Theory and Experiment

Abstract

We make here contact with the fundamental point in the scientific method of corroborating theory through comparison with experiment [282]. It is worth mentioning S. J. Gould’s observation that “a detail, by itself, is blind; a concept without a concrete illustration is empty [...] Darwin, who had such keen understanding of fruitful procedure in science, knew in his guts that theory and observation are Siamese twins, inextricably intertwined and continually interacting” (emphasis is ours) [116]. In particular, in the present question of statistical thermodynamics we restate the call of Riogo Kubo, who expressed that “statistical mechanics has been considered a theoretical endeavor. However, statistical mechanics exists for the sake of the real world, not for fictions. Further progress can only be hoped by close cooperation with experiment” [193].