The statistician George Box famously said: "All models are wrong, but some are useful". This statements highlights that although models distort and abstract away the systems they describe, they can help scientists in gaining knowledge about nature. In this seminar, we lookat a variety of different models and ask what role they play in scientific practice. We discuss questions such as: do models represent nature? When do models explain a phenomenon? How do models capture processes at different scales? What is exploratory modeling? We try to answer these questions based on philosophical texts about models in different disciplines (physics, ecology, neuroscience, climate science)
Veranstaltungsformat
This seminar will take place in person on campus throughout the entire semester. Participation numbers are restricted. Please register this seminar into your course schedule (Stundenplan). You will be notified in September whether you will have a spot in this seminar.
If there are good reasons why you want to participate in exactly this seminar (e.g. because there are no alternatives in your study plan), but have also good reasons why you cannot participate in person, please write to
corona.philosophie@uni-bielefeld.de at the earliest possible date. We will then work on a for a solution of your problem
Gelfert, A. (2014). Doing science with models. A philosophical primer. Berlin: Springer.
Die verbindlichen Modulbeschreibungen enthalten weitere Informationen, auch zu den "Leistungen" und ihren Anforderungen. Sind mehrere "Leistungsformen" möglich, entscheiden die jeweiligen Lehrenden darüber.
Zu dieser Veranstaltung existiert ein Lernraum im E-Learning System. Lehrende können dort Materialien zu dieser Lehrveranstaltung bereitstellen: