We propose a deepening of the relativity principle according to which the
invariant arena for non-quantum physics is a phase space rather than spacetime.
Descriptions of particles propagating and interacting in spacetimes are
constructed by observers, but different observers, separated from each other by
translations, construct different spacetime projections from the invariant
phase space. Nonetheless, all observers agree that interactions are local in
the spacetime coordinates constructed by observers local to them.
This framework, in which absolute locality is replaced by relative locality,
results from deforming momentum space, just as the passage from absolute to
relative simultaneity results from deforming the linear addition of velocities.
Different aspects of momentum space geometry, such as its curvature, torsion
and non-metricity, are reflected in different kinds of deformations of the
energy-momentum conservation laws. These are in principle all measurable by
appropriate experiments. We also discuss a natural set of physical hypotheses
which singles out the cases of momentum space with a metric compatible
connection and constant curvature.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures; in version 2 one reference added and some minor
modifications in sects. II and III mad
