I don't think the author is arguing for a banishment of certain authors "to qualitative methods." The problem described in the article is one I frequently see in Silicon Valley - ok, a couple of engineers build a thing. Note how they didn't start from asking "what is a real problem?" No, they built some tool/app. Now they spend several investment cycles trying to find "product market fit" by attempting to find some place in the market where that thing solves a real problem. This very rarely works as a business strategy - you first need to find a real problem and then build a tool that solves that problem.
Problem -> so what? (we build a solution) -> real business.
Now, replace "app" with "mathematical modeling," and you'll start to feel the author's gripe.
I do think the author is right to ask - what is the point? So what? What are you trying to do with those mathematical models? What problem are you solving? For instance, we have the hypothesis that the researchers of the British paper posited:
> the relative likelihood that certain stories are originally based in real-world events
Based on:
>looking at the (very complicated) mathematics of social networks
So, we have a tool - that tool is looking at the mathematics of social networks. Does high fidelity between models of social networks predict "realness?" Does a certain model of a social network described in the relationships of protagonists in a book suggest that book's events are accurate historical ones?
No, right? Then why is that step glossed over when the researchers go ahead and start modeling anyway?
The laser was famously named "a solution looking for a problem", many times in science we build theories/experiments/devices without solving a problem, but instead found many problems in hindsight where the theory could be applied (and many others where it could)
Many tropes in fiction can be boiled down to weird/unnatural social networks. I’m not convinced it’s a bad paper, in fact I’m worried the author of this post is being unfair to what seems like a pretty harmless/fun digital humanities paper.
Problem -> so what? (we build a solution) -> real business.
Now, replace "app" with "mathematical modeling," and you'll start to feel the author's gripe.
I do think the author is right to ask - what is the point? So what? What are you trying to do with those mathematical models? What problem are you solving? For instance, we have the hypothesis that the researchers of the British paper posited:
> the relative likelihood that certain stories are originally based in real-world events
Based on:
>looking at the (very complicated) mathematics of social networks
So, we have a tool - that tool is looking at the mathematics of social networks. Does high fidelity between models of social networks predict "realness?" Does a certain model of a social network described in the relationships of protagonists in a book suggest that book's events are accurate historical ones?
No, right? Then why is that step glossed over when the researchers go ahead and start modeling anyway?