The History of Thought Experiments: from Antiquity to the Contemporary World
Palavras-chave:
Thought Experiments. History of Philosophy. Epistemology.Resumo
In this paper, we will explore the history of thought experiments, from the birth of philosophy to the beginning of the contemporary discussion. In the first section, we will explore the possible connection between the emergence of philosophy and thought experiments, analyzing whether cases presented by the first philosophers are thought experiments and whether they had any term for thought experiments. Katerina Ierodiakonou explores the possibility that the Greeks have some term to describe thought experimentation. We will proceed with a thorough analysis by Nicholas Rescher of various cases used by the pre-Socratics, arguing that they are examples of thought experiments. Finally, Andrew D. Irvine argues that the cases pointed out by Rescher are not examples of genuine thought experiments. In the second section, we will discuss ancient and medieval philosophy, analyzing passages of Plato and Aristotle to investigate whether they made use of thought experiments. Peter King claims that thought experimentation is the methodology of medieval science, seeking to show the similarities between obligatio and the thought experiments. In the third and last section, we will briefly examine some of the authors who preceded the contemporary discussion, including Ernst Mach, Pierre Duhem, Karl Popper, Alexandre Koyré and Thomas Kuhn. We will end with a quick analysis of the beginning of the contemporary discussion with James Robert Brown and John Norton.
Downloads
Referências
ASPASIA S. M.; KYRIAKOS A. M.; HAIDO K. 2001. Tracing the Development of Thought Experiments in the Philosophy of Natural Sciences. Journal for General Philosophy of Science, 37:61-75.
BECKER, A. 2018. Thought Experiments in Plato. In: STUART, FEHIGE, BROWN (Org.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London and New York: Routledge, p. 44-56.
BIELIK, L. 2014. Thought Experiments: Their Structure and Function. Disponível em: http://www.amesh.sk/pdf/Bielik-Thought_Experiments_Their_Structure_and_Function.pdf. Acesso em: 22/11/2018.
BRENDEL, E. 2004. Intuition Pumps and the Proper Use of Thought Experiments. Dialectica, 58(1):89-108.
BROWN, J. R. 1986. Thought Experiments Since the Scientific Revolution. International Studies in The Philosophy of Science, 1:1-15.
BROWN, J. R. 1991. The Laboratory of The Mind: Thought Experiments in The Natural Sciences. New York, Routledge, 177 p.
BROWN, J. R. 2011. The Laboratory Of The Mind Thought Experiments In The Natural Sciences. New York, Routledge, 226 p.
BROWN, J. R.; FEHIGE, Y. 2017. Thought Experiments. Disponível em: https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2017/entries/thought-experiment/. Acesso em: 17/10/2018.
CORCILIUS, K. 2018. Aristotle and Thought Experiments. In: STUART, FEHIGE, BROWN (Org.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London and New York, Routledge, p. 57-76,
DUHEM, P. 1991. The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory. New Jersey, Princeton University Press, p. 346.
IERODIAKONOU, K. 2005. Ancient Thought Experiments: A first approach. Ancient Philosophy, 25:125–140.
IERODIAKONOU, K. 2011. Remarks on the History of an Ancient Thought Experiment. In: IERODIAKONOU, ROUX (eds.) Thought Experiments in Methodological and Historical Contexts. Leiden: Brill, 37-49.
IERODIAKONOU, K. 2018. The Triple Life of Ancient Thought Experiments. In: STUART, FEHIGE, BROWN (Org.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London and New York, Routledge, p. 31-43.
IRVINE, A. D. 1991. Thought Experimentation in Scientific Reasoning. In: HOROWITZ, MASSEY (Org.), Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc, p. 149-165.
KING, P. 1991. Mediaeval Thought-experiments: the Metamethodology of Mediaeval Science. In: HOROWITZ, MASSEY (Org.), Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc, p. 43-64.
KIRK, G. S.; RAVEN, J. E. 1957. The Presocratic Philosophers. Cambridge University Press, 487 p.
KOYRÉ, A. 1992. Metaphysics and Measurement. Gordon And Breach Science Publishers, 165 p.
KUHN, T. S. 1977. The Essential Tension. The University of Chicago Press: Chicago, 366 p.
MACH, E. 1976. Knowledge and Error: Sketches on the Psychology of Enquiry. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel Publishing Company, 393 p.
MCGINNIS, J. 2018. Experimental Thoughts on Thought Experiments in Medieval Islam. In: STUART, FEHIGE, BROWN (Org.), The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments. London and New York, Routledge, p. 77-91.
NORTON, J. D. 1991. Thought Experiments in Einstein’s Work. In: HOROWITZ, MASSEY (Org.), Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc, p. 129-148.
POPPER, K. 2005. The Logic Of Scientific Discovery. London: Taylor & Francis e-Library, 513 p.
RESCHER, N. 1991. Thought Experimentation in Presocratic Philosophy. In: HOROWITZ, MASSEY (Org.), Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy. Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc, p. 31-41.
Downloads
Publicado
Como Citar
Edição
Seção
Licença
Concedo à Controvérsia o direito de primeira publicação da versão revisada do meu artigo, licenciado sob a Licença Creative Commons Attribution (que permite o compartilhamento do trabalho com reconhecimento da autoria e publicação inicial nesta revista).
Afirmo, ainda, que meu artigo não está sendo submetido para outra publicação e não foi publicado na íntegra em outro periódico e assumo total responsabilidade por sua originalidade, podendo incidir sobre mim eventuais encargos decorrentes de reivindicação, por parte de terceiros, em relação à autoria do mesmo.
Também aceito submeter o trabalho às normas de publicação da Controvérsia acima explicitadas.