IMAGINATION AS A BORDERLINE OF UNDERSTANDING: THE FUNCTION OF IMAGINATION IN THOUGHT EXPERIMENTS
DOI: 10.23951/2312-7899-2020-2-199-224
The article is devoted to the epistemology of imagination and thought experiment. The starting point is the metaphorical definition of a thought experiment as a "laboratory of the mind" given by J. Brown. Based on this oxymoron, which combines experimental (material and manipulative) and theoretical activity into one concept, a study of imagination is carried out as a means for providing mental experiments. Firstly, the epistemological relations of the laboratory and thought experiment are examined in connection with the approach to bring these methods closer together on the basis of the structural and functional similarity of theoretical modeling and experimental practices, which is characteristic for the modern model approach in the philosophy of science. It is demonstrated that a thought experiment is not an experiment and solves different problems associated not with the production of concrete knowledge (about reality), but rather with the search for ways to objectify the scientific problems themselves and clarify their relationships with each other. For this, the themata concept proposed by J. Holton in his theory of “scientific imagination” is used. Themata, which are not clearly enough defined by Holton, are interpreted as machines of conversion that allow one to schematize perceptual content and give it a model-like form while maintaining the moment of visibility, i.e. the possibility of reverse conversion (the movement from a theoretical model to an experiment). Thought experiments, in turn, reveal the boundaries and nature of the relationship between themata. To clarify the mechanism of how the imagination works with non-visualizable objects, the prototype theory of E. Rosch was engaged. The imagination’s scheme of objectification in this context is based on the semiotic connection of the non-visualizable signifier with the visible signified (prototype), and semiosis is ensured by the “naturalization” of the metaphor, which throws the objectification scheme (rules for constructing images) associated with the prototype onto an unmarked (new) or requiring markup updating because of new circumstances subject area (task). The work of imagination here is the natural boundary of understanding – to understand is (at least to have an ability) to imagine, and a thought experiment allows you to map the work of the imagination and use the obtained maps to analyze the principles of its work. Therefore, although a thought experiment does not allow solving the question of the empirical adequacy of the results obtained in it, it is representative and reliable in the study of epistemological attitudes and associated conversion machines, i.e. imagination. The map does not say anything about the existence of the terrain depicted on it, but much can tell about the cartographer’s imagination.
Keywords: imagination, thought experiment, cognition, understanding, scientific discovery, methodology of science, epistemology
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Issue: 2, 2020
Series of issue: Issue 2
Rubric: ARTICLES
Pages: 199 — 224
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