Science & Education 11: 601–617, 2002. © 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. 601 The Substantivalist View of Spacetime Proposed by Minkowski and Its Educational Implications OLIVIA LEVRINI Physics Department, University of Bologna, Italy; E-mail: levrini@df.unibo.it Abstract. The geometrical interpretation of general relativity provides the formalism with intuitive imagery (Chandler 1994). Such an interpretation often presupposes a substantival space: a space taken to be a real entity whose existence is independent of the matter contained. Nowadays an image of space-container seems to have wide acceptance among physicists. Special relativity is, however, usually still taught as the theory which overthrew Newton’s absolute concepts (among which is the idea of a space-container). This inconsistency is considered here. Special relativity can also be interpreted substantivally, as Minkowski did in 1908. His substantivalism is the key to laying out an internally coherent substantivalist line running from Newtonian mechanics to general relativity. Another plausible interpretative line, namely the ‘relationist line’, will be mentioned. It will allow us to conclude with remarks concerning the cultural and educational implications of a consistent interpretative apparatus organised in several interpretative lines. Introduction ‘Space acts on matter, telling it how to move. In turn, matter reacts back on space, telling it how to curve’ (Misner et al. 1970) represents a deservedly famous ex- pression of the qualitative content of general relativity (GR) and, in particular, describes the basic ideas of the so-called geometro-dynamical interpretation of the theory. As Chandler has pointed out (Chandler 1994), the idea of a curved four- dimensional space 1 is counterintuitive only at first glance: there are in fact ‘ways to re-educate our intuitions’ and think about GR as an intuitively comprehensible theory. Chandler proposes that one’s intuitions be adjusted by an awareness that the curvature of space is a manifestation of gravity; in her opinion a geometrical image of gravity has more persuasive power than the ‘invisible, immaterial “force of gravity” demanded by the Newtonian universe’. Chandler’s proposal, however acceptable, avoids a delicate issue which has al- ways been at the centre of discussions, and will continue to re-emerge in physics: what is the real nature of space? Is it a physical object endowed with substantiality (the ‘space-container’ or ‘substantival space’) or is it no more than a set of formal relations among objects or possible positions of objects (if we refer to space), or among events or possible events (if we refer to spacetime), constructed by human