A Skeptic Embrace of Simulation

Skeptics tend not to be the first to jump on the next band- wagon. In quite a few areas of science, simulations and Com- plex Adaptive Systems (CAS) has been the bandwagon in question. This paper intends to reach out to the skeptics and convince them to hop-on; take over the controls and make the wagon do a U-turn and aim for the established scientific theories. The argument is that simulation techniques, such as Agent- Based Modelling (ABM), may possibly be epistemically problematic as one sets out to strongly corroborate theories concerned with our overly complex real world. However, us- ing the same techniques to explore the robustness of (or to falsify) existing abstract and idealised mathematical models will be to be epistemically uncomplicated. This allows us to study the effects of reintroduction of real-world traits, such as autonomy and heterogeneity that was previously sacrificed for mathematical tractability.