Phenomenology and First Principles

Abstract

The development of science, as A. Einstein saw it, is determined both by “external” and “internal” factors. “Constructive theories, from a relatively simple fundamental formalism, attempt to explain the more complex phenomena... Theories of principle, on the other hand, are based on empirically discovered general properties of natural processes, on principles from which mathematically formulated criteria follow and the individual processes or their theoretical models must observe” (Einstein, 2000).