Are thought experiments useful and if so how?
Question asked by: mrquestion
Asked on: 12 Jan 2010
Yes thought experiments can be very useful.
Setting up an experiment in the lab can be costly and expensive and require specialist skills you may not have. There are some thought experiments that are not possible to achieve in the lab and in fact may not ever be possible. But working them through in your head can lead to profound insights into reality.
Indeed many particles and pieces of fundamental physics subsequently proved by experiment are the result of thought experiments and equations on sheets of paper that have shown a particle with certain properties must exist, for instance, and then it turns up in reality.
By: knowitall
Replied at: 12 Jan 2010
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