Introduction to the special issue Hermann Weyl and the philosophy of the ‘New Physics’

Abstract

This Special Issue Hermann Weyl and the Philosophy of the ‘New Physics’ has two main objectives: first, to shed fresh light on the relevance of Weyl's work for modern physics and, second, to evaluate the importance of Weyl's work and ideas for contemporary philosophy of physics. Regarding the first objective, this Special Issue emphasizes aspects of Weyl's work (e.g. his work on spinors in n dimensions) whose importance has recently been emerging in research fields across both mathematical and experimental physics, as well as in the history and philosophy of physics. Regarding the second objective, this Special Issue addresses the relevance of Weyl's ideas regarding important open problems in the philosophy of physics, such as the problem of characterizing scientific objectivity and the problem of providing a satisfactory interpretation of fundamental symmetries in gauge theories and quantum mechanics. In this Introduction, we sketch the state of the art in Weyl studies and we summarize the content of the contributions to the present volume.