Quantum Gravity Meets &HPS

Abstract

Quantum gravity research constitutes an ideal and novel historical episode that should appeal to historians, philosophers, and sociologists of science alike. The absence of possible experiments and experimental anomalies that usually drive the development of the field expose an entirely different set of inner workings than we are used to seeing in science. One can see how a range of virtues (such as unification, beauty, and so on) beyond “the usual suspects” can guide both the construction and justification of theories. One also sees the strong role played by analogies, which continued to be pursued despite the knowledge that the analogy was far from perfect. Methodologically, what the development of quantum gravity reveals is that what is deemed appropriate will depend upon what constraints are available at the time, and this is prone to changes of a great variety of sorts. I have argued that the framework of constraints provides a useful tool with which to prise open the black box that contains the development of quantum gravity. However, quantum gravity itself provides a tool with which to see the operation and evolution of theoretical constraints that are often overpowered by experimental constraints.