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A World Without Time

A World Without Time
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"[Yourgrau] presents the nature of an intimate friendship between two magnificent thinkers and the nature of Godel's work, which inspired Einstein but is now lost in obscurity." (Deseret Morning News)

In 1942, the logician Kurt Godel and Albert Einstein became close friends; they walked to and from their offices every day, exchanging ideas about science, philosophy, politics, and the lost world of German science. By 1949, Godel had produced a remarkable proof: In any universe described by the Theory of Relativity, time cannot exist. Einstein endorsed this result reluctantly but he could find no way to refute it, since then, neither has anyone else. Yet cosmologists and philosophers alike have proceeded as if this discovery was never made. In A World Without Time, Palle Yourgrau sets out to restore Godel to his rightful place in history, telling the story of two magnificent minds put on the shelf by the scientific fashions of their day, and attempts to rescue the brilliant work they did together.

"[A World Without Time is] very interesting if you like [scientific] speculation. Even if you don't, the descriptions of the friendship between Godel and Einstein-Einstein said he went to his office at Princeton University mainly so that he would have the pleasure of Gšdel's company on his walk back home-make this book interesting." (Wisconsin State Journal)

如果时间只是幻想,而非真实存在,那世界将会怎样?作为一名哲学教授,《A World Without Time》作者在书中阐释说,爱因斯坦的相对论将允许这种可能性,而第一个意识到这一点的则是哥德尔。很多人都知道,哥德尔和爱因斯坦是非常亲密的朋友。他们每天都要一同从普林斯顿高等研究所步行回家,他们分享物理学、哲学以及政治上的想法。但是并不广为人知的是,哥德尔于1949年做出了一项不寻常的发现:他认为爱因斯坦的相对论提供了一种可能性,即可能存在一个没有时间的世界。作者以一种哲学的背景加以思考而认为,哥德尔的发现势必会带来这样一个后果:假如哥德尔是对的,那么爱因斯坦并没有解释何为时间,而只是将这个问题搪塞过去了。爱因斯坦意识到他的朋友已经对相对论做出了重要的贡献,因为正是他对其理论提出了一个令人困扰的新问题:他的理论中是否还应保留时间。爱因斯坦之后的物理学家并未在哥德尔的理论中找出什么有误的成分,而哲学家们则保持沉默。《A World Without Time》所聚焦的正是哥德尔和爱因斯坦之间这戏剧性的一幕,并且将它置于20世纪人类智慧发展的大背景之下来讲述。在哥德尔和爱因斯坦生活的年代,无论是物理学、数学、哲学还是艺术都获得了非常大的进步。在这一背景之下,两位思想者的友谊故事无疑是动人心弦的。


帕利•尤格拉(Palle Yourgrau),出生于南非的约翰内斯堡,八岁时前往美国。毕业于康乃尔大学,之后取得加州大学洛杉矶分校(UCLA)的博士学位。主要的研究兴趣为德国逻辑学家佛雷格(Frede)与奥地利数学家哥德尔。他于1999年出版的专题著作《当哥德尔遇见爱因斯坦:哥德尔宇宙中的时光旅行》(Gödel Meets Einstein : Time Travel in the Godel Universe)探索了哥德尔的宇宙论在哲学上的重要性,也让哥德尔的时间与相对论观点再度引发热潮。目前为美国布兰戴斯大学哲学系助理教授,现居马萨诸塞州。

尤斯德,一个希望能传播知识的人,译有《数学让脑袋变灵光》等。

马自恒,现任中央研究院信息科学研究所副研究员。毕业于国立台湾大学资讯工程学系学士、美国范德堡大学(Vanderbilt University )计...

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