A few notes have been appended to this edition to elucidate obscurities, and a few slips in the text have been corrected.
A.N.W.
TRINITY COLLEGE,
CAMBRIDGE
August, 1924
CONTENTS
[PART I] THE TRADITIONS OF SCIENCE
[CHAPTER I.] MEANING
ARTS. 1. [Traditional Scientific Concepts]
2. [Philosophic Relativity]
3. [Perception]
[CHAPTER II.] THE FOUNDATIONS OF DYNAMICAL PHYSICS
4. [Newton's Laws of Motion]
5. [The Ether]
6. [Maxwell's Equations]
Appendix I : [Newton's Laws of Motion]
Appendix II: [Clerk Maxwell's Equations of the
Electromagnetic Field]
[CHAPTER III.] SCIENTIFIC RELATIVITY
7. [Consentient Sets]
8. [Kinematic Relations]
9. [Motion through the Ether]
10. [Formulae for Relative Motion]
Appendix: [Mathematical Formulae]
[CHAPTER IV.] CONGRUENCE
11. [Simultaneity]
12. [Congruence and Recognition]
[PART II] THE DATA OF SCIENCE
[CHAPTER V.] THE NATURAL ELEMENTS
13. [The Diversification of Nature]
14. [Events]
15. [Objects]
[CHAPTER VI.] EVENTS
16. [Apprehension of Events]
17. [The Constants of Externality]
18. [Extension]
19. [Absolute Position]
20. [The Community of Nature]
21. [Characters of Events]
[CHAPTER VII.] OBJECTS
22. [Types of Objects]
23. [Sense-Objects]
24. [Perceptual Objects]
25. [Scientific Objects]
26. [Duality of Nature]
[PART III] THE METHOD OF EXTENSIVE ABSTRACTION
[CHAPTER VIII.] PRINCIPLES OF THE METHOD OF EXTENSIVE ABSTRACTION
27. [The Relation of Extension, Fundamental Properties]
28. [Intersection, Separation and Dissection]
29. [The Junction of Events]
30. [Abstractive Classes]
31. [Primes and Antiprimes]
32. [Abstractive Elements]
[CHAPTER IX.] DURATIONS, MOMENTS AND TIME-SYSTEMS
33. [Antiprimes, Durations and Moments]
34. [Parallelism and Time-Systems]
35. [Levels, Rects, and Puncts]
36. [Parallelism and Order]
[CHAPTER X.] FINITE ABSTRACTIVE ELEMENTS
37. [Absolute Primes and Event-Particles]
38. [Routes]
39. [Solids]
40. [Volumes]
[CHAPTER XI.] POINTS AND STRAIGHT LINES
41. [Stations]
42. [Point-Tracks and Points]
43. [Parallelism]
44. [Matrices]
45. [Null-Tracks]
46. [Straight Lines]
[CHAPTER XII.] NORMALITY AND CONGRUENCE
47. [Normality]
48. [Congruence]
[CHAPTER XIII.] MOTION
49. [Analytic Geometry]
50. [The Principle of Kinematic Symmetry]
51. [Transitivity of Congruence]
52. [The Three Types of Kinematics]
[PART IV] THE THEORY OF OBJECTS
[CHAPTER XIV.] THE LOCATION OF OBJECTS
53. [Location]
54. [Uniform Objects]
55. [Components of Objects]
[CHAPTER XV.] MATERIAL OBJECTS
56. [Material Objects]
57. [Stationary Events]
58. [Motion of Objects]
59. [Extensive Magnitude]
[CHAPTER XVI.] CAUSAL COMPONENTS
60. [Apparent and Causal Components]
61. [Transition from Appearance to Cause]
[CHAPTER XVII.] FIGURES
62. [Sense-Figures]
63. [Geometrical Figures]
[CHAPTER XVIII.] RHYTHMS
64. [Rhythms]
[Notes]
[PART I]
THE TRADITIONS OF SCIENCE
[CHAPTER I]
MEANING
[1. Traditional Scientific Concepts]. 1.1 What is a physical explanation? The answer to this question, even when merely implicit in the scientific imagination, must profoundly affect the development of every science, and in an especial degree that of speculative physics. During the modern period the orthodox answer has invariably been couched in terms of Time (flowing equably in measurable lapses) and of Space (timeless, void of activity, euclidean), and of Material in space (such as matter, ether, or electricity).
The governing principle underlying this scheme is that extension, namely extension in time or extension in space, expresses disconnection. This principle issues in the assumptions that causal action between entities separated in time or in space is impossible and that extension in space and unity of being are inconsistent. Thus the extended material (on this view) is essentially a multiplicity of entities which, as extended, are diverse and disconnected. This governing principle has to be limited in respect to extension in time. The same material exists at different times. This concession introduces the many perplexities centering round the notion of change which is derived from the comparison of various states of self-identical material at different times.
[1.2] The ultimate fact embracing all nature is (in this traditional point of view) a distribution of material throughout all space at a durationless instant of time, and another such ultimate fact will be another distribution of the same material throughout the same space at another durationless instant of time. The difficulties of this extreme statement are evident and were pointed out even in classical times when the concept first took shape. Some modification is evidently necessary. No room has been left for velocity, acceleration, momentum, and kinetic energy, which certainly are essential physical quantities.