Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T06:10:28.908Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Method-Driven Experiments and the Search for Dark Matter

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Siska De Baerdemaeker
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Since the discovery of dark matter in the 1980s, multiple experiments have been set up to detect dark matter particles through some other mode than gravity. Particle physicists provide detailed justifications as to why their experiments should be able to detect dark matter. I show that these justifications take on a structure different from what is often the case in experimental practice, and I argue that this is because of the limited description of dark matter. By illuminating this ‘method-driven logic’, I shed new light on questions surrounding measurement robustness and methodological pluralism in the context of dark matter research.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 88 , Issue 1 , January 2021 , pp. 124 - 144
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

I am especially grateful to John Norton, Sandra Mitchell, and James Woodward for many helpful discussions of this work. I would also like to thank Arthur Kosowsky, Michela Massimi, Morgan Thompson, and Nora Boyd for their insightful feedback on this article, as well as three anonymous referees. This work has been presented at the University of Edinburgh work in progress talk series, KU Leuven, and the Complutense University of Madrid; I would like to acknowledge audiences there for their questions and comments.

References

Albrecht, A., et al. 2006. “Report of the Dark Energy Task Force.” arXiv:astro-ph/0609591.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andersen, H., and Hepburn, B.. 2016. “Scientific Method.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Zalta, Edward N.. Stanford, CA: Stanford University.Google Scholar
Buchmueller, O., Doglioni, C., and Wang, L.-T.. 2017. “Search for Dark Matter at Colliders.” Nature Physics 13 (March): 217–23.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Castelvecchi, D. 2018. “Dark-Matter Detector in Italy Strikes Again.” Nature 556:13–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clowe, D., Bradac, M., Gonzalez, A. H., Markevitch, M., Randall, S. W., Jones, C., and Zaritsky, D.. 2006. “A Direct Empirical Proof of the Existence of Dark Matter.” Astrophysical Journal 648:L109–L113.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Colaço, D. 2018. “Rethinking the Role of Theory in Exploratory Experimentation.” Biology and Philosophy 33 (5): 1–17..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Currie, A. M. 2018. Rock, Bone, and Ruin: An Optimist’s Guide to the Historical Sciences. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Franklin, L. R. 2005. “Exploratory Experimentation.” Philosophy of Science 72 (5): 888–99..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gelmini, G. B., Hall, L. J., and Lin, M. J.. 1987. “What Is the Cosmion?” Nuclear Physics B 281:726–35.Google Scholar
Goodman, M. W., and Witten, E.. 1985. “Detectability of Certain Dark-Matter Candidates.” Physical Review D 31 (12): 3059–63..Google ScholarPubMed
Guala, F. 2003. “Experimental Localism and External Validity.” Philosophy of Science 70 (December): 1195–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, P., Jaffe, M., Haslinger, P., Simmons, Q., Müller, H., and Khoury, J.. 2015. “Atom-Interferometry Constraints on Dark Energy.” Science 349 (6250): 849–51..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hong, T. M. 2017. “Dark Matter Searches at the LHC.” arXiv:1709.02304.Google Scholar
Karaca, K. 2017. “A Case Study in Experimental Exploration: Exploratory Data Selection at the Large Hadron Collider.” Synthese 194 (2): 333–54..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kincaid, H. 1990. “Molecular Biology and the Unity of Science.” Philosophy of Science 57 (4): 575–93..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kincaid, H.. 1997. Individualism and the Unity of Science. Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Laudan, L., and Leplin, J.. 1991. “Empirical Equivalence and Underdetermination.” Journal of Philosophy 88 (9): 449–72..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leonelli, S. 2016. Data-Centric Biology: A Philosophical Study. Chicago: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Massimi, M. 2018. “Perspectival Modeling.” Philosophy of Science 85 (July): 335–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mitchell, S. D., and Gronenborn, A. M.. 2017. “After Fifty Years, Why Are Protein X-Ray Crystallographers Still in Business?” British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 68 (3): 703–23..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norton, J. D. 2018. “Einstein’s Conflicting Heuristics: The Discovery of General Relativity.” In Thinking about Space and Time: 100 Years of Applying and Interpreting General Relativity, ed. Beisbart, C., Sauer, T., and Wütrich, C.. Berlin: Springer.Google Scholar
O’Malley, M. A. 2013. “When Integration Fails: Prokaryote Phylogeny and the Tree of Life.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science C 44 (4): 551–62..Google Scholar
O’Malley, M. A., and Soyer, O. S.. 2012. “The Roles of Integration in Molecular Systems Biology.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science C 43 (1): 58–68..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parke, E. C. 2014. “Experiments, Simulations and Epistemic Privilege.” Philosophy of Science 81 (October): 516–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parker, W. S. 2009. “Does Matter Really Matter? Computer Simulations, Experiments, and Materiality.” Synthese 169 (3): 483–96..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pattie, R. W., et al. 2018. “Measurement of the Neutron Lifetime Using an Asymmetric Magneto-Gravitational Trap and In Situ Detection.” Science 360 (6389): 627–32..CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Collaboration, Planck. 2020. “Planck 2018 Results.” Pt. 6, “Cosmological Parameters.” Astronomy and Astrophysics 641: A6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Primack, J. R., Seckel, D., and Sadoulet, B.. 1988. “Detection of Cosmic Dark Matter.” Annual Review of Nuclear and Particle Science 28:751–807.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rubin, V. C., and Ford, W. K. Jr. 1970. “Rotation of the Andromeda Nebula from a Spectroscopic Survey of Emission Regions.” Astrophysical Journal 159:379.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rubin, V. C., Ford, W. K. Jr., and Rubin, J.. 1973. “A Curious Distribution of Radial Velocities of ScI Galaxies with 14.0 < m < 15.0.” Astrophysical Journal 183:L111–L115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stanford, K. 2017. “Underdetermination of Scientific Theory.” In Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Zalta, Edward N.. Stanford, CA: Stanford University.Google Scholar
Wasserman, I. 1986. “Possibility of Detecting Heavy Neutral Fermions in the Galaxy.” Physical Review D 33 (8): 2071–78..Google ScholarPubMed
Weisberg, M. 2013. Simulation and Similarity: Using Models to Understand the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
White, S. D. M., and Rees, M. J.. 1978. “Core Condensation in Heavy Halos: A Two-Stage Theory for Galaxy Formation and Clustering.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 183 (3): 341–58..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wimsatt, W. C. 2007. Re-engineering Philosophy for Limited Beings. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winsberg, E. 2009. “A Tale of Two Methods.” Synthese 169 (3): 575–92..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Woodward, J. 2006. “Some Varieties of Robustness.” Journal of Economic Methodology 13 (2): 219–40..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wylie, A. 1999. “Rethinking Unity as a ‘Working Hypothesis’ for Philosophy of Science: How Archaeologists Exploit the Disunities of Science.” Perspectives on Science 7 (3): 293–317..CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Yue, A. T., Dewey, M. S., Gilliam, D. M., Greene, G. L., Laptev, A. B., Nico, J. S., Snow, W. M., and Wietfeldt, F. E.. 2013. “Improved Determination of the Neutron Lifetime.” Physical Review Letters 111 (22): 2501.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Zwicky, F. 2009. “Republication of: The Redshift of Extragalactic Nebulae.” General Relativity and Gravitation 41 (1): 207–24..CrossRefGoogle Scholar