Reading Group Philosophical Foundations of Thermodynamics and Cosmology

Seminar / reading group on the foundations of thermodynamics, focused on the fascinating and tricky issues that aries when current cosmology is taken into account.

The schedule is flexible, in function of the availability of the many that have shown interest. So for the moment we are getting together online in the most voted option (via Doodle). Some authors will be invited to join.

The list of potential papers to discuss is this (I've already read them and I think they are good enough to be worth discussing):  

28 June:
- Callender, C. 2011. «Hot and heavy matters in the foundations of statistical mechanics.»Foundations of Physics, 41(6), 960–981. doi: 10.1007/s10701-010-9518-z

July 27:
- Katie Robertson "Stars and steam engines: To what extent do thermodynamics and statistical mechanics apply to self-gravitating systems?", Synthese (2019) 196:1783–1808, https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-02032-5

October 7:
- Carlo Rovelli "Where was past low-entropy?" arXiv:1812.03578v1 [gr-qc] 9 Dec 2018

November:
- Wallace, D. 2011. «Gravity, entropy, and cosmology: In search of clarity.» British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 61(3), 513–540. doi:10.1093/bjps/axp048

December 2:
- Callender, "The past hypothesis meets gravity", in "Time, Chance, and Reduction. Philosophical Aspects of Statistical Mechanics"

December 16:
- "Modeling the Past Hypothesis: A Mechanical Cosmology" Jordan Scharnhorst, Anthony Aguirre - Foundations of physics 2024.

- Øyvind Grøn "Entropy and Gravity", Entropy 2012, 14, 2456-2477; Special Issue Modified Gravity: From Black Holes Entropy to Current Cosmology Edited by Dr. Kazuharu Bamba and Prof. Dr. Sergei D. Odintsov https://doi.org/10.3390/e14122456 

- Charles H. Lineweaver, Chas A. Egan, "Life, gravity and the second law of thermodynamics", Physics of Life Reviews 5 (2008) 225–242, doi:10.1016/j.plrev.2008.08.002  

If you want to join or have any questions, send me an email.

(This activity is part of a grant ("Fondecyt"), with which I'll also organize some conferences on the same topic in Valparaíso (one hybrid, others in person).)