Representation in Science

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In his recent book, Explaining Science (1988), Professor Giere argued that theories in science are to be understood as families of models, which are abstract, non-linguistic entities. He claimed that the relationship between models and the world is to be understood in terms of similarity. He also suggested that further understanding of what models are, and how they are used, must come not only from logic or mathematics, but also from work in the cognitive sciences (Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Psychology, Linguistics, Philosophy, Neuroscience) which is focused on the general nature of representation. The goal of this project is to explore,in greater detail, recent work on representation to see to what extent this work might indeed provide both an empirical and theoretical basis for the exploration of his own account of representation in science.