A Muggle Interlude: Models
In ordinary epidemiological parlance, we would call Dumbledore’s scroll the beginnings of a model. A model is not the same thing as reality: rather, it is a simplified version of reality which assigns equations to those processes that you, the researcher, are interested in. A model is usually built to mimic some part of reality, such as the spread of a disease. There can be a lot of give and take between Model and Reality, for example:
- Once you build the model, you can test it against reality, by making predictions (i.e., how many people get sick) and then seeing how closely your model matches reality.
- You can also use the model to discover new hypotheses about reality, as we will discover later. For example, you might use the model to explore how best to control a disease. The model may suggest certain strategies, but these strategies are only hypotheses, and still need to be tested.
- Sometimes your model can be wrong, but it can still give you results that look like reality. This is known as “being right for the wrong reason” and ultimately it’s a Bad Thing.
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