DOI: 10.1017/psa.2026.10239 ISSN: 0031-8248
Implicit and Formal Symmetries
Sebastián Murgueitio RamírezAbstract
In this paper, I distinguish between three different roles that symmetries play in physics practice that are not always distinguished in the philosophical literature and which seem to clash with each other. I then propose that the best way to make sense of these roles requires introducing a distinction between two different kinds of symmetries. One kind concerns invertible transformations that map solutions to solutions. The other is associated with the fact that one can use the same equation to model a system in many different frames.