Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T09:31:40.392Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Toward a Pluralist Account of the Imagination in Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Alice Murphy
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

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 maintains that it is only the propositional imagination that is necessary for the conduct of a thought experiment. I set out problems with these monistic accounts and develop a pluralist stance. Thought experiments appeal to a variety of our imaginative capacities, and we ought to focus on the function of particular thought experiments when considering what type of imaginative engagement they invite.

Type
Understanding and Imagination
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 87 , Issue 5: PSA 2018 - Proceedings of the 2018 biennial meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association. Part II Symposia Papers , December 2020 , pp. 957 - 967
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 very grateful to Steven French, Aaron Meskin, Fiora Salis, Michael Stuart, Max Jones, and an anonymous reviewer for their feedback on this article. Thanks also to those who attended the Imagination in Science symposium at the 2018 PSA meeting in Seattle for helpful comments and conversations.

References

Arcangeli, Margherita. 2010. “Imagination in Thought Experimentation: Sketching a Cognitive Approach to Thought Experiments.” In Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology, ed. Magnani, Lorenzo, Carnielli, Walter A., and Pizzi, Claudio. Berlin: Springer.Google Scholar
Balcerak Jackson, Magdalena. 2016. “On the Epistemic Value of Imagining, Supposing, and Conceiving.” In Knowledge Through Imagination, ed. Kind, Amy and Kung, Peter. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Brown, James. 2004. “Why Thought Experiments Transcend Experience.” In Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Science, ed. Hitchcock, Christopher, 23–43. Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Cartwright, Nancy. 2010. “Models: Parables v Fables.” In Beyond Mimesis and Convention: Representation in Art and Science, ed. Frigg, Roman and Hunter, Matthew C., 19–32. Dordrecht: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cooper, Rachel. 2005. “Thought Experiments.” Metaphilosophy 36 (3): 328–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darwin, Charles. 1964. On the Origin of Species: A Facsimile of the First Edition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Regt, Henk W. 2017. Understanding Scientific Understanding. Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
French, Steven. 2020. There Are No Such Things as Theories. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friend, Stacie. 2011. “Fictive Utterance and Imagining II.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 85 (1): 163–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galileo. 1914. Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Gooding, David C. 1992. “What Is Experimental about Thought Experiments?” In PSA 1992: Proceedings of the 1992 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, ed. Hull, David, Forbes, Micky, and Okruhlik, Kathleen, 280–90. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Kind, Amy. 2013. “The Heterogeneity of the Imagination.” Erkenntnis 78 (1): 141–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lennox, James. 1991. “Darwinian Thought Experiments: A Function for Just-So Stories.” Thought Experiments in Science and Philosophy, ed. Horowitz, Tamara and Massey, Gerald J.. Savage, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.Google Scholar
Meynell, Letitia. 2014. “Imagination and Insight: A New Account of the Content of Thought Experiments.” Synthese 191 (17): 4149–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miščević, Nenad. 1992. “Mental Models and Thought Experiments.” International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 6 (3): 215–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nersessian, Nancy J. 1992. “In the Theoretician’s Laboratory: Thought Experimenting as Mental Modeling.” In PSA 1992: Proceedings of the 1992 Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association, ed. Hull, David, Forbes, Micky, and Okruhlik, Kathleen, 291–301. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association.Google Scholar
Norton, John D. 2004. “Why Thought Experiments Do Not Transcend Empiricism.” In Contemporary Debates in the Philosophy of Science, ed. Hitchcock, Christopher, 44–66. Malden, MA: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Salis, Fiora, and Frigg, Roman. 2020. “Capturing the Scientific Imagination.” In The Scientific Imagination: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives, ed. Godfrey-Smith, Peter and Levy, Arnon. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Starikova, Irina, and Giaquinto, Marcus. 2017. “Thought Experiments in Mathematics.” In The Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments, ed. Stuart, Michael T., Fehige, Yiftach J. H., and Brown, James Robert. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Stock, Kathleen. 2017. Only Imagine. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stuart, Michael T. 2016a. “Norton and the Logic of Thought Experiments.” Axiomathes 26 (4): 451–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stuart, Michael T.. 2016b. “Taming Theory with Thought Experiments: Understanding and Scientific Progress.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science A 58:24–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thoma, Johanna. 2016. “On the Hidden Thought Experiments of Economic Theory.” Philosophy of the Social Sciences 46 (2): 129–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walton, Kendall L. 1990. Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the Foundations of the Representational Arts. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Weisberg, Michael. 2013. Simulation and Similarity: Using Models to Understand the World. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar