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Why Thought Experiments Do Not Transcend Empiricism

In Christopher Hitchcock (ed.), Contemporary debates in philosophy of science. Malden, MA: Blackwell. pp. 44-66 (2004)

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  1. Gedankenexperimente in der Philosophie.Daniel Cohnitz - 2006 - Mentis.
    Wie ist es wohl, eine Fledermaus zu sein? Wäre ein rein physikalisches Duplikat von mir nur ein empfindungsloser Zombie? Muss man sich seinem Schicksal ergeben, wenn man sich unfreiwillig als lebensnotwendige Blutwaschanlage eines weltberühmten Violinisten wieder findet? Kann man sich wünschen, der König von China zu sein? Bin ich vielleicht nur ein Gehirn in einem Tank mit Nährflüssigkeit, das die Welt von einer Computersimulation vorgegaukelt bekommt? Worauf beziehen sich die Menschen auf der Zwillingserde mit ihrem Wort 'Wasser', wenn es bei (...)
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  • Philosophical thought experiments as heuristics for theory discovery.Asbjørn Steglich-Petersen & Sara Kier Praëm - 2015 - Synthese 192 (9):2827-2842.
    The growing literature on philosophical thought experiments has so far focused almost exclusively on the role of thought experiments in confirming or refuting philosophical hypotheses or theories. In this paper we draw attention to an additional and largely ignored role that thought experiments frequently play in our philosophical practice: some thought experiments do not merely serve as means for testing various philosophical hypotheses or theories, but also serve as facilitators for conceiving and articulating new ones. As we will put it, (...)
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  • International Handbook of Research in History, Philosophy and Science Teaching.Michael R. Matthews (ed.) - 2014 - Springer.
    This inaugural handbook documents the distinctive research field that utilizes history and philosophy in investigation of theoretical, curricular and pedagogical issues in the teaching of science and mathematics. It is contributed to by 130 researchers from 30 countries; it provides a logically structured, fully referenced guide to the ways in which science and mathematics education is, informed by the history and philosophy of these disciplines, as well as by the philosophy of education more generally. The first handbook to cover the (...)
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  • Cognitive Science and Thought Experiments: A Refutation of Paul Thagard's Skepticism.Michael T. Stuart - 2014 - Perspectives on Science 22 (2):264-287.
    Paul Thagard has recently argued that thought experiments are dangerous and misleading when we try to use them as evidence for claims. This paper refutes his skepticism. Building on Thagard’s own work in cognitive science, I suggest that Thagard has much that is positive to say about how thought experiments work. My last section presents some new directions for research on the intersection between thought experiments and cognitive science.
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  • Thought experiments, real experiments, and the expertise objection.Christopher Hitchcock - 2012 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 2 (2):205-218.
    It is a commonplace that in philosophy, intuitions supply evidence for and against philosophical theories. Recent work in experimental philosophy has brought to bear the intuitions of philosophically naïve subjects in a number of different ways. One line of response to this work has been to claim that philosophers have expertise that privileges their intuitive judgments, and allows them to disregard the judgments of non-experts. This expertise is supposed to be analogous to the expertise of the mathematician or the physicist. (...)
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  • How can computer simulations produce new knowledge?Claus Beisbart - 2012 - European Journal for Philosophy of Science 2 (3):395-434.
    It is often claimed that scientists can obtain new knowledge about nature by running computer simulations. How is this possible? I answer this question by arguing that computer simulations are arguments. This view parallels Norton’s argument view about thought experiments. I show that computer simulations can be reconstructed as arguments that fully capture the epistemic power of the simulations. Assuming the extended mind hypothesis, I furthermore argue that running the computer simulation is to execute the reconstructing argument. I discuss some (...)
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  • REVIEW: James R. Brown, Laboratory of the Mind. [REVIEW]Michael T. Stuart - 2012 - Spontaneous Generations 6 (1):237-241.
    Originally published in 1991, The Laboratory of the Mind: Thought Experiments in the Natural Sciences, is the first monograph to identify and address some of the many interesting questions that pertain to thought experiments. While the putative aim of the book is to explore the nature of thought experimental evidence, it has another important purpose which concerns the crucial role thought experiments play in Brown’s Platonic master argument.In that argument, Brown argues against naturalism and empiricism (Brown 2012), for mathematical Platonism (...)
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  • Quantum physics and theology: John Polkinghorne on thought experiments.Yiftach J. H. Fehige - 2012 - Zygon 47 (2):256-288.
    Abstract Thought experimentation is part of accepted scientific practice, and this makes it surprising that philosophers of science did not seriously engage with it for a very long time. The situation changed in the 1990s, resulting in a highly intriguing debate over thought experiments. Initially, the discussion focused mostly on thought experiments in physics, philosophy, and mathematics. Other disciplines have since become the subject of interest. Yet, nothing substantial has been said about the role of thought experiments in nonphilosophical theology. (...)
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  • (1 other version)Intuitions in Science: Thought Experiments as Argument Pumps.Darrell Patrick Rowbottom - 2014 - In Anthony Robert Booth & Darrell P. Rowbottom (eds.), Intuitions. Oxford, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press UK. pp. 119-134.
    In this piece, I advocate and motivate a new understanding of thought experiments, which avoids problems with the rival accounts of Brown and Norton.
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  • “Platonic” thought experiments: how on earth?Rafal Urbaniak - 2012 - Synthese 187 (2):731-752.
    Brown (The laboratory of the mind. Thought experiments in the natural science, 1991a , 1991b ; Contemporary debates in philosophy of science, 2004 ; Thought experiments, 2008 ) argues that thought experiments (TE) in science cannot be arguments and cannot even be represented by arguments. He rest his case on examples of TEs which proceed through a contradiction to reach a positive resolution (Brown calls such TEs “platonic”). This, supposedly, makes it impossible to represent them as arguments for logical reasons: (...)
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  • How to Reconstruct a Thought Experiment.Marek Picha - 2011 - Organon F: Medzinárodný Časopis Pre Analytickú Filozofiu 18 (2):154-188.
    The paper is a contribution to the debate on the epistemological status of thought experiments. I deal with the epistemological uniqueness of experiments in the sense of their irreducibility to other sources of justification. In particular, I criticize an influential argument for the irreducibility of thought experiments to general arguments. First, I introduce the radical empiricist theory of eliminativism, which considers thought experiments to be rhetorically modified arguments, uninteresting from the epistemological point of view. Second, I present objections to the (...)
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  • (4 other versions)Thought Experiments.Yiftach J. H. Fehige & James R. Brown - 2010 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy 25 (1):135-142.
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  • ‘Spuntar lo scoglio più duro’: did Galileo ever think the most beautiful thought experiment in the history of science?Paolo Palmieri - 2005 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 36 (2):223-240.
    Still today it remains unclear whether Galileo ever climbed the leaning tower of Pisa in order to drop bodies from its top. Some believe that he established the principle of equal speeds for falling bodies by means of an ingenious thought experiment. However, the reconstruction of that thought experiment circulating in the philosophical literature is no more than a cartoon. In this paper I will tell the story of the thought processes behind the cartoon.Keywords: Galileo Galilei; Thought experiment; Falling bodies.
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  • On thought experiments: Is there more to the argument?John D. Norton - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5):1139-1151.
    Thought experiments in science are merely picturesque argumentation. I support this view in various ways, including the claim that it follows from the fact that thought experiments can err but can still be used reliably. The view is defended against alternatives proposed by my cosymposiasts.
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  • Thought experiments rethought—and reperceived.Tamar Szabó Gendler - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5):1152-1163.
    Contemplating imaginary scenarios that evoke certain sorts of quasi‐sensory intuitions may bring us to new beliefs about contingent features of the natural world. These beliefs may be produced quasi‐observationally; the presence of a mental image may play a crucial cognitive role in the formation of the belief in question. And this albeit fallible quasi‐observational belief‐forming mechanism may, in certain contexts, be sufficiently reliable to count as a source of justification. This sheds light on the central puzzle surrounding scientific thought experiment, (...)
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  • (1 other version)Ciência, Imaginação e Valores na Virada Energética Alemã: um exemplo da metodologia de Neurath para a tecnologia social.Ivan Ferreira da Cunha & Alexander Linsbichler - 2024 - Revista Kriterion 65 (156):673-700.
    O utopianismo científico de Neurath é a proposta para que as ciências sociais se envolvam na elaboração, desenvolvimento e comparação de cenários contrafactuais, as ‘utopias’. Tais cenários podem ser entendidos como peças centrais de experimentos de pensamento científicos, isto é, em exercícios da imaginação que não apenas promovem a revisão conceitual, mas também estimulam a criatividade para lidar com problemas vivenciados, já que utopias são esforços para imaginar como o futuro poderia ser. Ademais, experimentos de pensamento utópicos podem oferecer conhecimento (...)
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  • Science, Imagination and Values in the German Energy Turn: an Example of Neurath's Methodology for Social Technology.Ivan Ferreira da Cunha & Alexander Linsbichler - manuscript - Translated by Ivan Ferreira da Cunha & Alexander Linsbichler.
    Neurath’s scientific utopianism is the proposal that the social sciences should engage in the elaboration, development, and comparison of counterfactual scenarios, the ‘utopias’. Such scenarios can be understood as centerpieces of scientific thought experiments, that is, in exercises of imagination that not only promote conceptual revision, but also stimulate creativity to deal with experienced problems, as utopias are efforts to imagine what the future could look like. Moreover, utopian thought experiments can offer scientific knowledge to inform political debates and decisions, (...)
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  • Thought Experiments as an Error Detection and Correction Tool.Igor Bascandziev - 2024 - Cognitive Science 48 (1):e13401.
    The ability to recognize and correct errors in one's explanatory understanding is critically important for learning. However, little is known about the mechanisms that determine when and under what circumstances errors are detected and how they are corrected. The present study investigated thought experiments as a potential tool that can reveal errors and trigger belief revision in the service of error correction. Across two experiments, 1149 participants engaged in reasoning about force and motion (a domain with well‐documented misconceptions) in a (...)
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  • Düşünce Deneylerinin Epistemolojik Statüsü: Galileo’nun Pisa Deneyine İlişkin Karşılaştırmalı Bir Çalışma.M. Efe Ateş - 2023 - Felsefe Dünyasi (78):98-121.
    Düşünce deneylerinden beklenen şeylerden biri de mevcut bilgimizi test etmesi ya da bilgimizi artırmasıdır. Ancak adından da kolayca anlaşılacağı gibi, yalnızca düşüncede yürütülen böyle bir deney, örneğin bize ne şekilde yeni bir bilgi sağlayabilir? Bu zamana kadar söz konusu soruya, bilim felsefesi literatüründe, başlıca beş temel yanıt verilmiştir. Bu makalede, tüm bu yaklaşımların -Platoncu yaklaşım hariç- ortak bir varsayımını ele alacağım. Bu varsayıma göre düşünce deneylerinin tüm yönlerini açıklayabilecek kapsayıcı bir teori bulunmaktadır. Düşünce deneylerinin doğasına ilişkin bu tekçi varsayım, en (...)
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  • Otto Neurath’s Scientific Utopianism Revisited-A Refined Model for Utopias in Thought Experiments.Alexander Linsbichler & Ivan Ferreira da Cunha - 2023 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 54 (2):233-258.
    Otto Neurath’s empiricist methodology of economics and his contributions to political economy have gained increasing attention in recent years. We connect this research with contemporary debates regarding the epistemological status of thought experiments by reconstructing Neurath’s utopias as linchpins of thought experiments. In our three reconstructed examples of different uses of utopias/dystopias in thought experiments we employ a reformulation of Häggqvist’s model for thought experiments and we argue that: (1) Our reformulation of Häggqvist’s model more adequately complies with many uses (...)
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  • Otto Neurath's Scientific Utopianism Revisited - A Refined Model for Utopias in Thought Experiments.Alexander Linsbichler & Ivan Ferreira da Cunha - 2023 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie (2):1-26.
    Otto Neurath’s empiricist methodology of economics and his contributions to politi- cal economy have gained increasing attention in recent years. We connect this research with contemporary debates regarding the epistemological status of thought experiments by reconstructing Neurath’s utopias as linchpins of thought experiments. In our three reconstructed examples of different uses of utopias/dystopias in thought experiments we employ a reformulation of Häggqvist’s model for thought experiments and we argue that: (1) Our reformulation of Häggqvist’s model more adequately complies with many (...)
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  • Putting the ‘Experiment’ back into the ‘Thought Experiment’.Lorenzo Sartori - 2023 - Synthese 201 (2):1-36.
    Philosophers have debated at length the epistemological status of scientific thought experiments. I contend that the literature on this topic still lacks a common conceptual framework, a lacuna that produces radical disagreement among the participants in this debate. To remedy this problem, I suggest focusing on the distinction between the internal and the external validity of an experiment, which is also crucial for thought experiments. I then develop an account of both kinds of validity in the context of thought experiments. (...)
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  • Mathematical Understanding by Thought Experiments.Gerhard Heinzmann - 2022 - Axiomathes 32 (3):871-886.
    The goal of this paper is to answer the following question: Does it make sense to speak of thought experiments not only in physics, but also in mathematics, to refer to an authentic type of activity? One may hesitate because mathematics as such is the exercise of reasoning par excellence, an activity where experience does not seem to play an important role. After reviewing some results of the research on thought experiments in the natural sciences, we turn our attention to (...)
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  • Imagination in science.Alice Murphy - 2022 - Philosophy Compass 17 (6):e12836.
    While discussions of the imagination have been limited in philosophy of science, this is beginning to change. In recent years, a vast literature on imagination in science has emerged. This paper surveys the current field, including the changing attitudes towards the scientific imagination, the fiction view of models, how the imagination can lead to knowledge and understanding, and the value of different types of imagination. It ends with a discussion of the gaps in the current literature, indicating avenues for future (...)
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  • Otto Neurath and Ludwig von Mises. Philosophy, Politics, and Economics in Viennese Late Enlightenment.Alexander Linsbichler - 2021 - Erasmus Journal for Philosophy and Economics 14 (2).
    Logical empiricism and the Austrian School of economics are two of the internationally most influential intellectual movements with Viennese roots. By and large independently of each other, both have been subject to detailed historical and philosophical investigations for the last two dec-ades. However, in spite of numerous connections and interactions be-tween the two groups, their relationship has captured surprisingly sparse attention. My dissertation focuses on the many-faceted juxtaposition of two supposedly antagonistic championsof Viennese Late Enlightenment: logical empiricist Otto Neurath and (...)
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  • Fizikalizm, Bilgi Argümanı ve Felsefi Düşünce Deneyleri.Alper Bilgehan Yardımcı & Atilla Volkan Çam - 2021 - Nosyon: Uluslararası Toplum Ve Kültür Çalışmaları Dergisi 1 (8):1-11.
    Thought experiments, one of the most effective ways of acquiring knowledge, are an intellectual tool frequently used by scientists or thinkers in their fields of study. Thought experiments used to respond to scientific issues are considered scientific thought experiments, while thought experiments used for philosophical problems are called philosophical thought experiments. In this context, firstly, the differences between scientific and philosophical thought experiments are determined in the article. In particular, philosophical thought experiments are often needed in discussions within the field (...)
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  • Why Computer Simulation Cannot Be an End of Thought Experimentation.N. K. Shinod - 2021 - Journal for General Philosophy of Science / Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 52 (3):431-453.
    Computer simulation (CS) and thought experiments (TE) seem to produce knowledge about the world without intervening in the world. This has called for a comparison between the two methods. However, Chandrasekharan et al. (2013) argue that the nature of contemporary science is too complex for using TEs. They suggest CS as the tool for contemporary sciences and conclude that it will replace TEs. In this paper, by discussing a few TEs from the history of science, I show that the replacement (...)
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  • Norton-Brown Tartışması Bağlamında Bilimsel Düşünce Deneyleri.Alper Bilgehan Yardımcı - 2020 - Beytulhikme An International Journal of Philosophy 10 (4):1235-1255.
    The question of where the knowledge comes from when we conduct thought experiments has been one of the most fundamental issues discussed in the epistemological position of thought experiments. In this regard, Pierre Duhem shows a skeptical attitude on the subject by stating that thought experiments cannot be evaluated as real experiments or cannot be accepted as an alternative to real experiments. James R. Brown, on the other hand, states that thought experiments, which are not based on new experimental evidence (...)
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  • Düşünce Deneylerinin Tarihsel Kökeni, Kavramın İlk Kullanımı ve Ernst Mach’ın Düşünce Deneyi.Alper Bilgehan Yardımcı (ed.) - 2020 - London: Ijopec Publication.
    In this study, the existing definitions of thought experiments and the origin of this concept with its first usage in history will be discussed. Then, the epistemology of Ernst Mach, who conducted the first systematic research on thought experiments, will be provided in order to grasp his views on this subject correctly. In this context, the views of James Brown and John Norton, who support different positions, will be briefly described in order to draw the general framework of the epistemological (...)
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  • The Aesthetic and Literary Qualities of Scientific Thought Experiments.Alice Murphy - 2020 - In Milena Ivanova & Steven French (eds.), The Aesthetics of Science: Beauty, Imagination and Understanding. New York: Routledge.
    Is there a role for aesthetic judgements in science? One aspect of scientific practice, the use of thought experiments, has a clear aesthetic dimension. Thought experiments are creatively produced artefacts that are designed to engage the imagination. Comparisons have been made between scientific (and philosophical) thought experiments and other aesthetically appreciated objects. In particular, thought experiments are said to share qualities with literary fiction as they invite us to imagine a fictional scenario and often have a narrative form (Elgin 2014). (...)
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  • The material theory of induction and the epistemology of thought experiments.Michael T. Stuart - 2020 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 83 (C):17-27.
    John D. Norton is responsible for a number of influential views in contemporary philosophy of science. This paper will discuss two of them. The material theory of induction claims that inductive arguments are ultimately justified by their material features, not their formal features. Thus, while a deductive argument can be valid irrespective of the content of the propositions that make up the argument, an inductive argument about, say, apples, will be justified (or not) depending on facts about apples. The argument (...)
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  • Towards a dual process epistemology of imagination.Michael T. Stuart - 2019 - Synthese (2):1-22.
    Sometimes we learn through the use of imagination. The epistemology of imagination asks how this is possible. One barrier to progress on this question has been a lack of agreement on how to characterize imagination; for example, is imagination a mental state, ability, character trait, or cognitive process? This paper argues that we should characterize imagination as a cognitive ability, exercises of which are cognitive processes. Following dual process theories of cognition developed in cognitive science, the set of imaginative processes (...)
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  • Kierkegaard on Variation and Thought Experiment.Eleanor Helms - 2018 - Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook 23 (1):33-54.
    Name der Zeitschrift: Kierkegaard Studies Yearbook Jahrgang: 23 Heft: 1 Seiten: 33-54.
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  • Thought Experiments: State of the Art.Michael T. Stuart, Yiftach Fehige & James Robert Brown - 2017 - In Michael T. Stuart, Yiftach Fehige & James Robert Brown (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London: Routledge. pp. 1-28.
    This is the introduction to the Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments.
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  • Why Thought Experiments do have a Life of Their Own: Defending the Autonomy of Thought Experimentation Method.N. K. Shinod - 2017 - Journal of Indian Council for Philosophical Research 34 (1):75-98.
    Thought experiments are one among the oldest and effectively employed tools of scientific reasoning. Hacking (Philos Sci 2:302–308, 1992) argues that thought experiments in contrast to real experiments do not have a life of their own. In this paper, I attempt to show that contrary to Hacking’s contentions, thought experiments do have a life of their own. The paper is divided into three main sections. In the first section, I review the reasons that Hacking sets out for believing in the (...)
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  • Thought Experiments: Determining Their Meaning.Igal Galili - 2009 - Science & Education 18 (1):1-23.
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  • Evaluating the Cognitive Success of Thought Experiments.Damián Islas Mondragón - 2017 - Transversal: International Journal for the Historiography of Science 3:68-76.
    Thought experiments are widely used in natural science research. Nonetheless, their reliability to produce cognitive results has been a disputable matter. This study is conducted to present some rules of confirmation for evaluating the cognitive outcome of thought experiments. I begin given an example of a “paradigmatic” thought experiment from Galileo Galilei: the falling bodies. Afterwards, I briefly surveying two different accounts of thought experiments: James R. Brown’s rationalism and John D. Norton’s empiricism. Then, I discuss their positions and I (...)
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  • Thought experiments in current metaphilosophical debates.Daniel Cohnitz & Sören Häggqvist - 2017 - In Michael T. Stuart, Yiftach Fehige & James Robert Brown (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London: Routledge. pp. 406-424.
    Although thought experiments were first discovered as a sui generis methodological tool by philosophers of science (most prominently by Ernst Mach), the tool can also be found – even more frequently – in contemporary philosophy. Thought experiments in philosophy and science have a lot in common. However, in this chapter we will concentrate on thought experiments in philosophy only. Their use has been the centre of attention of metaphilosophical discussion in the past decade, and this chapter will provide an overview (...)
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  • (1 other version)How Thought Experiments Increase Understanding.Michael T. Stuart - 2017 - In Michael T. Stuart, Yiftach Fehige & James Robert Brown (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London: Routledge. pp. 526-544.
    We might think that thought experiments are at their most powerful or most interesting when they produce new knowledge. This would be a mistake; thought experiments that seek understanding are just as powerful and interesting, and perhaps even more so. A growing number of epistemologists are emphasizing the importance of understanding for epistemology, arguing that it should supplant knowledge as the central notion. In this chapter, I bring the literature on understanding in epistemology to bear on explicating the different ways (...)
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  • Empathy and the Limits of Thought Experiments.Erick Ramirez - 2017 - Metaphilosophy 48 (4):504-526.
    This article criticizes what it calls perspectival thought experiments, which require subjects to mentally simulate a perspective before making judgments from within it. Examples include Judith Thomson's violinist analogy, Philippa Foot's trolley problem, and Bernard Williams's Jim case. The article argues that advances in the philosophical and psychological study of empathy suggest that the simulative capacities required by perspectival thought experiments are all but impossible. These thought experiments require agents to consciously simulate necessarily unconscious features of subjectivity. To complete these (...)
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  • A model for thought experiments.Sören Häggqvist - 2009 - Canadian Journal of Philosophy 39 (1):pp. 55-76.
    Philosophical interest in thought experiments has grown over the last couple of decades. Several positions have emerged, defined largely by their differing responses to a perceived epistemological challenge: how do thought experiments yield justified belief revision, even in science, when they provide no new empirical data? Attitudes towards this supposed explanandum differ. Many philosophers accept that it poses a genuine puzzle and hence seek to provide a substantive explanation. Others reject or deflate the epistemic claims made for thought experiments.In this (...)
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  • Thought experiments and mental simulations.John Zeimbekis - 2011 - In Katerina Ierodiakonou & Sophie Roux (eds.), Thought Experiments in Methodological and Historical Contexts. Brill.
    Thought experiments have a mysterious way of informing us about the world, apparently without examining it, yet with a great degree of certainty. It is tempting to try to explain this capacity by making use of the idea that in thought experiments, the mind somehow simulates the processes about which it reaches conclusions. Here, I test this idea. I argue that when they predict the outcomes of hypothetical physical situations, thought experiments cannot simulate physical processes. They use mental models, which (...)
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  • The Dome: An Unexpectedly Simple Failure of Determinism.John D. Norton - 2008 - Philosophy of Science 75 (5):786-798.
    Newton’s equations of motion tell us that a mass at rest at the apex of a dome with the shape specified here can spontaneously move. It has been suggested that this indeterminism should be discounted since it draws on an incomplete rendering of Newtonian physics, or it is “unphysical,” or it employs illicit idealizations. I analyze and reject each of these reasons. †To contact the author, please write to: Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA (...)
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  • Peeking into Plato’s Heaven.James Robert Brown - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5):1126-1138.
    Examples of classic thought experiments are presented and some morals drawn. The views of my fellow symposiasts, Tamar Gendler, John Norton, and James McAllister, are evaluated. An account of thought experiments along a priori and Platonistic lines is given. I also cite the related example of proving theorems in mathematics with pictures and diagrams. To illustrate the power of these methods, a possible refutation of the continuum hypothesis using a thought experiment is sketched.
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  • Thought Experiments & Literary Learning.McComb Geordie - 2020 - Dissertation, University of Toronto, St. George Campus
    In my dissertation, I develop a novel approach to thought experiments and literary learning. It’s novel primarily because, unlike many prominent approaches, it has us refrain from advancing theories, from giving logical analyses, and from explicating. We are, instead, to proceed in a way inspired by Wittgenstein’s writings. We are, that is, to clarify words that give rise to problems and to clear those problems away. To clarify words, we may compare language games in which figure terms like “thought experiment.” (...)
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  • Thought Experiments and The Pragmatic Nature of Explanation.Panagiotis Karadimas - 2024 - Foundations of Science 29 (2):257-280.
    Different why-questions emerge under different contexts and require different information in order to be addressed. Hence a relevance relation can hardly be invariant across contexts. However, what is indeed common under any possible context is that all explananda require scientific information in order to be explained. So no scientific information is in principle explanatorily irrelevant, it only becomes so under certain contexts. In view of this, scientific thought experiments can offer explanations, should we analyze their representational strategies. Their representations involve (...)
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  • Rigour and Thought Experiments: Burgess and Norton.James Robert Brown - 2022 - Axiomathes 32 (1):7-28.
    This article discusses the important and influential views of John Burgess on the nature of mathematical rigour and John Norton on the nature of thought experiments. Their accounts turn out to be surprisingly similar in spite of different subject matters. Among other things both require a reconstruction of the initial proof or thought experiment in order to officially evaluate them, even though we almost never do this in practice. The views of each are plausible and seem to solve interesting problems. (...)
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  • Probing theoretical statements with thought experiments.Rawad El Skaf - 2021 - Synthese 199 (3-4):6119-6147.
    Many thought experiments are used to probe theoretical statements. One crucial strategy for doing this, or so I will argue, is the following. A TE reveals an inconsistency in part of our previously held, sometimes empirically well-established, theoretical statements. A TEer or her critic then proposes a resolution in the form of a conjecture, a hypothesis that merits further investigation. To explore this characterisation of the epistemic function of such TEs, I clarify the nature of the inconsistencies revealed by TEs, (...)
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  • Spoiler Alert! Unveiling the Plot in Thought Experiments and other Fictional Works.Daniele Molinari - 2020 - Argumenta 1 (11):81-97.
    According to a recent philosophical claim, “works of fiction are thought experiments” (Elgin 2007: 47), though there are relevant differences, as the role of spoilers shows—they can ruin a novel but improve the understanding we can gain through a thought experiment. In the present article I will analyze the role of spoilers and argue for a more differentiated perspective on the relation between literature and thought experiments. I will start with a short discussion of different perspectives on thought experiments and (...)
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  • Toward a Pluralist Account of the Imagination in Science.Alice Murphy - 2020 - Philosophy of Science 87 (5):957-967.
    Typically, the imagination in thought experiments has been taken to consist in mental images; we visualize the state of affairs described. A recent alternative from Fiora Salis and Roman Frigg main...
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