Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T10:13:02.584Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Understanding the Time-Asymmetry of Radiation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Abstract

I discuss the nature of the puzzle about the time-asymmetry of radiation and argue that its most common formulation is flawed. As a result, many proposed solutions fail to solve the real problem. I discuss a recent proposal of Mathias Frisch as an example of the tendency to address the wrong problem. I go on to suggest that the asymmetry of radiation, like the asymmetry of thermodynamics, results from the initial state of the universe.

Type
Philosophy of Space and Time
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

I thank David Albert, Frank Arntzenius, Mathias Frisch, Tim Maudlin, Bradley Monton, Matthew Parker, and Huw Price for helpful comments.

References

Albert, David. Z. (2000), Time and Chance. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Callender, Craig (2002), “Thermodynamic Asymmetry in Time”, in Edward N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (spring 2002 edition), http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2001/entries/time-thermo/.Google Scholar
Feynman, Richard P. (1985), QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Feynman, Richard P., Leighton, Robert B., and Sands, Matthew (1964), The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. II. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.Google Scholar
Frisch, Mathias (2000), “(Dis-)Solving the Puzzle of the Arrow of Radiation”, (Dis-)Solving the Puzzle of the Arrow of Radiation 51:381410.Google Scholar
Jackson, John D. (1962), Classical Electrodynamics. New York: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Price, Huw (1996), Time's Arrow and Archimedes' Point: New Directions for the Physics of Time. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Ridderbos, T. M. (1997), “The Wheeler-Feynman Absorber Theory: A Reinterpretation?”, The Wheeler-Feynman Absorber Theory: A Reinterpretation? 10 (5): 473486..Google Scholar
Schwinger, Julian, et al. (1998), Classical Electrodynamics. Reading, MA: Perseus Books.Google Scholar
Sciama, D. W. (1967), “Retarded Potentials and the Expansion of the Universe”, in Gold, T. (ed.), The Nature of Time. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 5567.Google Scholar