Bas van Fraassen on success and adequacy in representing and modelling
(2016) Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Theoretical and Cognitive Issues. — ISBN: [978-3-319-38983-7], p. 21-42, published
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- Authors
Ghins, Michel 
- Abstract
- In his Scientific Representation. Paradoxes of Perspective (2008), Bas van Fraassen offers a pragmatic account of scientific representation and representation tout court. In this paper I examine the three conditions for a user to succeed in representing a target in some context: identification of the target of the representational action, representing the target as such and such and correctly representing it in some respects. I argue that success on these three counts relies on the supposed truth of some predicative assertions, and thus that truth is more fundamental than representation. I do this in the framework of a version of the so-called “structural” account of representation according to which the establishment of a homomorphism by the user between a structure abstracted from the intended target and some relevant structure of the representing artefact is a necessary (although certainly not sufficient) condition of success for representing the target in some respects. Finally, on the basis of a correspondence view (not theory) of truth, I show that it is possible to address what van Fraassen calls “the loss of reality objection”.
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Citations
Ghins, M. (2016). Bas van Fraassen on success and adequacy in representing and modelling. In Claudia Casadio and Lorenzo Magnani (ed.) (ed.), Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Theoretical and Cognitive Issues. (p. p. 21-42). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-38983-7_2