I don’t want to say too much about the Rathbun-Arena smackdown (smackduck?) taking place but I will say this: We often rely on maps that are not “true.” The Mercator projection is “wrong” if our criterion is “showing countries according to their relative size” but “useful” if our criterion is “helping to plot sea voyages.” Moreover, we sometimes explicitly distort maps to make them more useful:
As Wikipedia notes, the Tube map is considered a huge advance on earlier maps despite being flatly wrong about distance, train routes, and everything else.
When we consider theories, it may be that depicting actors’ behaviors as following rationalist behaviors are deeply false, but nevertheless useful. We shouldn’t be deluded into mistaking assumptions for reality but we should also not forego the power of simplification.
(And I have to say that every empirical researcher who’s ever used a parametric estimation method like OLS has used untested, and often blatantly wrong, assumptions in their analysis, unless they have a signed note from God that their errors follow a known distribution.)
Late Update: Similar and longer argument (read after posting).
this is text because there’s a bug in the template
But maps are also territories, which complicates the whole thing a bit, no?
The London tube map is not wrong, it’s realistic (true) in terms of what it is attempting to map. The lines, the stations, and their relationship. If it was flatly wrong, it wouldn’t be useful.. And it’s only useful because it gets what is it representing right. Rationalist assumptions can’t get off on the argument about usefulness because they aren’t useful. And they aren’t useful because the things they are attempting to represent, aren’t represented in the models. If a theory/model keeps failing in such spectacular terms, then time to examine the assumption. I’m not sure I’d keep using the London tube map if it had consistently taken me to Earls Court when I wanted to be at Holborn.
Could you say a little more about what you mean by “failing in such spectacular terms” and perhaps point to some examples from social science that do not similarly fail?
I don’t mean that “as I know you are but what am I”. I’m just trying to get a sense of what standards you’re using to evaluate “useful”.
Well I’d extend that claim to most of the social sciences actually. But in terms of economics and pol sci I’d say that they are used by policy makers and politicians much like a drunk uses a lamppost, for support rather than guidance. There’s a massive literature on this, particularly in economics, after GFC, but there’s plenty of stuff in Pol sci as well about the irrelevance of pol sci research to policy debates. That’s why we’ve had debates over Bent Flyberg’s book, and Keith Topper’s book. But also some links:
https://www.american.com/archive/2010/september/the-irrelevance-of-modern-political-science
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/24/opinion/sunday/political-scientists-are-lousy-forecasters.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/2012/04/17/how-relevant-is-political-science-john/
Then of course there’s the blatantly political decision to cut NSF funding. Now you don’t have to agree with all of these, but what they indicate is a problem about perceptions of pol sic and its utility/relevance to anything other than other political scientists. Now, I don’t want you get get me wrong, I’m not saying this is a good thing, it’s terrible. But what’s brought it about and what we can do about it requires more than simply saying ‘business as usual’. And for me, part of the problem is that if utility is the (only) measure of the success of a theory, then at least in terms of public policy, I think it can pretty well get on without Pol Sci. PTJ has an interesting take on this insofar as he seems to accept the irrelevance of much Pol Sci in terms of policy formation, but says that our primary goal is to use our theories to educate and bring about change that way. I have some sympathy with that view but I’m not convinced that a lot of the content that we teach them stays with them as pressure to adapt to a market driven system take over once they get a job. Anyway, the left leaning liberal agenda of much of the academy hasn’t so far been translated into much social radicalism as far as I can see, over the last 100 years or so, so if Patrick is right what’s going wrong?
Anyway, bottom line, which I think we will probably disagree on, I largely buy the Green and Shapiro critique of rational models.
All I’ll say is that I think you are conflating two different critiques. It may very well be true that society does not benefit from social science research. (The fact that society does not appreciate it isn’t necessarily sufficient to establish that, but I’m not going to argue the point.) That does not establish that there is in fact no scientific value to social science.
Pure mathematics is undergoing a similar crisis. Many universities are talking about shrinking, or even eliminating, their math departments. At present, math departments mostly exist to teach undergraduate engineering majors calculus. If engineering departments expanded, there’d be little need for math departments. The research produced by professional mathematicians is not valued by society a whole lot more than research in economics or political science. If you were to argue that this is a good reason to conclude that society would be well served by withdrawing public funding for mathematics departments, I would consider that a defensible position. If you were to claim that research in mathematics has “failed spectacularly”, I would disagree. Rather strongly. Perhaps you do not actually feel the same way about mathematics as you do social science. I don’t know. But the argument you have laid out implies that math is a great big failure.
I’m not saying social science is of ‘no’ value to society, but I think it depends on the area. The issue differentiated, I think criminology, for example, has been useful, but not always for good ends, but that another minefield it’s best not to confuse with this issue. I’m not going to say too much about pure maths as I don’t know enough about it to comment. However, I wouldn’t start by comparing what we do, or try to do, with pure maths. Not all sciences have the same logic or rationales; that why I reject the idea there anything like the ‘scientific method’. The social sciences are much more like medicine or the biological sciences. We deal with concrete objects, that display emergence and are in open systems. I haven’t given up on the social sciences and I’d like to see us go back to something like they were originally conceived by the founders.
Long complicated story here, and this is not the place to unpack all this, but, if I might input something you say in a previous post. If you accept the ‘realism’ aspect of science (particularly the kinds we are involved in), then we maybe don’t disagree that much, and it also probably means that you and Brian don’t disagree that much (sorry Brian). So bottom line for me is always to place that claim about what is useful in a realist framework. So sure, we come up with lots of assumptions and some might seem more useful than others. That gets us so far, but resting there isn’t far enough. We now need to ask why are these assumptions useful, and for who, and how. Now as to whether the assumptions of rationalists have been useful so far, and if all they got is usefulness as a measure of success, they had better been, then it seems to me they are a spectacular failure. There are difficult issues here, but one is that instrumentalism as it has developed in rationalism is also committed to the idea that explanation and prediction are symmetrical. Nobody in the philosophy of science really believes this anymore, but rationalists in pol sci and in economics remain committed to it (it’s embedded in the models).
Does anyone really want to defend economics after the GFC? If that wasn’t a spectacular failure I’m not sure what was. Many, even mainstream economists, have recognised that their models were inadequate and there’s hopefully a real period of reflection going on in that discipline. Btw, my critique applies equally well to most of the reflectivists as well, because as PTJ has made clear, he’s happy with instrumentalism as well. Anyway, as Dan said somewhere else, it’s the debate that matters. We really are getting into deep waters now that probably can’t be dealt with here. Mind you a couple of Duck panels at ISA, or somewhere else, could be a good place to go further. I’d happily do a paper setting out my position more consistently.
A lot of important stuff here.
I don’t know what makes you say that “rationalism” is committed to the idea that explanation and prediction are symmetrical. I honestly don’t know anyone who believes this. This is why I hate the term “rationalism”. The vast majority of what people tell me “rationalism” assumes happens to be stuff I reject, and my game-theorist friends reject, and almost every single thing I’ve ever been told “rationalism” leaves no room for has been incorporated into a published game-theoretic model. Either you are arguing against a strawman here or we need to be a whole lot clearer about what the heck “rationalism” is (and whether anyone anywhere in the world actually subscribes to such a view).
I have heard a lot of people say that the GFC serves as an indictment of economics. I have not seen anyone explain why in a way that is remotely plausible. We don’t blame geologists for earthquakes (well except in Italy). We don’t blame meteorologists for storms. We didn’t blame IR scholars for the Iraq War. We didn’t blame scholars of American politics for Gore being denied the White House in 2000. We aren’t blaming criminologists or sociologists for the tragedy in Connecticut today. Are you assuming that economists, and only economists, are necessarily responsible for any bad outcome that occurs in the domain they purport to explain? Or are you assuming that the roots of the crisis can be decisively demonstrated to lie in the adoption of policies advocated by economists?
At any rate, I think you are right that pure math is a different beast. I didn’t mean to suggest that the social sciences are equivalent in every meaningful way. I was just drawing an analogy. My point is that you can argue that society hasn’t, for whatever reason, seen much benefit from social science research (which really is not the same as claiming that social science findings have no relevance for policy), and that’s not unimportant, but that only takes you so far. If a map that distorts reality, but not in ways that prevent people who only seek to use it for its intended purpose to benefit from it, can be deemed useful, I fail to see why theoretical models that distort reality, but not in ways that prevent people who only seek to use them for their intended purpose to benefit from them, would not also be considered useful *to some extent*. Curing cancer, we ain’t. But “spectacular failure” is strong language.
Alright, this is going to sound patronising and arrogant, but i don’t know a better way to put it. It always shocks me that most rationalists don’t know that the model of explanation they are taught, by necessity, requires that explanation and prediction are symmetrical. It shocks me, but it doesn’t surprise me. It doesn’t surprise me, because they are rarely taught to unpack the assumptions that make rationalism possible (and why would they given that it doesn’t matter, according to them). The D-N model of explanation most certainly does imply the symmetry and I’ve not see a rationalist position that doesn’t embrace that model, and if they do they are close to becoming realists. I’m very happy to accept the point about most geologist, or most sciences you want to mention, because most geologists (and I’ve interviewed a lot of them) aren’t instrumentalists, but realists. They really think the assumptions they make about moving plates etc are attempts to describe what’s going on, no just what’s useful. The point is because most geologists aren’t instrumentalists they don’t accept the symmetry of the D-N model, and they know they are modelling complex systems, with complex mechanisms in play. Anyway, however we look at it we seem to have come a long way from yo initial intervention re Brian that we can be happy with utility over realism; that seems like progress to me, although doubtless you’ll disagree.
I don’t think that comment is patronizing or arrogant, and I appreciate you taking the time to explain. I had hoped you would.
I suppose some game-theorists are working with the D-N model. But most implicitly reject it, even if they don’t realize they are doing so. Again, I don’t know what you refer to when you refer to “rationalism”, so perhaps your claim that “rationalism” is made possible by the D-N model of explanation is correct. But it is demonstrably false that non-cooperative game theory necessarily weds one to the D-N model, and I’m not sure what I’ve said to indicate that I embrace it.
I have accepted you labeling my argument as instrumentalist because you clearly know these terms better than I do. But I just went and read your 2002 ISQ, and I’m now pretty confused, because the understanding of critical realism I have after reading that piece leaves room for a lot of the work that game-theorists do (which may or may not be “rationalist”). There’s obviously some disconnect here. Either I have misunderstood the assumptions of critical realism or you have misunderstood the position I have staked out or something.
Actually, I do agree that we’ve made progress. I apologize that it has been slow. I am trying to be constructive, and I look forward to continuing the conversation (should you be interested in doing so).
Incidentally, have you read either the article by Primo and Clarke or the Clarke and Primo book? My views have been heavily influenced by theirs, and they do a better job of explaining many things than I do.
https://www.eastman.edu/college/psc/clarke/POPArticle.pdf
Hi Phil, well if we’ve made progress that’s great. And I’m happy to concede that some versions of game theory may not be rationalist in the way I’m using it. To be honest, I hate the term and I’m writing a piece with Brian Schmidt on why. But it seemed churlish to challenge it given that it is a term that Brian used and most people seem happy with. I’m equally unhappy with positivism and neopositivism btw, and don’t start me on the way people use the term ‘epistemology’. But if I start using totally different terms nobody would know what In was on about, and it would be even worse if I started to use a term like ‘epistemology’ but in different ways to how people normally (although in my opinion incorrectly) do. Anyway, leaving aside that problematic issue, my concern is with instrumentalism, and as I’ve already said multiple times, this is not just an issue for rationalism. I don’t know about the specific non-coperative game theorists you mention, but if they see compatible with what I say in the ISQ piece then fine, and I don’t really care whether they label themselves (or anyone labels them) rationalist or not. I’m interested in what people do not how they describe what they do. I do, however, genuinely believe that we can do much better, just by adopting the kind of implicit realism that underpins most of the science that we have most in common with, and I just happen to believe that instrumentalism gets in the way of that. I’m also firmly committed to a science of the social world. I just think we can do it better and make it more useful by really putting our ideas on the line by saying, ‘ok this is the way I think things are/work, now prove me wrong’. Instrumentalism might be a waypoint on the way to that, but at some point those assumption have to come under the realist principle, and if we don’t do that we aren’t doing science. Anyway, I really am going to leave it there. Thanks for the challenging debate, sorry if it seemed to get heated at times, but I care about things (which is not to imply you don’t), so I take this stuff seriously; and I care because I’d like to see the social sciences be more relevant and valued.
Phil,
At times I am a little confused with your argument. While I do not hold Colin’s position on this, yours is a little harder to understand. At times it seems like you are excepting that there is a ‘real’ that we can match assumptions up to, though you think that it isn’t necessary. While Colin is certainly a Mind-World Dualist (to use PTJs terminology), I am not sure where you stand on this. If tehre is a real, then shouldn’t our assumptions match reality? If there is no real then why would we do things like test hypotheses (which I know is something that you do). Is there a stance that accepts dualism that can be both a) accepting of instrumentalism AND b) philosphically sound?
To restate, if you believe that there is a ‘real’ as Colin does, why not have your assumptions match reality (as he would like them to). If you do no believe in a real, why test hypotheses?
Thanks for the clarification.
Hi MAS,
I think you actually understand my position quite well, though it apparently surprises you that I hold it.
I believe there is a “real”, yes. Yet I do not believe that the only way to study it is to make assumptions that are 100% accurate in every single respect. In fact, I have no idea how that would even be possible, but if you know of examples of scholarly inquiry that are free of any simplification or distortion of any kind, I’d love to hear about them.
It is NOT my position, as I suspect Colin believes, that all assumptions are equally valid. I already discussed this in response to another comment, but I’ll elaborate. My position is that it is absurd to argue that a theoretical model that contains a single assumption which is not 100% true cannot be useful, which is essentially Brian’s argument.
If I assume that increases in x increase y, and only increases in x increase y, despite knowing that in reality y depends on many things, none of which confound the relationship between x and y, and my goal is to understand the total impact of x on some problem (which is larger than y, but influenced by y), then the fact that I have ignored other things that influence y does nothing whatsoever to detract from my goal of gaining a better insight into the impact of x.
Assumptions which are known to be false, yet which only allow us to prove the same result more cleanly, are not problematic. Sometimes, game-theorists assume things to be true that we know are false because we see little sense in writing 40 page mathematical appendices when 25 pages of math will establish the same exact conclusion with 15 fewer pages of math.
I’m often (though not always) interested in whether the observable implications of my theoretical models are consistent with reality. If I discover something about the world that I never would have discovered before as a result of analyzing a model that rests on premises that assume away inessential and irrelevant, albeit true, details, why should it bother me that there are truths about the world that weren’t built into the model that helped me see the world more clearly?
Phil,
First, sorry for the double post (though I can’t find both posts in this thread. Ugh.
Second, I am with you on the assumptions part. I wonder if part of the ‘problem’ that you are having here is that you are both a dualist AND an instrumentalist, a position that can be hard to defend philosophically because I am not sure of where it comes from in this regard. As a monist, I am not as troubled by your stance on assumptions, I just wonder what you mean when you ALSO talk about it matching some reality, since there is no fixed reality.
BTW, this isn’t a criticism so much as me pointing out what might be your problem with both those who think like Colin/Brian and the more analyticist/reflexivist camp at the same time.
That’s helpful, MAS. I’ll think about that some more. In the past, I’ve found that the models as maps metaphor does a pretty good job of explaining how one can think that it’s possible to better understand reality even while adopting assumptions that simplify and even distort reality, but apparently it’s not as powerful as I thought it was.
Also, though this surprises many people for reasons I don’t quite understand, I am not aware of many (any?) game-theorists who would say that they are doing anything other than “modeling complex systems.” Computational modelers have attempted to define complexity in a way that necessarily means that game-theoretic models are not “complex”, but the definition of “complexity” they provide is one that matches the properties of just about every non-trivial game-theoretic model I have ever seen. So I guess here too I must qualify my words by saying that I’m not sure what you mean by “complex systems”, but I strongly suspect that you are arguing against a view I do not hold. I don’t mean that as an attack. It is entirely likely that if this is the case, it is due to poor word choice on my part. I’m just throwing that out there.
Ok, well, here we have to be really careful. Complex systems aren’t just complicated, they have certain properties, most people buy the complexity argument, but I’m not sure they mean it in the technical sense I do. I’m not sure I’m attacking anything other than instrumentalism. Incidentally, you may not know what the views you hold are. That seems curious to say, but when I talk to many rationalists, and reflectivists (these terms are really clumsy) they often say, ‘but I don’t believe that’. All well and good, but beliefs and theories (and rationalism (sic) is after all just a theory about how inquiry should proceed), hang together as complexes, so once you buy one part of the argument you are often unknowingly committed to other aspects of it. Hence if you say you don’t want to argue that prediction and explanation are symmetrical, then it really needs a fundamental rethinking on your behalf about a lot of the other assumptions you may hold (explicitly and implicitly).
I’m aware that complex systems aren’t just complicated, thanks.
I’m also quite familiar with the idea that people might make assumptions without realizing it, and that theories hang together as complexes. I’m honestly not sure what you are arguing against. I thought we might be getting somewhere, but I’m starting to doubt that.
Simples, instrumentalism…
Perhaps I’m just not expressing myself well. That’s entirely possible. But wherever the fault lies, we are not having a conversation with one another. Not a productive one anyway.
I’ll think about the panel idea, though I’m not sure it would be a good use of either your time or mine.
“Even some economists agree that…” is not very different from “even some women agree that God’s plan is for a wife to submit dutifully to her husband.” That some members of a group might accept the views outsiders have of the group hardly validates those views. Consider that those economists who’ve embraced the criticism of economics have seen their popularity with non-economists skyrocket and your left with pretty weak sauce.
I’m also still wondering what “And they aren’t useful because the things they are attempting to represent, aren’t represented in the models,” means…but I’m happy to let things go at this point if you prefer. I think you are right that we are unlikely to agree.
Let me just clarify this point. The London Tube map is useful because the things it attempts to represent do stand in the relationships suggested by the model/map. I don’t find most rationalist models useful (and I’d suggest policy makers don’t either) because the things they attempt to represent in don’t possess the properties the model says they do. I.e they get what they attempt represent wrong, whereas the tube map gets it right. Might be interesting to make this concrete and come up with an example of a model that you think is useful.
How do you know that? What is the basis for your claim that things rationalist models attempt to represent don’t possess the properties the models say they do? This comes as a great surprise to me, since I am familiar with quite a bit of research that directly contradicts this claim.
I don’t expect non-specialists to be intimately familiar with this literature. But I do think that anyone who asserts that an entire approach to research fails by its own standards ought to be prepared to back that up. I never have, and never will, make such claims about research approaches with which I am not familiar. I’m not sure I will ever understand why some people are so comfortable doing so with respect to “rationalism.”
I’m not sure i like using the term specialist to myself, but I suppose that in terms of the issue we are discussing, realism vs instrumentalism that I know the literature as well as anyone. Incidentally if you personally aren’t committed to the idea that prediction and explanation are symmetrical you will need a different model of explanation than rationalism allows (I hate term as well). But as I say these are not issues that can be unpacked here but more than happy to have fun packed public shoot out.
I do not question your expertise in the literature on realism and instrumentalism. I question your expertise in applied “rationalism”. I question whether you have any intimate familiarity with the work you say is not useful. If you do, I apologize. And if you don’t, that’s perfectly understandable. If you have a strong ex ante expectation that you wouldn’t care for any of it, it makes sense not to read it. Your time is valuable, and I’m sure there’s lots of stuff you’d like to read that you don’t have time for as it is. I’d just ask you to be a little more modest in your criticisms if you’re not particularly familiar with that which you are criticizing.
How about their failure to be of any use? Apart from keeping people in jobs. Look, on their own terms, usefulness they don’t seem to be doing too well. If you don’t want to ask why, that’s a problem for me. Alternatively, you could argue that they are useful. I’d be keen to see that because I’m pretty confident that useful ones will be useful because they are realistic. Incidentally I should have said many economists.
Perhaps we need to clarify something — do you think that a theoretical model that explains patterns that were poorly understood previously, or leads us to discover patterns we had not previously been aware of, is “useful” in some sense? Or is the only sense in which any research can be “useful” practical?
I mean, do you honestly not see how it looks when you say, “Hi, I don’t really know your area of the field that well, but I think it’s all garbage. Can you convince this hostile audience that they’re wrong? Preferable in 250 words or less. And…go.” I mean, come on Colin. I would never say the same thing to you.
Sorry, where did I say I don’t know your area of the field that well, or that it’s all garbage? I’m happy to have a debate with you Phil, but not if you just want to make things up maybe because they are useful. Btw if you are now conceding that you are aware of some models that are realistic, then you already conceded the point. What you need to do (I think) is come up with some models that are useful, which you know are unrealistic but say you are happy with that from a scientific perspective. As I said people are touchy about this aren’t they?
You didn’t say that you don’t my area of the field that well, but the claims you have made about what “rationalism” assumes indicate as much. I see no evidence to indicate that you know much about what I do, or what people like me do. That’s fine. I won’t claim I’ve read much of your work. Of course, I’m also not criticizing it in a public forum, but whatever. If you have an intimate familiarity with “rationalism” that isn’t apparent from your previous posts, I do sincerely apologize.
I thought it was clear that was I speaking figuratively when I said that you said it’s all garbage, but if you think this is a gross mischaracterization of your position I must confess that I’m very confused about everything you’ve said up until now.
You are making very provocative claims about an entire approach to research. Claims that necessarily imply that my work, and the work of many others, is devoid of value. I’m trying to understand where you are coming from, but please try to see where I am coming from as well. Try to imagine how you might react if I were to suggest that all of the research you are doing is devoid of value.
I have come up with models that I think are useful despite resting upon some assumptions I would readily acknowledge are not realistic. I provided examples in my post. If you choose not to engage with what I’ve already said, that’s fine, but it’s not really fair to say that its incumbent upon me to provide examples when I have done so just because you’ve ignored them.
I’ve made clear that I extend my critique not just to rationalism, but to most of the social sciences. Sure I won’t make many friends, although I’m not alone in thinking this. Besides I see two things going on in your argument now. One, that some of the models you are aware of are realistic, which problematises your initial claim that the only thing that matters is that they are useful. Two that they can be useful, but not realistic. I’m not sure which examples you are referring to but point me in the right direction and I’ll check. But, I’m not denying that models can be unrealistic yet useful, there are loads of historical example, but the reason we have these historical examples, is because science has provided a ‘more’ realistic account and we improve the models. Anyway, as I say, not the best forum, but more than happy to do some panels and really go through the arguments. Btw, I will say, and this will sound harsher than it’s meant, but because of the very poor training in the philosophy of science that most pol sci grads get many people (of all persuasions) don’t actually have a firm grasp on what the assumptions are that underpins their approach to research. Which is why, although PTJ, Fred Chernoff, and I all disagree about major things, we agree that the issues are important.
I understand that your critique applies broadly. I apologize if my comments indicated that I thought otherwise.
I think we may be speaking past each other. My contention is that there are models that are useful in the same sense that subway maps are useful — that some of the assumptions they make are distorting, but the relationships they identify are observed in reality, and as such they are useful in one particular sense of the word. You may or may not be persuaded by this, but I have not contradicted my claim that assumptions do not need to be true in order for the theoretical models upon which they are built to be useful. Of course, if you define “useful” as “resting upon assumptions that are realistic”, then my contention is trivially false and we’re not going to get anywhere. Similarly, if you define “useful” as “has greatly impacted the practice of policy-making”, then I will concede that I know of very few “useful” models, though I would also wish to go on the record as saying that this is a very limiting view of what constitutes “useful”.
I confess that I’m still having trouble figuring out exactly what that term means to you. Please know, however, that I am not *trying* to misrepresent your views. I am sincerely trying to see where you are coming from.
An example of a theoretical model that rests upon a number of strong assumptions yet which makes implies the existence of a pattern no one had previously considered, a pattern which subsequent empirical work has provided evidence of, can be found here:
https://slantchev.ucsd.edu/courses/pdf/powell-wp1996.pdf
The relevant empirical work here (gated):
https://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayFulltext?type=1&fid=2465384&jid=JOP&volumeId=70&issueId=04&aid=2465376
and ungated:
https://sitemason.vanderbilt.edu/files/cfyf2E/War%20Power%20and%20Bargaining%20CLARK.pdf
Perhaps you will find this example trivial or uninteresting. Perhaps you are not persuaded by the empirical work. Perhaps if I took you through several dozen other examples, you’d yawn. That’s fine. But I hope this at least clarifies for you what I’m arguing.
Damn, I did a lengthy post about this then followed one of your links and puff, my response is gone. Lifes too short. So short version:
1. The London tube make is realistic not just useful, it maps what it’s aiming to map in a very accurate way. it doesn’t try and tell you that the London tube system is thousands of miles long but can be fitted on a small page. It’s a representation of the stations, the connections and the relationship, and it’s useful precisly because of that. So it tells you that you can’t get from Edgware Rd to Euston without changing, and lo and behold you can’t; it’s right.
2. Always shocked that most rationalists don’t know that the D-N model of explanation that they work with (even if they don’t know they work with it) does imply the symmetry; it’s well accepted in the philosophy of science. It shocks me but doesn’t surprise me and they are trained only in the assumptions of rationalism (sic) not how the assumptions work or why 9but then why would they, they aren’t bothered about how realistic the assumptions are).
3. happy with the link to biologists, as I’ve interviewed many of them. key difference; they are realists, not instrumentalists hence have no need to apologise for the lack of prediction, they don’t aim to predict (yet).
4. In the email there’s a sentence or two that’s missing here, maybe you deleted it but it’s important: ‘But I cannot think of any reasonable way to interpret the statement “the things they attempt to represent don’t possess the properties the model says they do” that would allow you to say that the distortions found in maps of London’s subway system are “useful” while this theoretical model is not’. Because the tube map is useful because it is realistic, whereas most rationalist (sic) models of ‘man’ (sic) aren’t very realistic.
5. You are right, I don’t find any of those examples either interesting or useful. Mere symmetries (or not) of power don’t tell me much about why states go to war, without a context. We could bat this back ad forward with examples vs examples. But I’ll give you a theoretical argument. Mono-causal accounts can never be right, or useful, in open systems. I can say that without looking at multiple articles on this subject due to the properties open systems possess. I din’t follow the other link because I didn;t want to lose what I’d written again. However, one could say, from your perspective, that I didn’t find the first one useful, so why bother with the second. From my perspective (realism), I could be an absolute idiot, but then if you say that welcome to realism.
6. It’s not me that needs to articulate a defence of useful; I know what most instrumentalists mean by it. what do you mean by it?
7. Still not sure how can you can claim that some models are realistic (why would you care?).
8. Really, these issues go way beyond what can be unpacked here. But again, I’m more than happy to publicly debate them with proper (real ;)) papers.
Having spent a bit of time researching and reading about cartographic history, I’m a little puzzled by the “models as maps” metaphor. If it is meant as a defense of formal modeling (and the necessity of operating with assumptions here, as per Brian and Phil’s discussion), then I think it fails – at least partially.
If there is anything that the history of cartography has taught us, it is that maps are inherently political objects (in the broadest sense), malleable to the extreme and often more useful at projecting a desired reality than an actual one. Almost all maps are representations of territories, making them laced with all sorts of often-contradicting interests and power relationships. I would argue that the map of the London subway system is more of an info-graphic than an actual map, and it works so well at conveying useful information exactly because it is so stylized as to be non-representational of reality. The majority of “regular” maps purport to have a more direct relationship to (geographic) reality, often without openly acknowledging their inherent distortions of it or, more problematically, the claims to territory, proportionality, categorizing, etc that they make.
There are several objections here and I’m not sure I understand them fully. In part, I could have been more clear; in part, I think that readers can be more charitable.
To Jeppe: That is interesting but ultimately I think that if we are redefining “maps” as not including “the London subway map” then we are beyond splitting hairs. This is not meant as a defense of rationalism but of some sort of reductionism–basically exactly the point Borges makes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Exactitude_in_Science).
To Colin: You’ve made my point exactly: the Tube map is not realistic but that doesn’t make it “wrong” (not the quotes in both this comment and the post) but it is also not “true”. (It is also not always “useful”; there are at least a couple of intra-Tube journeys that take you across several transfers to make a journey that is “big” on the map but a physical distance of a couple of blocks.)
As Magritte might point out, all maps should come with a legend reading “This is not the London Underground” (or “the world” or “Topeka, Kansas”). It is exactly the power of simplification and reductionism to highlight things that are relevant that I find interesting. The standard model of a perfectly competitive market is not “wrong” or “true” but it is useful–even if you disagree with it! (There is, I think, nothing that “is” a perfectly competitive market although there are some markets that begin to approach that, but that doesn’t mean that insights drawn from that model are useless.) Now, if you find that rationalist (NOT FORMALIZED) assumptions are useless, that is a separate proposition but it is not the same as the claim that “my work doesn’t make assumptions.” All representations of reality require assumptions.
I didn’t mean to be hair-splitting or nit-picky, but I can see my first post as coming off as such. My point is that the metaphor of models-as-maps mostly seems to work with schematic network maps, since any map more directly representing geographic territory is by default much more muddied by political relations and concerns (whether these are over the boundaries of states, the neighborhoods of New York City, or the relative size of continents). The metaphor might still work, but then it becomes about more than just simplifying in order to make analysis or data “useful.”
I completely agree with you on the general usefulness (and even necessity) of simplification or reductionism, by the way. Almost all of my theorizing has been on the basis of ideal typification, so I’m not trying to be snarky or argumentative on that account.
Hi Jeppe,
Okay. That makes a lot more sense to me. Is there work on this to read?
The best work on this that I can think of off the top of my head is Martin Lewis and Kären Wigen’s “The Myth of Continents: A Critique of Metageography.” Definitely recommended for anyone interested in spatiality and political geography.
PM, the London tube map isn’t trying to tell you anything about physical distance (there’s not even a scale indicator), so to say it’s not useful in that respect misses the point (imo – do we need to keep saying that). It is realistic in terms of what it’s mapping. I’m interested now, what do people mean when they say it’s not ‘true’ or ‘realistic’; what would make it ‘realistic’? As for whether the assumption of perfectly competitive is useful, tell me how please.? and by that an example of our erstwhile tube rider getting from point A to point B with it, rather than other academics building more outputs on the basis of it. Anyway, look, I wouldn’t even equate social theories to maps and I didn’t introduce it.
I always though that the London tube map existed to help us play Mornington Crescent.
Jokes aside, wouldn’t it be fair to say that there are aspects of the map which are unrealistic, and that those assumptions are in place to help us pay closer attention to where we are trying to ‘map reality’? I remember a chapter by Gunnell on Weber that I read after seeing PTJ cite it in everything ever, and the term he used (if I recall) was that models are ‘caricatures’ of reality. We probably want to say that a caricature is less ‘realistic’ than a photo, but part of what makes them so compelling is that by exaggerating or twisting some facets of reality away from how we normally experience them, we see other facets with greater clarity.
One way this might apply to formal modeling is that, since theories emerge or develop as the result of a whole community of scholars working in conversation, it pays to draw caricatures which are more broadly adaptable or which link up to other problems and other caricatures. Testing the implications of, say, bargaining theories both deductively and empirically is one way to do this.
So THAT’s what Mornington Crescent means! Another Belle and Sebastian lyric decoded.
They were almost certainly playing when they wrote that song. I’m not sure, but I think Belle and Sebastian were actually channeling one of the great Old Masters of the game, Rob ‘the Fish’ Lox, whose lyrical ‘Gamble Gold’ manoeuvre (a clever pun on the similarities between his name and the myth of Robin Hood, of course) involves playing according to a cadence that grants an advantage in time. It’s a variant of the Marlow Gambit. Truly their skill is beyond my ken, though!
Sorry to leave such a trite response to one of the smartest comments on this thread.
While I’ve enjoyed reading this exchange, I was surprised to note that no one had mentioned the great Borges’ short story, “On Exactitude in Science.” As it is only a paragraph long, I leave it below:
…In that Empire, the Art of Cartography attained such Perfection that the map of a single Province occupied the entirety of a City, and the map of the Empire, the entirety of a Province. In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers Guilds struck a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, and which coincided point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the Study of Cartography as their Forebears had been, saw that that vast Map was Useless, and not without some Pitilessness was it, that they delivered it up to the Inclemencies of Sun and Winters. In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of that Map, inhabited by Animals and Beggars; in all the Land there is no other Relic of the Disciplines of Geography.
—Suarez Miranda,Viajes devarones prudentes, Libro IV,Cap. XLV, Lerida, 1658
I cite it in my response to Jeppe :)
Arggh!
With 40+ comments it’s no surprise there’s some duplication :)
This comment is rather off the main topic of the post and thread; however, since maps are being discussed, I figured I’d note that loose statements about the history of territorial boundaries — and occasionally about the relation of that history to cartography — continue to be made in the IR literature (and just to be clear, there is also some pretty good recent work being done on this). But I’m thinking specifically of a recent article I skimmed through the other day — I’m hesitant to give the cite because I’m not judging the article as a whole — which contains a passage about the importance of maps and mapping (and advances in cartographic technique) to the development of well-defined territorial boundaries. Which would be o.k., except that some of the language is much too broad, e.g. this sentence: “In fact, borders did not really exist prior to maps.” Wrong. Before there were (minimally) accurate maps or even any maps, there were borders – in both the medieval and the ‘classical’ or ancient world (Hadrian’s Wall, anyone?). Now if the author had written: “In fact, continuous, well-defined, and mutually recognized boundaries did not exist prior to reasonably accurate maps,” that would have been a *somewhat* more defensible statement.
A fair number of IR people seem to think there were no linear boundaries of any kind in medieval Europe, which is far from true. Yes, there is a difference betw. medieval and modern territoriality, but these are, to at least some degree, ideal types, and the situation on the ground (during the long [so-called] medieval-to-modern transition) was often somewhat fuzzy. And to the extent that ‘medieval territoriality’ and ‘modern territoriality’ do correspond to real, distinct, identifiable phenomena (which, to some extent, they do), the two forms co-existed, albeit sometimes rather uneasily, for a long period. It seems this point has yet to fully sink in, partly because many IR scholars, as Dan has noted, continue to think of early-modern Europe as “little more than a way-station” on the road to the modern state system.
with regards to the issue of firstly, science and secondly, being-realistic.
I think science still has the onus to be-realistic.
While yes, science uses simplifying maps (and even metaphors like the “solar system model of the atom”), that’s because they have, (in another filing cabinet), a model of the world that tries to be as realistic as possible.
The London tube map is a useful, simplifying map which is pragmatically useful, but it’s based on an atlas somewhere with the realistic distances and stuff.
which, if my above view of science has warrant,…
rationalists (with their useful assumptions/tube map) are indeed drunks leaning on lamp-posts cos’ we in social science don’t have a realistic theory/accurate atlas.