Papers by Nancy Nersessian
Systems Biology Modeling Practices: Reflections of a Philosopher-Ethnographer
“The nature of the problems being formulated and addressed by systems biology creates interdepend... more “The nature of the problems being formulated and addressed by systems biology creates interdependence among researchers in engineering, applied mathematics, computing, and biosciences. In this context, the prefix “trans” signifies that this enterprise seeps into, penetrates, specific prior practices of the mother fields and opens an emergent problem space with multiple possibilities for interaction and integration. I have characterized the problem space of systems biology as an adaptive problem space in that, as with the systems it investigates, adaptation of the researchers is a process of continually revising and reconfiguring knowledge, methods, and so forth as they learn and gain experience. Research in adaptive problem spaces is driven by complex interdisciplinary problems, and these require that the individuals themselves achieve a measure of hybridization in methods, concepts, models, materials – in how they think and how they act.”
Conference Cognitive Science, 2011
The Embodied Conceptual Combination (ECCo) theory differs from previous theories of conceptual co... more The Embodied Conceptual Combination (ECCo) theory differs from previous theories of conceptual combination in two key respects. First, ECCo proposes two basic interpretation types: destructive and nondestructive. Second, ECCo assumes complementary roles for linguistic distributional information and perceptual simulation information. Here, we empirically test these assumptions using a noun-noun compound interpretation task. We show that ECCo's destructive/nondestructive interpretation distinction is a significant predictor of people's successful interpretation times, while the traditional property/relationbased distinction is not. We also demonstrate that both linguistic and simulation systems make complementary contributions to the timecourse of successful and unsuccessful interpretation. Results support the ECCo theory's account of conceptual combination.
The Learning Person
Science as Psychology
Hybrid Devices
Duke University Press eBooks, Mar 23, 2017
The Problem-Solving Person
Cambridge University Press eBooks, Nov 22, 2010
Bounded rationality, distributed cognition, and the computational modeling of complex systems
Routledge eBooks, Dec 2, 2020
Beyond the Meme
Minnesota studies in the philosophy of science, Sep 1, 2019
Design Journal, Jul 28, 2017
By focusing on episodes from a case study of healthcare design practice investigated in situ, the... more By focusing on episodes from a case study of healthcare design practice investigated in situ, the aim of this paper is to provide a better understanding of the nature and use of evidence in design. Our account portrays a practice where sources other than scientific research findings were also considered. Based on observations and interviews from the field, the paper first provides a brief account of sources and representations of evidence. The varieties of evidence within the observed practice fall into four major groups: precedents, scientific research, embodied knowledge, and anecdotes. We observed how the participants in the design process used each of these forms of evidence to formulate and explain their design ideas in terms of mechanistic models to form causal links. These mechanistic arguments, which follow a model of scientific thinking, were repositories of transdisciplinary knowledge involving design and other disciplines.
European journal for philosophy of science, Jul 20, 2016
Integrative systems biology is an emerging field that attempts to integrate computation, applied ... more Integrative systems biology is an emerging field that attempts to integrate computation, applied mathematics, engineering concepts and methods, and biological experimentation in order to model large-scale complex biochemical networks. The field is thus an important contemporary instance of an interdisciplinary approach to solving complex problems. Interdisciplinary science is a recent topic in the philosophy of science. Determining what is philosophically important and distinct about interdisciplinary practices requires detailed accounts of problem-solving practices that attempt to understand how specific practices address the challenges and constraints of interdisciplinary research in different contexts. In this paper we draw from our 5-year empirical ethnographic study of two systems biology labs and their collaborations with experimental biologists to analyze a significant problem-solving approach in ISB, which we call adaptive problem solving. ISB lacks much of the methodological and theoretical resources usually found in disciplines in the natural sciences, such as methodological frameworks that prescribe reliable model-building processes. Researchers in our labs compensate for the lack of these and for the complexity of their problems by using a range of heuristics and experimenting with multiple methods and concepts from the background fields available to them to search out good techniques and practices for transforming intractable problems into potentially solvable ones. The relative freedom lab directors grant their researchers to explore methodological options and find good practices that suit their problems is not only a response to the complex interdisciplinary nature of the specific problem, but also provides the field itself with an
IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics, Nov 1, 2008
Even though information visualization (InfoVis) research has matured in recent years, it is gener... more Even though information visualization (InfoVis) research has matured in recent years, it is generally acknowledged that the field still lacks supporting, encompassing theories. In this paper, we argue that the distributed cognition framework can be used to substantiate the theoretical foundation of InfoVis. We highlight fundamental assumptions and theoretical constructs of the distributed cognition approach, based on the cognitive science literature and a real life scenario. We then discuss how the distributed cognition framework can have an impact on the research directions and methodologies we take as InfoVis researchers. Our contributions are as follows. First, we highlight the view that cognition is more an emergent property of interaction than a property of the human mind. Second, we argue that a reductionist approach to study the abstract properties of isolated human minds may not be useful in informing InfoVis design. Finally we propose to make cognition an explicit research agenda, and discuss the implications on how we perform evaluation and theory building.
Intellectual Mastery of Nature: Theoretical Physics from Ohm to Einstein
Physics Today, Nov 1, 1988
From Maxwell to Microphysics: Aspects of Electromagnetic Theory in the Last Quarter of the Nineteenth Century. Jed Z. Buchwald
Philosophy of Science, Sep 1, 1987
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Dec 1, 2019
In this paper we aim to give an analysis and cognitive rationalization of a common practice or st... more In this paper we aim to give an analysis and cognitive rationalization of a common practice or strategy of modeling in systems biology known as a middle-out modeling strategy. The strategy in the cases we look at is facilitated through the construction of what can be called mesoscopic models. Many models built in computational systems biology are mesoscopic (midsize) in scale. Such models lack the sufficient fidelity to serve as robust predictors of the behaviors of complex biological systems, one of the signature goals of the field. This puts some pressure on the field to provide reasons for why and how these practices are warranted despite not meeting the stated goals of the field. Using the results of ethnographic study of problem-solving practices in systems biology, we aim to examine the middle-out strategy and mesoscopic modeling in detail and to show that these practices are rational responses to complex problem solving tasks on cognitive grounds in particular. However making this claim requires us to update the standard notion of bounded rationality to take account of how human cognition is coupled to computation in these contexts. Our account fleshes out the idea that has been raised by some philosophers on the "hybrid" nature of computational modeling and simulation. What we call "coupling" both extends modelers' capacities to handle complex systems, but also produces various cognitive and computational constraints which need to be taken into account in any computational problem solving strategy seeking to maintain insight and control over the models produced.
Abstraction via Generic Modeling in Concept Formation in Science
BRILL eBooks, 2005
ABSTRACT
Guest Editors' Introduction
The Journal of the Learning Sciences, 1997
Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 2000
This paper presents a pattern of reasoning called "functionfollows-form" (FFF) uncovered through ... more This paper presents a pattern of reasoning called "functionfollows-form" (FFF) uncovered through a study of scientific problem solving. In the study we modeled eleven "think-out-loud" problem-solving protocols taken by John Clement (1989). Our work involved computationally modeling the reasoning processes of eleven scientists each attempting to solve the same problem about springs. We describe experiments with two computational systems, ToRQUE and ToRQUE2, which were used to model salient reasoning found in the protocols, and we show how the use of function-follows-form reasoning patterns enables exploration and conceptual change.
Perspectives on Science, Aug 1, 2019
The paper frames interdisciplinary research as creating complex, distributed cognitive-cultural s... more The paper frames interdisciplinary research as creating complex, distributed cognitive-cultural systems. It introduces and elaborates on the method of cognitive ethnography as a primary means for investigating interdisciplinary cognitive and learning practices in situ. The analysis draws from findings of nearly 20 years of investigating such practices in research laboratories in pioneering bioengineering sciences. It examines goals and challenges of two quite different kinds of integrative problem-solving practices: biomedical engineering (hybridization) and integrative systems biology (collaborative interdependence). Practical lessons for facilitating research and learning in these specific fields are discussed and a preliminary set of interdisciplinary epistemic virtues are proposed as candidates for cultivation in interdisciplinary practices of these kinds more widely.
Revista Eureka sobre Enseñanza y Divulgación de las Ciencias, 2007
En esta amplia reseña, se recogen las líneas principales del trabajo desarrollado por Nancy Nerse... more En esta amplia reseña, se recogen las líneas principales del trabajo desarrollado por Nancy Nersessian al analizar los mecanismos que permiten al científico modificar sus teorías en los momentos creativos de "descubrimiento científico". Nos referiremos concretamente a tres trabajos publicados por dicha autora (Mersessian, 1992, 1999, 2002), que recopilan una parte importante de su producción en relación al cambio conceptual en ciencias[1],
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Papers by Nancy Nersessian