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Speaker: Salvatore Sciortino (INAF)

Titolo: ” `Time` and Physics: A strange marriage and more …”

Abstract:

The physical nature of Space and Time has been always at the core of the
physical theories. After General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics have become
consolidated main-stream theories some of the attempts to reconcile them have
required to consider a world where Space have more than 3 dimensions, like in
the string theories, or Time is not fundamental, like in the some proposed GR
reformulations, or in the Loop Quantum Gravity, or Space and Time are not
fundamental, like seems to imply the Twistor theory. Following L. Smoolin
analysis and arguments I will discuss why one arrives to the conclusion
(contrary to rooted and somehow hidden ideas) that Time is fundamental and
illustrates some of the key implications on our effort to understand the
physical world, and the conceptual difficulty to apply “standard” physical
theory to the Universe.