For me, this was also the most interesting course. But I don't think you can still access it (I tried a couple of months ago to revisit it).
But Scott Page also has a book out on the topic "The Model Thinker", which covers most of the course.
Models are tools to help us reason clearly about the world. They help us deal with complexity in manageable chunks by focusing on salient parts of a problem, rather than the whole.
From my course notes, a nearly comprehensive summary of how the social sciences use models was presented:
16 uses of modeling outside prediction include from Epstein, Joshua M. (2008). Why Model?. Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation:
1. Explain (very distinct from predict)
2. Guide data collection
3. Illuminate core dynamics
4. Suggest dynamical analogies
5. Discover new questions
6. Promote a scientific habit of mind
7. Bound (bracket) outcomes to plausible ranges
8. Illuminate core uncertainties
9. Offer crisis options in near-real time
10. Demonstrate tradeoffs / suggest efficiencies
11. Challenge the robustness of prevailing theory through perturbations
12. Expose prevailing wisdom as incompatible with available data
13. Train practitioners
14. Discipline the policy dialogue
15. Educate the general public
16. Reveal the apparently simple (complex) to be complex (simple)
Think scientifically/mathematically. It what most people who hang out HN do intuitively, but most of the general public does not. (Like how Dr Fauci talks about COVID-19 vs how Donald Trump does).
