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Thought Experiments and the Belief in Phenomena

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

James W. McAllister
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Abstract

Thought experiment acquires evidential significance only on particular metaphysical assumptions. These include the thesis that science aims at uncovering “phenomena”—universal and stable modes in which the world is articulated—and the thesis that phenomena are revealed imperfectly in actual occurrences. Only on these Platonically inspired assumptions does it make sense to bypass experience of actual occurrences and perform thought experiments. These assumptions are taken to hold in classical physics and other disciplines, but not in sciences that emphasize variety and contingency, such as Aristotelian natural philosophy and some forms of historiography. This explains why thought experiments carry weight in the former but not the latter disciplines.

Type
The Epistemology of thought Experiments
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 71 , Issue 5: Proceedings of the 2002 Biennial Meeting of The Philosophy of Science Association. Part II: Symposia Papers , December 2004 , pp. 1164 - 1175
Copyright
Copyright © 2004 by the Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

I thank the other speakers, James Robert Brown, Tamar Szabó Gendler, and John D. Norton, the chair, Nancy J. Nersessian, and the audience for a very enjoyable symposium on “The Epistemology of Thought Experiments” at the 2002 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, Milwaukee. I benefited from their stimulating comments on the draft of this paper that I presented there.

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