Publication Details

Abstract

The study deals with the role played by mathematical models in the perceptual process, with special reference to physics. As a rational characteristic of the mathematical model, the term „measure of adequacy“ of the mathematical model is introduced here. This measure of adequacy is proportional to the truthfulness of the picture of physical reality in the subject’s consciousness, i e., the more adequate the model, the truer will be the perception of reality mediated by this model. A difference is established between the relative and the absolute adequacy of the mathematical model, the measure of relative adequacy characterizing the efforts at simple perception of partial reality, while that of absolute adequacy denotes efforts at uniform perception of partial realities. The former has a rather practical, the latter a gnoseological significance. It is apparent, nevertheless, that not even the absolutely adequate model of the given complex of phenomena will fully characterize all the quantitative aspects of this complex, and therefore this absolutely adequate model too, is dependent cm subjective factors. Furthermore, the dynamicity of the whole perceptual process, brought about by the developmental progress of mankind^ is underlined, and the impossibility of the existence of a universal mathematical model which would formally describe in a uniform way all the physical phenomena, is pointed out. Formalism in mathematical modelling is dealt with and is illustrated in part by examples from modern physics. Point is also made of a comparison with a similar situation in economics.