Recently, biologists have argued that data - driven biology fosters a new scientific methodology; namely, one that is irreducible to traditional methodologies of molecular biology defined as the discovery strategies elucidated by mechanistic philosophy. Here I show how data - driven studies can be included into the traditional mechanistic approach in two respects. On the one hand, some studies provide eliminative inferential procedures to prioritize and develop mechanistic hypotheses. On the other, different studies play an exploratory role in providing useful (...) generalizations to complement the procedure of prioritization. Overall this paper aims to shed light on the structure of contemporary research in molecular biology. (shrink)

In this paper we consider some questions surrounding whether or not regional climate models “add value,” a controversial issue in climate science today. We highlight some objections frequently made about regional climate models both within and outside the community of modelers, including several claims that regional climate models do not “add value.” We show that there are a number of issues involved in the latter claims, the primary ones centering on the fact that different research questions are being pursued by (...) the modelers making the complaints against regional climate models. Further issues focus on historical deficiencies of particular—but not generalizable—failures of individual regional models. We provide tools to sort out these different research questions and particular failures, and to improve communication and understanding surrounding added value in climate modeling and philosophy of climate science. (shrink)

In this paper I argue, first, that ecologists have routinely treated humans—or more specifically, anthropogenic causal factors—as disturbing conditions. I define disturbing conditions as exogenous variables, variables “outside” a model, that when present in a target system, inhibit the applicability or accuracy of the model. This treatment is surprising given that humans play a dominant role in many ecosystems and definitions of ecology contain no fundamental distinction between human and natural. Second, I argue that the treatment of humans as disturbing (...) conditions is an idealization: since it is, and has long been, known that humans are pervasive, this treatment amounts to an intentionally introduced theoretical distortion. Finally, characterizing this treatment as idealization forces us to confront the question of its justification, and so, drawing on three different kinds of idealization, I evaluate how this treatment may be justified. (shrink)

Cognitive values like simplicity, broad scope, and easy handling are properties of a scientific representation that result from the idealization which is involved in the construction of a representation. These properties may facilitate the application of epistemic values to credibility assessments, which provides a rationale for assigning an auxiliary function to cognitive values. In this paper, I defend a further rationale for cognitive values which consists in the assessment of the usefulness of a representation. Usefulness includes the relevance of a (...) representation regarding the investigation of a given problem and its practicability for the users. This rationale builds on the claim that any evaluation of scientific representations should pursue two aims: providing information about their credibility and providing information about their usefulness. Cognitive values relating to the usefulness of a representation and epistemic values relating to its credibility both perform a first-order function. Cognitive values are abstract, and several values with first-order functions may conflict in their application. Thus, in order for cognitive values to account for the sort of problem that is to be investigated by means of a representation, they need to be appropriately specified and weighed. Comprehensiveness, complexity, high resolution, and easy handling, for instance, may be required in a first-order function for model-based prediction of regional climate impacts but not for explaining how the global climate system works. Specifying and weighing cognitive and epistemic values relative to a given problem is a legitimate second-order function of social values. (shrink)