Three facets of time-reversal symmetry

European Journal for Philosophy of Science 11 (2):1-19 (2021)
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Abstract

The notion of time reversal has caused some recent controversy in philosophy of physics. The debate has mainly put the focus on how the concept of time reversal should be formally implemented across different physical theories and models, as if time reversal were a single, unified concept that physical theories should capture. In this paper, I shift the focus of the debate and defend that the concept of time reversal involves at least three facets, where each of them gives rise to opposing views. In particular, I submit that any account of time reversal presupposes (explicitly or implicitly) modal, metaphysical, and heuristic facets. The comprehension of this multi-faceted nature of time reversal, I conclude, shows that time reversal can be coherently said in many ways, suggesting a disunified concept.

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Time and Chance.David Z. Albert - 2000 - Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Quantum Gravity.Carlo Rovelli - 2004 - Cambridge University Press.
The logic of the past hypothesis.David Wallace - 2023 - In Barry Loewer, Brad Weslake & Eric B. Winsberg, The Probability Map of the Universe: Essays on David Albert’s _Time and Chance_. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press. pp. 76-109.
Two accounts of laws and time.Barry Loewer - 2012 - Philosophical Studies 160 (1):115-137.

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