SCIMOD · Scientific Models, Fiction and Imagination

Scientific Models, Fiction and Imagination

In this project I aimed to systematically explore a novel approach to model-based reasoning drawing on the relation between the debate on the nature of scientific models from philosophy of science and the debate on the nature of fiction from aesthetics. This connection has been suggested by some philosophers of science but it has not been spelled out rigorously and many questions remain open. In particular, this will change our current understanding of the nature of models by pursuing five main research objectives: 1. Conduct the first rigorous study of the analogy between models and fiction starting from a deep understanding of the notion of fictionality. 2. Develop a novel theory of models as fictions that rejects the recurrent equivocation in the philosophy of science between fictionality and non-existence. 3. Explore the sort of imaginative activities characterizing our cognitive engagement with models. 4. Build a new defensive strategy against traditional criticisms to the fiction view of models. 5. Offer the first taxonomy of the representational styles used in science. The project benefitted from the combination of Roman Frigg’s (the supervisor) expertise in philosophy of science and modelling and my specialisation in the areas of aesthetics and the philosophy of mind and language. Furthermore, we will collaborate with the experts from the CPNSS Philosophy of Physics project, with the decision theorists and social choice experts in the LSE’s Choice Group and with the CATS (Centre for the Analysis of Time Series) group on climate models based at LSE. The dissemination of the project outcomes, which were tested through specific case studies directly involving the competences of modellers, will be of considerable interest to scientists and to a much broader scientific audience, and it will positively contribute to the public debate on the nature of model-based science. Scientists are often unclear about how to understand the model-world interface. There is a vague recognition that there is a problem, but they typically don’t have the conceptual means to frame it and discuss it in an informed way. So, often they say something vague like “the world is roughly like the model”, which is deeply unsatisfactory. By presenting a view of what models are, what representational strategies they can pursue and what sort of cognitive resources are deployed in reasoning with models, we will give scientists a tool to discuss the model-world interface in an informed way.

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