The Demons of Science What They Can and Cannot Tell Us About Our World

Abstract

The title The Demons of Science may at first appear like a contradiction in terms. Demons are associated with the forces of darkness; science represents the power of light. One could assume, therefore, that science has no time for demons. This book aims to destroy this assumption. Science opens its gates to demons as long as they play a rational rather than an evil part. They are put to work. Demons are figures of thought: they belong to the category of thought experiments, which are routinely employed in science and philosophy. As they are cast as agents with superhuman abilities, we may expect that demons provide us with valuable—albeit non-empirical—clues about the constitution of the physical world. But I am interested in exploring not only what the demons tell us but also what they do not tell us about our world. They are cast as superhuman actors but even demons have their limitations. The following chapters contain, I believe, the first systematic study of the role of demons in scientific and philosophical reasoning about the external world.