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Taming the Dimensions-Visualizations in Science

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 January 2023

William C. Wimsatt
William C. Wimsatt*
Affiliation:
The University of Chicago
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Extract

The role of pictures and visual modes of presentation of data in science is a topic of increasing interest to workers in artificial intelligence, the psychology of problem solving, and increasing numbers of scientists in all fields who must deal with problems of how to represent large quantities of complex multidimensional data in an intelligible fashion. The use of pictures is marvelously illustrated by but not limited to the biological sciences, so I will use examples from elsewhere as appropriate. With the development of our visual technology—television, videotape, and the computer, the uses (and misuses) of visualization has properly become a matter not only of theoretical but also of practical concern. I will start with a practical story because it has multiple morals, both practical and theoretical—most of which lead elsewhere than I wish to go here.

Type
Part III. Biology: The Non-Propositional Side
Information
PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association , Volume 1990 , Issue 2: Volume Two: Symposia and Invited Papers 1990 , 1990 , pp. 111 - 135
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1991

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Footnotes

1

I would like to thank Jim Griesemer, Ron McClamrock, Mike Ruse, Jeff Schank, Edward Tufte, and Hugh Wilson for thought provoking conversations, Tufte, Wilson, and Dan Margoliash for bibliography, and for Marey’s photographs and knowledge of his work, I owe major debts to Joel Snyder, and to Marta Braun, respectively. From each of them I have gotten more than I gave. I hope that I can repay the favor some time. Much of this work would have been impossible without support through National Science Foundation Grant, SES-8807869 from the History and Philo-sophy of Science Panel.

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