Niels Bohr's Complementarity: The Experimentalist Method And The Experimental Phenomena Behind It

Slobodan Perović
Department of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia

Abstract I identify a strong undercurrent of Baconian method of induction in Niels Bohr’s work that likely emerged during his experimental training and practice. When its development is analyzed in light of Baconian induction, complementarity emerges as a levelheaded rather than a controversial account. It is carefully elicited from a comprehensive grasp of the available experimental basis, shunning hasty metaphysically motivated generalizations based on partial experimental evidence. I explore the nature of experimental phenomena that enables such a method to be successful.