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Originally Posted by Len Moran
The use of the term model is an acknowledgment that our knowledge of the actual is not complete and thus must always be representative of something out of reach (temporarily or permanently), so models can never be fully faithful to what they actually model, for then we would know the actual.
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I agree that speaking of scientific theory as a model is a means of acknowledging that science can always improve. I quibble with the notion that way out in the distance there is "the actual" that science falls short of. When your theory fails, there is no "actual" sitting remotely at a distance. Think of any new drug introduced to the market that ends up harming or killing people. We do not live separately from the actual. We either master the world well enough or we don't.
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If we choose not to define our scientific truths as models, then they become states of practical knowledge rather in the manner in which we practice engineering - EM radiation can be though of propagating electric and magnetic waves and we design an antenna as if the electric wave was a real physical entity. It's good engineering, but it is clearly a model representing a much deeper underlying reality.
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But notice that science doesn't work that way at all. Science tests its theories to the utmost degree, but it never once compares some model to some deeper underlying reality. "Model" and "deeper underlying reality" are philosophical notions imposed on science. (I'm not suggesting that is bad.) The scientific method is an instance of a dynamic, closed-loop system where experimentation and peer review serve as correcting feedback for the overall process. The scientist, and his science, is embodied in the environment and does not stand isolated from it.
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As soon as we acknowledge that fact we have created a distinction between what we observe and what that observation actually relates to.
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You have to define what you mean by "what we observe" on one side and "what that observation actually relates to" on the other. Pointing out instances of each would be best. Otherwise, it is not clear what sort of distinction is being drawn.
I observe a woman being sawn in two. In fact, it turns out there are actually two women concealed in the magician's box. There is a distinction here, but not between a model and a deeper underlying reality. I observe "the actual." The women in the box do constitute something "deeper," but perhaps you meant something more out of reach by "deeper underlying reality." It just so happens that some actual things look like other actual things from particular perspectives, that is, there is ambiguity in the light patterns, as the magician Teller says. Most importantly, none of this means I am in some way isolated behind a model. I'm in touch with the actual in all cases. I just come to master it better with experience and exploration.
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At a stroke the "state of practical knowledge" that could be thought of as having no representational value now becomes a model that is a human representation of absolute reality.
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I saw David Copperfield perform the sawing-in-two-trick, except he did it with himself as the subject. True, what was taking place on the stage was fake in one sense, but it was no representation of some other absolute reality. There was only one thing, the performance, not two. That performance was real. He was just taking advantage of the optical ambiguity such that it was visually consistent with being sawn in two.
The point here is that it is still possible to be in contact with actual, yet to be wrong. My examples with the golfer practicing his putts shows that as well. You don't need to introduce the model/absolute-reality dichotomy to explain why we are wrong. We can directly observe the actual and still screw it up!
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The role of science surely is to acknowledge the model as an objective human representation, to acknowledge the limits of science and to pursue the reality as best as we are able to. That pursuit has revealed a notion of unreachable absolute reality, but I don't see this as insulating us from nature, I see it as very much defining our place within nature.
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About all I can recommend at this point is that you spend a day appreciating all the ways science has altered the way we live our lives. Science is not about an unreachable absolute. It's about grasping onto the reachable and exploring for more fertile grounds.