Weingarten, Karla (2026) Productive Idealizations for Scientific Understanding: A Case Study in Effective Theories. [Preprint]

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Abstract

Scientific models often rely on idealizations to obtain insights into target phenomena, which distort and simplify their targets and are therefore commonly regarded as false. This conflicts with the idea that if we take the goal of modeling to be the ability to make inferences about a target, idealized models should, prima facie, be on equal footing with models that maintain a closer correspondence to the target. In this article, I argue that we can best capture the contributions of idealizations by assigning to them, besides an extrinsic content associated with the relation between model and target, also an intrinsic informational content. The latter is generally not dependent on the target but grounded in independent scientific conclusions, and hence true. This way idealizations can actively contribute to understanding and be called productive. I support this claim with a case study of effective field theories (EFTs) in quantum field theory, which are non-fundamental theories with a limited domain of applicability. Their intrinsic cutoff scale, I argue, functions as a productive idealization that carries information contributing crucially to understanding. An EFT can thus be better at providing understanding of the specific phenomenon studied than a UV-complete theory. Understanding is not correlated to the degree of idealization, or in an EFT context, the fundamentality of the theory.

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Item Type:	Preprint
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID Weingarten, Karla karla.weingarten@ru.nl 0009-0004-6200-2287
Keywords:	Idealization, Quantum field theory, Scientific Understanding, Effective Theories, Scientific Models
Subjects:	General Issues > Explanation General Issues > Models and Idealization Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Field Theory
Depositing User:	Karla Weingarten
Date Deposited:	20 Jan 2026 22:24
Last Modified:	20 Jan 2026 22:24
Item ID:	27959
Subjects:	General Issues > Explanation General Issues > Models and Idealization Specific Sciences > Physics > Quantum Field Theory
Date:	2026
URI:	https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/27959

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