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Getting Serious about Similarity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Michael Weisberg
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Abstract

Although most philosophical accounts about model/world relations focus on structural mappings such as isomorphism, similarity has long been discussed as an alternative account. Despite its attractions, proponents of the similarity view have not provided detailed accounts of what it means that a model is similar to a real-world target system. This article gives the outlines of such an account, drawing on the work of Amos Tversky.

Type
Fictions, Models and Representation
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 79 , Issue 5 , December 2012 , pp. 785 - 794
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

†

Many thanks to Matt Bateman, Brett Calcott, Zoltan Domotor, Alkistis Elliott-Graves, Emily Parke, Isabelle Peschard, Daniel Singer, Martin Thomson-Jones, Bas van Fraassen, Scott Weinstein, and Deena Skolnick Weisberg for comments and suggestions. This research was supported, in part, by National Science Foundation grant SES-0957189.

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