Are thought experiements empirical?

Question

Just because we don't have evidence for a scenario doesn't mean we cannot conceive its possibility. Einstein's thought experiments for the proofs of general relativity come to mind.

But why are philosophical thought experiments considered "a priori" and unscientific?

Answer 1

Experiments are only empirical when they can be subjected to peer review (independently verifiable), that is the scientific method.

Answer 2

Thought experiments are designed by the thinker, drawing together familiar elements , in novel ways, and then mentally imagining the outcome of the experiment. Arranging elements of thought in new ways, is an empirical process (though Kant's ignored, temporal feature of arithmetic, would suggest this process is a priori). Thought experiments, thus, do have an important empirical component. A lot of people claim that Einsteins theories of relativity are simply a priori processes, and while it's true there is the a priori component of visualization, a thought experiment is more complex than that. More importantly, the internal (thinking in your head) visualization process often involved in thought experiments, is a distinct cognitive process from making a an a priori observation (such as noting that two parrellel lines will never cross).

Answer 3

I would challenge the idea that thought experiements do not rely on any physical experience whatsoever. Oddly enough, I would evoke Kant's thought experiement about someone who was born without any sensual perception at all. Would this man be able to have a thought? I would answer no.

Thought experiments rely on the limitations and parameters that we give them. Many of these limitations are drawn from physical possiblities, but the point of a thought experiment is to alter a limitation or possibility. In this sense they are a posteriori. Yet they also preceede the actual experience of the experiment and therefore are a priori.

It would seem that the heart of the matter lies on the differences and connections between logical and physical possibilities.

Answer 4

This is because thought experiments do not in anyway rely on experience (unlike what one may suspect from looking at the term representing them). when one does a thought experiment they are working strictly inside the mind which means everything is defined by language. With these boundries, all things learned from the expieriment are known a priori because the opposite would imply a contradiction and could not be imagined.

Answer 5

'Empirical' means getting evidence, not simply thinking something in your head.

Thought experiments don't prove; though they may inspire a line of thought (such as riding on light, as with Einstein), or, as with Galileo's thought experiment of a weight, broken in two, joined by a rope falling at the same speed as when it was whole -- which he later tried to verify empirically.

But 'a priori' means, before gathering evidence from the actual world.

And just because I conduct a thought experiment, doesn't mean that what I think is actually so. (When I try to imagine a feather falling in a vacuum, it wafts, rather than falls, clunk.)

I'm wrong when I see it that way -- the way to really find out is empirically, that is, by checking in the world itself.

Thus, a thought experiment isn't empirical.

Answer 6

Because they pretty much epitomize what a priori propositional knowledge is. Thought experiments are entirely hypothetical and don't rely on any physical experience, and thus aren't technically considered scientific.

Einstein's theory of relativity, however, has been scientifically proven.

Answer 7

Very good question. To rephrase your question: Why do some people consider thought experiments unempirical. Perhaps some people are not as well organized in their thought process to substantiate them. Certainly we would need to start with the possible meanings for the word 'thought'. If the substance of experience does not enter into science its self, then where do we derive our logic for our thought. The simple answer is dialectic, but the complex process that produce our descriptions for them are themselves composed of those simple logical forms and therefor the simple logical forms would be incomplete. In the phenomenology the construction for logic forms have as their environment the larger complex self consciousness. Self reflecting self gives the appearance infinity, but we know empirically we are not infinite in the physical. The finite quality of physical existence gives thought experiment a high degree for its validity.

see Hegels science for logic

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/index.htm

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/hegel/works/ol/ol_logic.htm

Answer 8

thought experiments are used to isolate concepts so as to see the relationships between them. Specifically, to see what is a necessary or sufficient condition of what. now when you're doing that you're doing conceptual analysis. conceptual analysis can be influenced by empircal results (as those can change what is possible and impossible and what the concepts are) but strictly speaking possibility and necessity are not themselves 'empirical'.

Answer 9

A thought experiment involves me thinking of something, and then seeing the outcome through the visual powers of my mind. The problem is, you can't see what I'm thinking.

Answer 10

Philosophy has a problem letting science into their realm. But, in fact, they must. We can conceive its possibility but without FACTS proven scientifically....well it is just a jungle out there.