Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, Free School Lane, Cambridge CB2 3RH, United Kingdom.
Stud Hist Philos Sci. 2022 Jun;93:30-38. doi: 10.1016/j.shpsa.2022.02.014. Epub 2022 Mar 16.
The successful prediction of new phenomena by scientific theories has gained much interest in philosophy. I will discuss a case that is often taken to be such a successful prediction within physics: Bose-Einstein condensation. The common story goes: the phenomenon was predicted in 1925 by Einstein, and the prediction was confirmed in 1995 at JILA and MIT. I will discuss the history of Bose-Einstein condensation and argue that the observations made in 1995 were inconceivable in several ways in 1925. Therefore, it stands to reason that this is not a story of a confirmed prediction, at least not in the common sense of "prediction". I will suggest that it would be worthwhile for philosophers to investigate further into differences between types of predictions and the various roles those play in science.
科学理论对新现象的成功预测在哲学领域引起了广泛关注。我将讨论一个常被视为物理学中成功预测的案例:玻色-爱因斯坦凝聚。通常的说法是:爱因斯坦于 1925 年预言了这一现象,这一预言于 1995 年在 JILA 和麻省理工学院得到证实。我将讨论玻色-爱因斯坦凝聚的历史,并论证 1995 年的观测在 1925 年从几个方面来看是不可思议的。因此,可以说这并不是一个已证实的预言的故事,至少不是在“预言”的通常意义上。我将建议,哲学家进一步研究不同类型的预言及其在科学中的各种作用,这将是值得的。