Carolina QuotesSince all models are wrong the scientist cannot obtain a "correct" one by excessive elaboration. On the contrary following William of Occam he should seek an economical description of natural phenomena. Just as the ability to devise simple but evocative models is the signature of the great scientist so overelaboration and overparameterization is often the mark of mediocrity.
George E. P. Box Connected to the Carolinas
Source
p. 792
- work
- Science and Statistics (1976)
- year
- 1976
- locator
- p. 792
Cite this record
“Since all models are wrong the scientist cannot obtain a "co…” George E. P. Box. Carolina Quotes, record CQ-DE9A55527F. https://carolinaquotes.com/quote/de9a55527f
More from George E. P. Box
The penalty for scientific irrelevance is, of course, that the statistician's work is ignored by the scientific community.
A man in daily muddy contact with field experiments could not be expected to have much faith in any direct assumption of independently distributed normal errors.
A mechanistic model has the following advantages: 1. It contributes to our scientific understanding of the phenomenon under study. 2. It usually provides a better basis for extrapolation (at least to conditions worthy of further experimental investigation if not through the entire range of all input variables). 3. It tends to be parsimonious (i.e, frugal) in the use of parameters and to provide better estimates of the response