, and metaphysical issues in physics. This seminar has the dual purpose of systematically introducing the background necessary to do research in philosophy of physics as well as discussing current research in the field.

This seminar focuses on a young research field within metaphysics and philosophy of physics: the metaphysics of quantum gravity. Quantum gravity is an umbrella term for research programs aiming at the formulation of a physical theory that reconciles the theory of general relativity with quantum physics. A striking feature of most of those theories is that various features usually ascribed to space and/or time seems to disappear, prompting questions about how to relate such exotic ontologies to the familiar world of our daily lives, happening in space and time. The seminar will first introduce three important approaches to quantum gravity emphasizing the features of spacetime missing in each approach: string theory, loop quantum gravity, and causal set theory. Then, a number of problems of conceptual and empirical coherence for claims of spacetime emergence will be investigated and linked to a variety of interpretations of the non-fundamentality of spacetime. The last part of the seminar will focus on some consequences of the non-fundamentality of spacetime for other areas of metaphysics, such as the philosophy of time, modality, and laws of nature.

This seminar will be conducted in English.

If this seminar is taken for credit, please let us know. You will have to fulfill requirements, depending on the module for which you are taking this course. For credit in philosophy:

MA6:

- travail écrit de recherche avec soutenance (env. 25 pages, 50'000 signes)

MA8:

- travail écrit de recherche (env. 12 pages, 24'000 signes) ou présentation orale durant le séminaire

Contact us if you need credit in physics or in another programme.

Our expectation is that everyone prepares the assigned readings ahead of time, actively participates in the seminar (including those featuring a guest speaker), and accepts a reasonable share of presentation duties.

In its Statement on artificial intelligence, the University of Geneva clearly states that

In their scientific publications and creations, researchers and students are required to respect the rules and principles governing scientific integrity, in particular the prohibition of plagiarism, and to comply with good scientific practice.

This good scientific practice demands that the use of generative AI "must always be explicitly agreed upon with the research supervisor and must be methodologically describable" (Guidebook on Generative Artificial Intelligence, p. 14) because they "raise issues of plagiarism" (ibid.). Hence, "[w]riting tasks should not be delegated to the tool" (ibid.). In other words, it is impermissible to use ChatGPT or similar tools in the writing of seminar papers or theses.

Course materials such as lecture notes, handouts, etc may be made available as they will be used in class.

All reading materials will be made available on Moodle.

This is the schedule for the seminar. It is subject to adjustment. Readings marked with an asterisk (*) are optional background reading.

Date	Readings	Presenter(s)
19.09.	*Le Bihan and Vieser (forthcoming)	Annica Vieser, Baptiste Le Bihan, Christian Wüthrich
26.09.	Huggett and Wüthrich (forthcoming), Le Bihan (forthcoming), Rovelli (2008)	Group discussions
03.10.	Healey (2002)	Ryan Miller
10.10.	Barnes (2012)	Isabelle Schönbächler
17.10.	Crowther (2022)	Maria Nørgaard
24.10.	Lam and Wüthrich (2018)	Tim Riedel
31.10.	Le Bihan (2021)	Elisa Ballabio
07.11.	No seminar (semaine de lecture)
14.11.	Baron and Le Bihan (2022)	Matěj Krátký
21.11.	Miller (2024)	Annica Vieser
28.11.	Lam and Wüthrich (2023)	Emilia Margoni
05.12.	Baron and Miller (2014)	Matra Pedroni
12.12.	Seminar: laws of nature and quantum gravity	(David Grimmer)
19.12.	Wüthrich (2021)	Anja Lukic