Aesthetics and Agency in Experiments
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21293756 |
|---|---|
| Authors | A Murphy (0000-0002-3707-6872, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München), Adrian Currie (0000-0003-2638-202X, University of Exeter), Kirsten Walsh (0000-0001-5763-1215, University of Exeter) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Pages | 1-22 |
| Publication date | 2026-04-09 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Australasian Journal of Philosophy (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0004-8402 • E-ISSN: 1470-6828 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/00048402.2026.2647963 |
| OpenAlex | W7152639591 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 34 |
We place agency front-and-centre in the aesthetics of science via an analysis of experimental design and performance. This first involves developing an account of scientific agency relevant to experiment. We do this via an analogy between experiments and games (as understood by Suits and Nguyen): both involve artificial practical environments designed to enable participants to exercise particular forms of agency. Second, we consider how this account of agency might underwrite an aesthetics of experiment. Experiments are well-designed not only when they generate clear, elegant results, but also when they actively confront the experimenter with experimental phenomena, afford the exercise of agency throughout experimental runs and in iterative design and tweaking, and underlie stable, intersubjective experiences across agents. We apply the account to Newton’s optical work, and contrast this with contemporary experimental practices, where significantly more ‘experimental distance’ holds between the experimenter and the result. Taking the agency of experimental practice seriously enables a richer account of the role of aesthetic values, sensibilities, and judgments in science
Agency (philosophy) · Analogy · Sense of agency · Structure and agency · Thought experiment · Aesthetic Perception and Analysis · Ethics, Aesthetics, and Art · Philosophy and History of Science
Constructing Natural Historical Facts
Data-Centric Biology
Experiments versus models
What is a Beautiful Experiment
Games
The Grasshopper
Beauty in experiment
A New Account of Replication in the Experimental Life Sciences
Form and Content
Newton
Epistemic Engagement, Aesthetic Value, and Scientific Practice
The aesthetics of scientific experiments
The epistemic significance of appreciating experiments aesthetically
| Highly cited | No |
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