Sophie Roux is Professor at the École Normale Supérieure, Paris. Among her recent publications are Thought Experiments in Historical and Methodological Contexts (ed. with Ierodiakonou); La mathématisation comme problème (ed. with Chabot); L’Essai de logique de Mariotte. Archéologie des idées d’un savant ordinaire; L’automate. Machine, métaphore, modèle, merveille (ed. with Gaillard et al.); and The Mechanization of Natural Philosophy (ed. with Garber).

 

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Lecture:

Is a Thought Experiment an Experiment?
When we wonder what would happen if a man standing at the edge of the universe threw a spear, or what we would do if we had a ring granting us the power to become invisible, we are making a thought experiment. But what is it exactly that we are doing then? Are we experiencing another world? Are we dealing with an argument presented under the disguise of a pleasant story? Roux will argue that, although thought experiments are not truly experiments, they nevertheless have something in common with experiments, which is that they propose scenarios, heterogeneous to the arguments in which they are integrated.

Time: 1:50 am
Location: Ukrainian Institute of America / Concert Hall

 

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