EXPERIMENT IN PHILOSOPHICAL ANALYSIS: ECHOES FROM THE LABORATORY OF THE MIND

Abstract

Philosophy is seen as a theoretical, abstract, abstruse and speculative discipline with no tincture of connection to practical life. This observation is often predicated on the argument that unlike the natural sciences, philosophy has no laboratories where its ideas and theories can be put to test to ascertain its efficacy. Against this backdrop, this paper argues that experiment as a concept is given a myopic empirical connotation that makes philosophy appear as lacking experiments to illustrate its claims. Hence, the paper disagrees with the reductive notion of experiment and outlines its wider sense. It identifies thought
experiment as experiment in philosophical analysis and the mind as its laboratory. The paper presents some selected thought experiments in philosophy to illustrate how philosophical concepts and theories are tested in order to show their relevance to practical life. The paper concludes that philosophy engages in experiment within the purview of thought.