Philosophers of physics have long debated whether the Past State of low entropy of our universe calls for explanation. What is meant by “calls for explanation”? In this article we analyze this notion, distinguishing between several possible meanings that may be attached to it. Taking the debate around the Past State as a case study, we show how our analysis of what “calling for explanation” might mean can contribute to clarifying the debate and perhaps to settling it, thus demonstrating the fruitfulness of this analysis. Applying our analysis, we show that two main opponents in this debate, Huw Price and Craig Callender, are, for the most part, talking past each other rather than disagreeing, as they employ different notions of “calling for explanation”. We then proceed to show how answering the different questions that arise out of the different meanings of “calling for explanation” can result in clarifying the problems at hand and thus, hopefully, to solving them.

中文翻译：

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呼吁解释：热力学过去状态的情况

物理学家们长期以来一直在争论我们宇宙低熵的过去状态是否需要解释。“呼吁解释”是什么意思？在本文中，我们分析了此概念，并区分了可能附加的几种含义。以围绕过去状态的辩论为案例研究，我们展示了我们对“要求解释”可能意味着什么的分析如何有助于澄清辩论并可能解决它，从而证明了这一分析的成果。应用我们的分析，我们表明，这场辩论中的两个主要反对者，休·普莱斯和克雷格·卡伦德，在大多数情况下互相交谈而不是不同意，因为他们采用了“呼吁解释”的不同观念。