Peter Jones writes:
> Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
> > I can agree. No physicist posit matter in a fundamental theory.
>
> All physical theories are theories of matter (mass/energy).
True, but they are not theories of what matter *actually is*. At
the turn of last century Rutherford showed that atoms were mostly
empty space. Tables and chairs did not suddenly become less solid as
a result, but it became clear that their apparent solidity was not
actually evidence that atoms are solid all the way through. In a similar
fashion, the apparent solidity of matter is not actually evidence that it
isn't just fluff all the way down, or part of a computer simulation. Our
physical theories describe the behaviour of matter without formally
addressing this question at all, despite what prejudices and working
assumptions physicists may have about the true basis of physical reality.
Stathis Papaioannou
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Received on Wed Aug 23 2006 - 05:13:09 PDT