-
10Climate Models and Robustness Analysis – Part I: Core Concepts and PremisesIn Pellegrino Gianfranco & Marcello Di Paola (eds.), Handbook of Philosophy of Climate Change, Springer Nature. pp. 67-88. 2023.Robustness analysis (RA) is the prescription to consider a diverse range of evidence and only regard a hypothesis as well-supported if all the evidence agrees on it. In contexts like climate science, the evidence in support of a hypothesis often comes in the form of model results. This leads to model-based RA (MBRA), whose core notion is that a hypothesis ought to be regarded as well-supported on grounds that a sufficiently diverse set of models agrees on the hypothesis. This chapter, which is t…Read more
-
12Climate Models and Robustness Analysis – Part II: The Justificatory ChallengeIn Pellegrino Gianfranco & Marcello Di Paola (eds.), Handbook of Philosophy of Climate Change, Springer Nature. pp. 89-103. 2023.Robustness analysis (RA) is the prescription to consider a diverse range of evidence and only regard a hypothesis as well-supported if all the evidence agrees on it. In contexts like climate science, the evidence in support of a hypothesis often comes from scientific models. This leads to model-based RA (MBRA), whose core notion is that a hypothesis ought to be regarded as well-supported on grounds that a sufficiently diverse set of models agrees on the hypothesis. This chapter, which is the sec…Read more
-
24Neuropsychology of ArtIn Elisabeth Schellekens Dammann & Peter Goldie (eds.), The Aesthetic Mind: Philosophy and Psychology, Oxford University Press. pp. 54. 2011.
-
23Equilibrium in Gibbsian Statistical MechanicsIn Eleanor Knox & Alastair Wilson (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Physics, Routledge. 2022.
-
28Equilibrium in Boltzmannian Statistical MechanicsIn Eleanor Knox & Alastair Wilson (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Physics, Routledge. 2022.
-
134At first blush, the idea that fictions play a role in science seems to be off the mark. Realists and antirealists alike believe that science instructs us about how the world is. Fiction not only seems to play no role in such an endeavour; it seems to detract from it. The aims of science and fiction seem to be diametrically opposed and a view amalgamating the two rightly seems to be the cause of discomfort and concern
-
61Beyond Mimesis and Convention: Representation in Art and Science (edited book)Boston Studies in Philosophy of Science. 2008.Featuring contributions from leading experts, this book represents the first collection of essays on the topic of art and science in the analytic tradition of ...
-
285Models in Science (2nd ed.)The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2021.Models are of central importance in many scientific contexts. The centrality of models such as inflationary models in cosmology, general-circulation models of the global climate, the double-helix model of DNA, evolutionary models in biology, agent-based models in the social sciences, and general-equilibrium models of markets in their respective domains is a case in point (the Other Internet Resources section at the end of this entry contains links to online resources that discuss these models). …Read more
-
5Book review: the images of time: an essay on temporal representation (review)British Journal of Aesthetics 48 (4): 467-469. 2008.
-
68Models and SimulationsSynthese 169 (3). 2009.Special issue. With contributions by Anouk Barberouse, Sarah Francescelli and Cyrille Imbert, Robert Batterman, Roman Frigg and Julian Reiss, Axel Gelfert, Till Grüne-Yanoff, Paul Humphreys, James Mattingly and Walter Warwick, Matthew Parker, Wendy Parker, Dirk Schlimm, and Eric Winsberg.
-
14On the Property Structure of Realist Collapse Interpretations of Quantum Mechanics and the so-Called 'Counting Anomaly'Centre for the Philosophy of the Natural and Social Sciences. 2002.The aim of this paper is two-fold. Recently, Lewis has presented an argument, now known as the `counting anomaly', that the spontaneous localization approach to quantum mechanics, suggested by Ghirardi, Rimini, and Weber, implies that arithmetic does not apply to ordinary macroscopic objects. I will take this argument as the starting point for a discussion of the property structure of realist collapse interpretations of quantum mechanics in general. At the end of this I present a proof of the fa…Read more
-
450Scientific representation and the semantic view of theoriesTheoria 21 (1): 49-65. 2006.It is now part and parcel of the official philosophical wisdom that models are essential to the acquisition and organisation of scientific knowledge. It is also generally accepted that most models represent their target systems in one way or another. But what does it mean for a model to represent its target system? I begin by introducing three conundrums that a theory of scientific representation has to come to terms with and then address the question of whether the semantic view of theories, wh…Read more
-
37The influence of footwear on functional outcome after total ankle replacement, ankle arthrodesis, and tibiotalocalcaneal arthrodesisClinical Biomechanics 32 34-39. 2016.Background: Gait analysis after total ankle replacement and ankle arthrodesis is usually measured barefoot. However, this does not reflect reality. The purpose of this study was to compare patients barefoot and with footwear. Methods: We compared 126 patients (total ankle replacement 28, ankle arthrodesis 57, and tibiotalocalcaneal arthrodesis 41) with 35 healthy controls in three conditions (barefoot, standardized running, and rocker bottom shoes). Minimum follow-up was 2 years. We used dynamic…Read more
-
229Models and representationIn Lorenzo Magnani & Tommaso Bertolotti (eds.), Springer Handbook of Model-Based Science, Springer. pp. 49-102. 2017.Scientific discourse is rife with passages that appear to be ordinary descriptions of systems of interest in a particular discipline. Equally, the pages of textbooks and journals are filled with discussions of the properties and the behavior of those systems. Students of mechanics investigate at length the dynamical properties of a system consisting of two or three spinning spheres with homogenous mass distributions gravitationally interacting only with each other. Population biologists study th…Read more
-
25Equilibrium is a central concept of statistical mechanics. In previous work we introduced the notions of a Boltzmannian alpha-epsilon-equilibrium and a Boltzmannian gamma-epsilon-equilibrium. This was done in a deterministic context. We now consider systems with a stochastic micro-dynamics and transfer these notions from the deterministic to the stochastic context. We then prove stochastic equivalents of the Dominance Theorem and the Prevalence Theorem. This establishes that also in stochastic s…Read more
-
13Boltzmannian Non-Equilibrium and Local VariablesIn Cristián Soto (ed.), Current Debates in Philosophy of Science: In Honor of Roberto Torretti, Springer Verlag. pp. 275-287. 2023.Boltzmannian statistical mechanics (BSM) partitions a system’s space of micro-states into cells and refers to these cells as ‘macro-states’. One of these cells is singled out as the equilibrium macro-state while the others are non-equilibrium macro-states. It remains unclear, however, how these states are characterised at the macro-level as long as only real-valued macro-variables are available. We argue that physical quantities like pressure and temperature should be treated as field-variables …Read more
-
6When Does a Boltzmannian Equilibrium Exist?In Cristián Soto (ed.), Current Debates in Philosophy of Science: In Honor of Roberto Torretti, Springer Verlag. pp. 247-273. 2023.We present a definition of equilibrium for Boltzmannian statistical mechanics based on the long-run fraction of time a system spends in a state. We then formulate and prove an existence theorem which provides general criteria for the existence of an equilibrium state. We illustrate how the theorem works with toy example. After a look at the ergodic programme, we discuss equilibria in a number of different gas systems: the ideal gas, the dilute gas, the Kac gas, the stadium gas, the mushroom gas …Read more
-
13Models and theories: a philosophical inquiryRoutledge/Taylor & Francis Group. 2022.Models and theories are of central importance in science, and scientists spend substantial amounts of time building, testing, comparing and revising models and theories. It is therefore not surprising that the nature of scientific models and theories has been a widely debated topic within the philosophy of science for many years. The product of two decades of research, in this book Roman Frigg provides an accessible yet critical introduction to the debates about models and theories within analyt…Read more
-
11Book review: explaining chaos (review)British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 52 (1): 201-205. 2001.Review of: Peter Smith, Explaining chaos. Cambridge: Cambridge univeristy Press, 1998. ISBN 0 521 47747 6.
-
26Models and representation: why structures are not enoughLondon School of Economics and Political Science. 2002.
-
11This volume is a serious attempt to open up the subject of European philosophy of science to real thought, and provide the structural basis for the interdisciplinary development of its specialist fields, but also to provoke reflection on the idea of ‘European philosophy of science’. This efforts should foster a contemporaneous reflection on what might be meant by philosophy of science in Europe and European philosophy of science, and how in fact awareness of it could assist philosophers interpre…Read more
-
43This volume is a serious attempt to open up the subject of European philosophy of science to real thought, and provide the structural basis for the interdisciplinary development of its specialist fields, but also to provoke reflection on the idea of ‘European philosophy of science’. This efforts should foster a contemporaneous reflection on what might be meant by philosophy of science in Europe and European philosophy of science, and how in fact awareness of it could assist philosophers interpre…Read more
-
10Fiction and scientific representationIn Roman Frigg & Matthew Hunter (eds.), Beyond Mimesis and Convention: Representation in Art and Science, Boston Studies in Philosophy of Science. pp. 97-138. 2008.
-
6Why typicality does not explain the approach to equilibriumIn Mauricio Suárez (ed.), Probabilities, Causes and Propensities in Physics, Springer. pp. 77-93. 2010.Why do systems prepared in a non-equilibrium state approach, and eventually reach, equilibrium? An important contemporary version of the Boltzmannian approach to statistical mechanics answers this question by an appeal to the notion of typicality. The problem with this approach is that it comes in different versions, which are, however, not recognised as such, much less clearly distinguished, and we often find different arguments pursued side by side. The aim of this paper is to disentangle diff…Read more
-
12Probability in Boltzmannian statistical mechanicsIn Gerhard Ernst & Andreas Hüttemann (eds.), Time, chance and reduction: philosophical aspects of statistical mechanics, Cambridge University Press. pp. 92-118. 2010.
-
113The ergodic hierarchyStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2011.The so-called ergodic hierarchy (EH) is a central part of ergodic theory. It is a hierarchy of properties that dynamical systems can possess. Its five levels are egrodicity, weak mixing, strong mixing, Kolomogorov, and Bernoulli. Although EH is a mathematical theory, its concepts have been widely used in the foundations of statistical physics, accounts of randomness, and discussions about the nature of chaos. We introduce EH and discuss how its applications in these fields.
-
150Scientific representationStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2016.Science provides us with representations of atoms, elementary particles, polymers, populations, genetic trees, economies, rational decisions, aeroplanes, earthquakes, forest fires, irrigation systems, and the world’s climate. It's through these representations that we learn about the world. This entry explores various different accounts of scientific representation, with a particular focus on how scientific models represent their target systems. As philosophers of science are increasingly acknow…Read more
-
London School of EconomicsProfessor
-