Abstrakt
Besides the friends of the analogy between scientific models and works of fiction there is also a number of philosophers hostile to the idea. In my talk I first elaborate on what the main positions or accounts come down to.
I then offer a framework within which it is be possible to accommodate all those different perspectives. This framework consists of three topics that turn up over and over again.
First, scientific models seem to be simplified versions of their intended targets and, taken at face value, the systems described within these models do not exist. Though the make-believe approach highlights the element of imagination it also pushes the analogy between models and works of fiction too far.
On the other hand, the truth-oriented approach emphasizes the fact that no real system satisfies the model descriptions; but then claims that construing models as fictions based on this would be a mistake (i.e. argument from imperfect fit). I argue for a modified version of make-believe while maintaining the basics of the truth-oriented approach, the argument from imperfect fit notwithstanding.
Second, imagination plays a key role in scientific modeling as well as in ordinary works of fiction, thus confirming that (non-physical) models and works of fiction are ontologically on a par. Third, there is the question whether scientific models and works of fiction are similar in some additional respects.
Frigg (2010) claims that there are at least four similarities in how models and literary fictions function, though he also acknowledges the existence of differences. Portides (2014) and Currie (2016), on the other hand, stress the differences, although they acknowledge some similarities.
I dispute some of those alleged similarities suggested by Frigg, arguing for a more cautious attitude. Given that both the proponents and the opponents of the fiction view share these three concerns, it is possible to accommodate some of the already presented insights while correcting others.