This commentary discusses Nurmi's account of the relation of “theories” and “models,” and compares it to methodological discussions in economics. I differentiate between two styles of modeling, “theory first” v. “data first,” and argue that Nurmi's recent work falls in the “theory first” category. This implies that models at any level can function as agents of change that may unidirectionally affect models at other levels.

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© 2013 by The Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2013
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