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Descriptive understanding and prediction in COVID-19 modelling.

Johannes Findl1, Javier Suárez2

  • 1LOGOS/BIAP, Department of Philosophy, Facultat de Filosofia, Univerity of Barcelona, C/ Montalegre 6-8, Room 4049, 08001, Barcelona, Spain.

History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences
|September 21, 2021
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Early COVID-19 epidemiological models provided descriptive understanding, not explanatory. These statistical models, despite lacking causal knowledge, aided political decisions through accurate predictions and insights into pandemic dynamics.

Keywords:
DescriptionEpidemiological modellingSARS-CoV-2Scientific explanationStatistical modelling

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Area of Science:

  • Epidemiology
  • Philosophy of Science

Background:

  • COVID-19 pandemic spurred development of epidemiological models.
  • Early models relied on statistical curve-fitting, lacking causal disease knowledge.
  • These models informed significant political decisions due to their predictive power.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To explore how purely statistical models can generate understanding.
  • To investigate the relationship between prediction and understanding in epidemiological models.
  • To introduce and define 'descriptive understanding' as a modality of scientific understanding.

Main Methods:

  • Analysis of early COVID-19 epidemiological models, specifically the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) model.
  • Philosophical inquiry into the nature of understanding derived from statistical modeling.
  • Distinguishing descriptive understanding from explanatory understanding.

Main Results:

  • Purely statistical models can yield a form of understanding termed 'descriptive understanding'.
  • Descriptive understanding, while not explanatory, effectively provides insights into phenomena.
  • The IHME model exemplifies how statistical approaches can offer valuable understanding.

Conclusions:

  • Scientific understanding encompasses modalities beyond traditional explanatory understanding.
  • Descriptive understanding is a valid and useful form of knowledge derived from predictive models.
  • Further research into diverse modalities of scientific understanding is necessary.