Robert DiSalle’s Conception of the Ontological Status of Spacetime

Abstract

In this paper R. DiSalle’s conception of the ontological status of spacetime are discussed.

The first part of the article is devoted to the presentation of his objections to the standard substantial-relational debate concerning spacetime ontology, especially to the usual interpretations of Newton’ and Leibniz’s views on the nature of space and the relativity of motion. In the second is shown spacetime theory as kind of physical geometry. This peculiar characteristic of spacetime theory was one of the insights of the empiricist tradition in the philosophy of geometry. R. DiSalle’s new approach for ontological status of spacetime provides, as he believes, a much clearer and more defensible account of what is entailed by realism concerning spacetime, but some objections to this view are presented.