Philosophy of Science Colloquium, René Voltz

Department of HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE Eötvös University, Budapest ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Pázmány P. sétány 1/A Budapest, Hungary Phone/Fax: (36-1) 372 2924 The web site of the seminar: http://hps.elte.hu/seminar Philosophy of Science Colloquium Room 6.54 (6th floor) Monday 4:00 PM _________________________________________ 7 October 4:00 PM 6th floor 6.54 (Language of presentation: English) R e n é V o l t z Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg Platonism in modern physics Since Galileo, modern physics can be envisaged as progressing following a Platonic program: explore the world beyond sensory appearances, with ideas and theories based on the existence of unchanging physical laws that are expressible in mathematics. In the search of unified theories and the "dreams of a final theory", contemporary physics expresses more than ever the Platonic tendencies: it basically admits the reality of intelligible forms, representations of generalized symmetries, which convince via their "beauty"besides the necessary verifications of their empirical consequences. The importance of Platonic inspirations during the successive conceptual mutations which mark the History of physics was recognized by the most creative actors. Representative examples are discussed in the presentation. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The organizer of the seminar: László E. Szabó <http://hps.elte.hu/~leszabo><mailto:leszabo@hps.elte.hu>) L a s z l o E. S z a b o Theoretical Physics Research Group of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Department of History and Philosophy of Science Eotvos University, Budapest H-1518 Budapest, Pf. 32, Hungary Phone/Fax: (36-1)372-2924 Mobil/SMS: (36) 20-366-1172 http://hps.elte.hu/~leszabo