Dartmouth Events

Abstract: In “Relativity and the Problem of Space” (1961), Einstein describes GR as presenting a picture of the world according to which spacetime emerges as a “structural quality of the field.”   This, he argues, marks a departure from the Newtonian view according to which spacetime exists independent of whatever particles or fields happen to exist.  In this talk, we’ll look closely at the idea of spacetime as a “structural quality of the field.”  I’ll argue that the picture fails to offer an alternative to the Newtonian view and that, in particular, it is of no help in avoiding certain problems involving the general covariance of GR.