Synthese
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-1820-x
S.I.: ABSTRACTION AND IDEALIZATION IN SCIENTIFIC MODELLING
Using models to correct data: paleodiversity
and the fossil record
Alisa Bokulich
1
Received: 14 August 2017 / Accepted: 17 May 2018
© Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract Despite an enormous philosophical literature on models in science, surpris-
ingly little has been written about data models and how they are constructed. In this
paper, I examine the case of how paleodiversity data models are constructed from the
fossil data. In particular, I show how paleontologists are using various model-based
techniques to correct the data. Drawing on this research, I argue for the following
related theses: first, the ‘purity’ of a data model is not a measure of its epistemic
reliability. Instead it is the fidelity of the data that matters. Second, the fidelity of a
data model in capturing the signal of interest is a matter of degree. Third, the fidelity
of a data model can be improved ‘vicariously’, such as through the use of post hoc
model-based correction techniques. And, fourth, data models, like theoretical models,
should be assessed as adequate (or inadequate) for particular purposes.
Keywords Paleontology · Paleobiology · Evolution · Data · Model · Suppes · Fossil ·
Biodiversity · Representation · Simulations · Climate science · Sepkoski · Data
models
1 Introduction
One of the most influential early papers in thinking about the philosophy of data is
Patrick Suppes’s (1962) paper “Models of Data.” In this paper, Suppes introduces the
seminal notion of a ‘data model’ and the related concept of a hierarchy of data models.
He challenges the simplistic view that there are just two things: ‘theory’ and ‘data’,
which are directly compared with one another, and argues that “one of the besetting
B
Alisa Bokulich
abokulic@bu.edu
1
Department of Philosophy, Boston University, Boston, USA
123
@Phil_Robichaud
@deepthiw
@JoseServera