Skip to content
Carmelics
TopicsThinkersChangesContributorsLoading account…

    Carmelics

    A reasoning platform. Break down any belief into clear reasons, explore both sides, and weigh the evidence honestly.

    Navigate

    • Topics
    • Search
    • Recent Changes
    • Contribute
    • How It Works
    • Glossary
    • Thinkers
    • Contributors
    • About
    • Statistics
    • Terms
    • Privacy

    Database

    Statements
    —
    Perspectives
    —
    Topics
    —

    Press ? for keyboard shortcuts

    LoyalLoyalJusticeJustice
    Made withinDC&Austin
    Statements
    321,452
    Perspectives
    108,905
    Topics
    42
    Home/Original/inverse
    See Original
    Inverse View

    It is not the case that Thought experiments can teach us something new about the world without new empirical data.

    ?Set your confidence on the premises below to see your aggregate.

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Thought experiments draw exclusively on concepts and intuitions derived from prior empirical experience.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.Reorganizing or recombining existing empirical knowledge cannot constitute genuinely new knowledge about the world.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.Therefore, any insight produced by thought experiments is analytic repackaging, not synthetic discovery about reality.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Quine's critique of the analytic-synthetic distinction entails that purely a priori reasoning cannot be cleanly separated from empirical commitments.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.If thought experiments smuggle in hidden empirical assumptions, their conclusions are only as reliable as those unexamined assumptions.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 3.The appearance of learning without new data is thus an illusion masking implicit empirical premises that have not been rigorously tested.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
    ?
    • 1.A well-conceived thought experiment can bring on a crisis or create an anomaly in the reigning theory and contribute to paradigm change.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    • 2.Thought experiments help us re-conceptualize the world in a new way.
      ?

      Think about whether this reason is strong or weak

    Next step

    Based on where you are in your exploration

    Strongest counterpoint
    Explore the most compelling reason on the other side.