Editing Thought experiment (section)

==Properties==
Further categorization of thought experiments can be attributed to specific properties.

===Possibility===
In many thought experiments, the scenario would be [[nomological possibility|nomologically possible]], or possible according to the laws of nature. John Searle's [[Chinese room]] is [[nomological]]ly possible.

Some thought experiments present scenarios that are not nomologically possible. In his [[Twin Earth thought experiment]], [[Hilary Putnam]] asks us to imagine a scenario in which there is a substance with all of the observable properties of water (e.g., taste, color, boiling point), but is chemically different from water.  It has been argued that this thought experiment is not nomologically possible, although it may be possible in some other sense, such as [[metaphysical possibility]].  It is debatable whether the nomological impossibility of a thought experiment renders intuitions about it moot.

In some cases, the hypothetical scenario might be considered metaphysically impossible, or impossible in any sense at all. [[David Chalmers]] says that we can imagine that there are [[philosophical zombie|zombies]], or persons who are physically identical to us in every way but who lack consciousness. This is supposed to show that [[physicalism]] is false. However, some argue that zombies are inconceivable: we can no more imagine a zombie than we can imagine that 1+1=3. Others have claimed that the conceivability of a scenario may not entail its possibility.

===Causal reasoning===
The first characteristic pattern that thought experiments display is their orientation
in time.<ref>Yeates, 2004, pp. 138–143.</ref> They are either:

*''Antefactual speculations'': experiments that speculate about what might have happened prior to a specific, designated event, or
*''Postfactual speculations'': experiments that speculate about what may happen subsequent to (or consequent upon) a specific, designated event.

The second characteristic pattern is their movement in time in relation to "the present
moment standpoint" of the individual performing the experiment; namely, in terms of:

* Their ''temporal direction'': are they past-oriented or future-oriented?
* Their ''temporal sense'':
** (a) in the case of past-oriented thought experiments, are they examining the consequences of temporal "movement" from the present to the past, or from the past to the present? or,
** (b) in the case of future-oriented thought experiments, are they examining the consequences of temporal "movement" from the present to the future, or from the future to the present?

===Relation to real experiments===
The relation to real experiments can be quite complex, as can be seen again from an example going back to Albert Einstein. In 1935, with two coworkers, he published a paper on a newly created subject called later the EPR effect ([[EPR paradox]]). In this paper, starting from certain philosophical assumptions,<ref>Jaynes, E.T. (1989).[http://bayes.wustl.edu/etj/articles/cmystery.pdf  Clearing up the Mysteries], opening talk at the 8th International MAXENT Workshop, St John's College, Cambridge UK.</ref> on the basis of a rigorous analysis of a certain, complicated, but in the meantime assertedly realizable model, he came to the conclusion that ''quantum mechanics should be described as "incomplete"''. [[Niels Bohr]] asserted a refutation of Einstein's analysis immediately, and his view prevailed.<ref>French, A.P., Taylor, E.F. (1979/1989). ''An Introduction to Quantum Physics'', Van Nostrand Reinhold (International), London, {{ISBN|0-442-30770-5}}.</ref><ref>Wheeler, J.A, Zurek, W.H., editors (1983). ''Quantum Theory and Measurement'', Princeton University Press, Princeton.</ref><ref>d'Espagnat, B. (2006). ''On Physics and Philosophy'', Princeton University Press, Princeton, {{ISBN|978-0-691-11964-9}}</ref> After some decades, it was asserted that feasible experiments could prove the error of the EPR paper. These experiments tested the [[Bell inequalities]] published in 1964 in a purely theoretical paper. The above-mentioned EPR philosophical starting assumptions were considered to be falsified by the empirical fact (e.g. by the optical ''real experiments'' of [[Alain Aspect]]).

Thus ''thought experiments'' belong to a theoretical discipline, usually to [[theoretical physics]], but often to [[theoretical philosophy]]. In any case, it must be distinguished from a real experiment, which belongs naturally to the experimental discipline and has "the final decision on ''true'' or ''not true''", at least in physics.

===Interactivity===
Thought experiments can also be interactive where the author invites people into his thought process through providing alternative paths with alternative outcomes within the narrative, or through interaction with a programmed machine, like a computer program.

Thanks to the advent of the Internet, the digital space has lent itself as a new medium for a new kind of thought experiments. The philosophical work of [[Stefano Gualeni]], for example, focuses on the use of virtual worlds to materialize thought experiments and to playfully negotiate philosophical ideas.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web |last=Gualeni |first=Stefano |date=21 April 2022 |title=Philosophical Games |url=https://eolt.org/articles/philosophical-games |access-date=6 August 2024 |website=Encyclopedia of Ludic Terms}}</ref> His arguments were originally presented in his 2015 book ''Virtual Worlds as Philosophical Tools''.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Gualeni |first=Stefano |title=Virtual Worlds as Philosophical Tools: How to Philosophize with a Digital Hammer |publisher=Palgrave MacMillan |year=2015 |isbn=978-1-137-52178-1 |location=Basingstoke (UK)}}</ref>

Gualeni's argument is that the history of philosophy has, until recently, merely been the history of written thought, and digital media can complement and enrich the limited and almost exclusively linguistic approach to philosophical thought.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":2" /><ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last=Gualeni |first=Stefano |date=2016 |title=Self-reflexive videogames: observations and corollaries on virtual worlds as philosophical artifacts |url=http://www.gamejournal.it/gualeni-self-reflexive-videogames/ |journal=G a M e, the Italian Journal of Game Studies |volume=1, 5}}</ref> He considers virtual worlds (like those interactively encountered in videogames) to be philosophically viable and advantageous. This is especially the case in thought experiments, when the recipients of a certain philosophical notion or perspective are expected to objectively test and evaluate different possible courses of action, or in cases where they are confronted with interrogatives concerning non-actual or non-human phenomenologies.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":2" /><ref name=":1" />