Microbes, mathematics, and models

Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 72:1-10 (2018)
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Abstract

Microbial model systems have a long history of fruitful use in fields that include evolution and ecology. In order to develop further insight into modelling practice, we examine how the competitive exclusion and coexistence of competing species have been modelled mathematically and materially over the course of a long research history. In particular, we investigate how microbial models of these dynamics interact with mathematical or computational models of the same phenomena. Our cases illuminate the ways in which microbial systems and equations work as models, and what happens when they generate inconsistent findings about shared targets. We reveal an iterative strategy of comparative modelling in different media, and suggest reasons why microbial models have a special degree of epistemic tractability in multimodel inquiry.

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Emily Parke
University of Auckland

Citations of this work

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Development and microbiology.Aja Watkins - 2021 - Biology and Philosophy 36 (4):1-30.

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References found in this work

How models are used to represent reality.Ronald N. Giere - 2004 - Philosophy of Science 71 (5):742-752.
The strategy of model-based science.Peter Godfrey-Smith - 2006 - Biology and Philosophy 21 (5):725-740.
Who is a Modeler?Michael Weisberg - 2007 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 58 (2):207-233.
Modelling and representing: An artefactual approach to model-based representation.Tarja Knuuttila - 2011 - Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 42 (2):262-271.

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