Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-cfpbc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-24T15:18:55.736Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The map, the territory, and the cartographer: Linking the “pure” formal models to the “murky” material world

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 September 2022

Anna Ciaunica*
Affiliation:
Centre for Philosophy of Science, University of Lisbon, Campo Grande, Edificio C4 - 1749-016 Lisbon, Portugal Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, London WC1N 3AR, UK a.ciaunica@ucl.ac.uk

Abstract

Assigning to Pearl blankets an instrumental, a “pure” formal role, tacitly delegates the thorny question of mapping the “murky” territory to empirical sciences. But this move side-lines the problem, and does not offer a solution to the question: How do we relate the formal properties of an agent's model of the world to the real properties of the world itself?

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ainsworth, T. (2020). Form vs matter – Sandford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy. First published February 8, 2016; substantive revision March 25, 2020. Retrieved from https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/form-matter/.Google Scholar
Neurath, O. (1944). Foundations of the social sciences. In Neurath, O., Carnap, R. & Morris, C. (Eds.), International encyclopedia of unified science (Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. iii+50). University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Schlick, M. (1959). The foundation of knowledge. In Ayer, A. J. (Ed.), Logical positivism (pp. 209227). The Free Press.Google Scholar