Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-07T08:39:19.221Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Diversity-Ability Trade-Off in Scientific Problem Solving

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Samuli Reijula  and
Jaakko Kuorikoski
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

According to the diversity-beats-ability theorem, groups of diverse problem solvers can outperform groups of high-ability problem solvers. We argue that the model introduced by Lu Hong and Scott Page is inadequate for exploring the trade-off between diversity and ability. This is because the model employs an impoverished implementation of the problem-solving task. We present a new version of the model that captures the role of ‘ability’ in a meaningful way, and we use it to explore the trade-offs between diversity and ability in scientific problem solving.

Type
Social Epistemology and Science Policy
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 88 , Issue 5 , December 2021 , pp. 894 - 905
Copyright
Copyright 2021 by the Philosophy of Science Association. All rights reserved.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

†

We thank Kristina Rolin, Inkeri Koskinen, Renne Pesonen, and the other members of the TINT group (University of Helsinki), as well as the participants of the Diversity in Science workshop (Tampere University, May 5, 2019) and the poster sessions at EPSA 2019 (University of Geneva) for their helpful comments. Thanks to Kate Sotejeff-Wilson for editing the manuscript. This research was carried out as part of the Social and Cognitive Diversity in Science project funded by the Academy of Finland.

References

Aydinonat, N. E., Reijula, S., and Ylikoski, P. K.. 2020. “Argumentative Landscapes: The Function of Models in Social Epistemology.” Synthese, forthcoming.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darden, L. 1997. “Recent Work in Computational Scientific Discovery.” In Proceedings of the Nineteenth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society, 161–66. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Grim, P., Singer, D. J., Bramson, A., Holman, B., McGeehan, S., and Berger, W. J.. 2019. “Diversity, Ability, and Expertise in Epistemic Communities.” Philosophy of Science 86 (1): 98–123.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holman, B., Berger, W. J., Singer, D. J., Grim, P., and Bramson, A.. 2018. “Diversity and Democracy: Agent-Based Modeling in Political Philosophy.” Historical Social Research 43 (1): 259–84.Google Scholar
Hong, L., and Page, S. E.. 2001. “Problem Solving by Heterogeneous Agents.” Journal of Economic Theory 97 (1): 123–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hong, L., and Page, S. E.. 2004. “Groups of Diverse Problem Solvers Can Outperform Groups of High-Ability Problem Solvers.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA 101 (46): 16385–89.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jeppesen, L. B., and Lakhani, K. R.. 2010. “Marginality and Problem-Solving Effectiveness in Broadcast Search.” Organization Science 21 (5): 1016–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kahneman, D., and Klein, G.. 2009. “Conditions for Intuitive Expertise: A Failure to Disagree.” American Psychologist 64 (6): 515–26.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kauffman, S., and Levin, S.. 1987. “Towards a General Theory of Adaptive Walks on Rugged Landscapes.” Journal of Theoretical Biology 128 (1): 11–45.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mannix, E., and Neale, M. A.. 2005. “What Differences Make a Difference? The Promise and Reality of Diverse Teams in Organizations.” Psychological Science in the Public Interest 6 (2): 31–55.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
March, J. G. 1991. “Exploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning.” Organization Science 2 (1): 71–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newell, A., and Simon, H. A.. 1972. Human Problem Solving. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Page, S. E. 1996. “Two Measures of Difficulty.” Economic Theory 8 (2): 321–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, S. E.. 2008. The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reagans, R., and Zuckerman, E. W.. 2001. “Networks, Diversity, and Productivity: The Social Capital of Corporate R&D Teams.” Organization Science 12 (4): 502–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Simon, H. A. 1989. “The Scientist as Problem Solver.” In Complex Information Processing: The Impact of Herbert A. Simon, ed. Klahr, David and Kotovsky, Kenneth, 375–98. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Singer, D. J. 2019. “Diversity, Not Randomness, Trumps Ability.” Philosophy of Science 86 (1): 178–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steel, D., Fazelpour, S., Crewe, B., and Gillette, K.. 2021. “Information Elaboration and Epistemic Effects of Diversity.” Synthese 198:1287–307.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Thompson, A. 2014. “Does Diversity Trump Ability?” Notices of the AMS 61 (9): 1024–30.Google Scholar
Woodward, J. 2003. Making Things Happen: A Theory of Causal Explanation. Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Science. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar