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  1. Software Intensive Science.John Symons & Jack Horner - 2014 - Philosophy and Technology 27 (3):461-477.
    This paper argues that the difference between contemporary software intensive scientific practice and more traditional non-software intensive varieties results from the characteristically high conditionality of software. We explain why the path complexity of programs with high conditionality imposes limits on standard error correction techniques and why this matters. While it is possible, in general, to characterize the error distribution in inquiry that does not involve high conditionality, we cannot characterize the error distribution in inquiry that depends on software. Software intensive (...)
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  • Strengthening Weak Emergence.Nora Berenstain - 2020 - Erkenntnis 87 (5):2457-2474.
    Bedau's influential (1997) account analyzes weak emergence in terms of the non-derivability of a system’s macrostates from its microstates except by simulation. I offer an improved version of Bedau’s account of weak emergence in light of insights from information theory. Non-derivability alone does not guarantee that a system’s macrostates are weakly emergent. Rather, it is non-derivability plus the algorithmic compressibility of the system’s macrostates that makes them weakly emergent. I argue that the resulting information-theoretic picture provides a metaphysical account of (...)
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  • Can we trust Big Data? Applying philosophy of science to software.John Symons & Ramón Alvarado - 2016 - Big Data and Society 3 (2).
    We address some of the epistemological challenges highlighted by the Critical Data Studies literature by reference to some of the key debates in the philosophy of science concerning computational modeling and simulation. We provide a brief overview of these debates focusing particularly on what Paul Humphreys calls epistemic opacity. We argue that debates in Critical Data Studies and philosophy of science have neglected the problem of error management and error detection. This is an especially important feature of the epistemology of (...)
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  • On malfunctioning software.Giuseppe Primiero, Nir Fresco & Luciano Floridi - 2015 - Synthese 192 (4):1199-1220.
    Artefacts do not always do what they are supposed to, due to a variety of reasons, including manufacturing problems, poor maintenance, and normal wear-and-tear. Since software is an artefact, it should be subject to malfunctioning in the same sense in which other artefacts can malfunction. Yet, whether software is on a par with other artefacts when it comes to malfunctioning crucially depends on the abstraction used in the analysis. We distinguish between “negative” and “positive” notions of malfunction. A negative malfunction, (...)
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  • City in Code: The Politics of Urban Modeling in the Age of Big Data.Madeline G. Johnson - 2020 - Open Philosophy 3 (1):429-445.
    A model is “any representation or concept that helps us to understand the world whenever common sense or direct observations are inadequate.” Common sense and direct observation often prove inadequate to the complexities of the twenty-first-century cities. Thus, models abound in urban life and governance. However, a model is not only a tool for control but a way of defining a situation. Framing the city so as to render it susceptible to interpretation and intervention is an exercise not merely with (...)
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  • Epistemic Entitlements and the Practice of Computer Simulation.John Symons & Ramón Alvarado - 2019 - Minds and Machines 29 (1):37-60.
    What does it mean to trust the results of a computer simulation? This paper argues that trust in simulations should be grounded in empirical evidence, good engineering practice, and established theoretical principles. Without these constraints, computer simulation risks becoming little more than speculation. We argue against two prominent positions in the epistemology of computer simulation and defend a conservative view that emphasizes the difference between the norms governing scientific investigation and those governing ordinary epistemic practices.
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  • Complexity-based Theories of Emergence: Criticisms and Constraints.Kari L. Theurer - 2014 - International Studies in the Philosophy of Science 28 (3):277-301.
    In recent years, many philosophers of science have attempted to articulate a theory of non-epistemic emergence that is compatible with mechanistic explanation and incompatible with reductionism. The 2005 account of Fred C. Boogerd et al. has been particularly influential. They argued that a systemic property was emergent if it could not be predicted from the behaviour of less complex systems. Here, I argue that Boogerd et al.'s attempt to ground emergence in complexity guarantees that we will see emergence, but at (...)
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  • Representando fenômenos emergentes.William Ananias Vallerio Dias - 2022 - Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology 26 (1):153-171.
    Modelos representacionais são usados na prática científica para representar diferentes fenômenos. O propósito deste trabalho é examinar o uso de autômatos celulares para representar fenômenos emergentes, isto é, fenômenos com aspectos globais que não podem ser preditos apenas a partir de seus aspectos locais, procurando entender como se dá a representação nesse processo de modelagem. Uma abordagem sugerida é a acepção DEKI desenvolvida por Roman Frigg e James Nguyen, no qual o processo de representação envolve quatro aspectos: denotação do sistema-alvo (...)
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  • Strong Emergence in Biological Systems: Is It Open to Mathematical Reasoning?Lars H. Wegner, Min Yu, Biao Wu, Jiayou Liu & Zhifeng Hao - 2021 - Acta Biotheoretica 69 (4):841-856.
    Complex, multigenic biological traits are shaped by the emergent interaction of proteins being the main functional units at the molecular scale. Based on a phenomenological approach, algorithms for quantifying two different aspects of emergence were introduced (Wegner and Hao in Progr Biophys Mol Biol 161:54–61, 2021) describing: (i) pairwise reciprocal interactions of proteins mutually modifying their contribution to a complex trait (denoted as weak emergence), and (ii) formation of a new, complex trait by a set of n ‘constitutive’ proteins at (...)
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