The epistemic schism of statistical mechanics

• Anta, Javier ^[1]
  1. [1] Universitat de Barcelona

     Universitat de Barcelona

     Barcelona, España

     
• Localización: Theoria: an international journal for theory, history and foundations of science, ISSN 0495-4548, Vol. 36, Nº. 3, 2021, págs. 399-419
• Idioma: inglés
• Títulos paralelos:
  • El cisma epistémico de la mecánica estadística
• Enlaces
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• Resumen

  • In this paper I will argue that the two main approaches to statistical mechanics, that of Boltzmann and Gibbs, constitute two substantially different theoretical apparatuses. Particularly, I defend that this theoretical split must be philosophically understood as a separation of epistemic functions within this physical domain: while Boltzmannians are able to generate powerful explanations of thermal phenomena from molecular dynamics, Gibbsians can statistically predict observable values in a highly effective way. Therefore, statistical mechanics is a counterexample to Hempel's (1958) symmetry thesis, where the predictive capacity of a theory is directly correlated with its explanatory potential and vice versa.