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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ourph" data-source="post: 5134986" data-attributes="member: 20239">Perhaps there's a difference in nomenclature between different fields, but in the fields I'm familiar with (Psychology, Biology, Neuroscience) there is a clear distinction made between a model and a hypothesis/theory. Models are purely descriptive. Models describe the known interactions of their components, they do not predict future interactions. Future interactions based on the current model are the realm of hypotheses. If you submit a research manuscript to a neuroscience journal that claims your model "predicts" an outcome to a certain experiment, the action editor will write back to you and tell you to resubmit once you graduate from basic vocabulary school. (And, no, that's never happened to me before.... <img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/blush.png"  class="smilie" loading="lazy" alt=":blush:" title="Blush    :blush:" data-shortname=":blush:" /> )Ron Edward's personal opinions on gaming don't necessarily equate to predictions made by the Big Model. In addition, there is a distinction to be made between using a model as a basis for making predictions and the model itself being predictive. There is also a distinction between a model being diagnostic (diagnosis is just another name for description) and a model being predictive. Ron does claim that the Big Model is diagnostic.</blockquote>