Computer Simulation, Experiment, and Novelty

ABSTRACT

It is often said that computer simulations generate new knowledge about the empirical world in the same way experiments do. My aim is to make sense of such a claim. I first show that the similarities between computer simulations and experiments do not allow them to generate new knowledge but invite the simulationist to interact with simulations in an experimental manner. I contend that, nevertheless, computer simulations and experiments yield new knowledge under the same epistemic circumstances, independently of any features they may share.

Acknowledgements

I am very grateful to Anouk Barberousse, Thomas Boyer-Kassem, Paul Humphreys, Cyrille Imbert, Ashley Graham Kennedy, and John Stewart, as well as to the two anonymous referees of this journal for their helpful comments. Any remaining shortcomings are of course mine.

ORCID

Julie Jebeile http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7164-5848