Ernst Mach
Ernst Mach
Ernst Waldfried Josef Wenzel Machwas an Austrian physicist and philosopher, noted for his contributions to physics such as study of shock waves. Quotient of one's speed to that of sound is named the Mach number in his honor. As a philosopher of science, he was a major influence on logical positivism, American pragmatism and through his criticism of Newton, a forerunner of Einstein's relativity...
NationalityAustrian
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth18 February 1838
CountryAustria
Strange as it may seem, the power of mathematics rests on its evasion of all unnecessary thought, and on its wonderful saving of mental operations.
The theory of relativity is just as unacceptable to me as, say, the existence of the atom or other such dogmas.
What Mach calls a thought experiment is of course not an experiment at all. At bottom it is a grammatical investigation.
If our dreams were more regular, more connected, more stable, they would also have more practical importance for us.
Thought experiment is in any case a necessary precondition for physical experiment. Every experimenter and inventor must have the planned arrangement in his head before translating it into fact.
Science always has its origin in the adaptation of thought to some definite field of experience.
A movement that we will to execute is never more than a represented movement, and appears in a different domain from that of the executed movement, which always takes place when the image is vivid enough.
The popular notion of an antithesis between appearance and reality has exercised a very powerful influence on scientific and philosophical thought.