  No-go theorems have played an important role in the development and
assessment of scientific theories. They have stopped whole research programs
and have given rise to strong ontological commitments. Given the importance
they obviously have had in physics and philosophy of physics and the huge
amount of literature on the consequences of specific no-go theorems, there has
been relatively little attention to the more abstract assessment of no-go
theorems as a tool in theory development. We will here provide this abstract
assessment of no-go theorems and conclude that the methodological implications
one may draw from no-go theorems are in disagreement with the implications that
have often been drawn from them in the history of science.
