Cosmology

All models of the atom are lies in the sense that they do not represent the single, unique truth about atoms; but all models are true, and useful, in so far as they give us a handle on some aspect of the atomic world. The point is that not only do we not know what an atom is 'really', we cannot ever know what an atom is 'really'. We can only know what an atom is like. . . . [All models use] images that we carry over from the everyday world to build up a picture of what the atom 'is'. We construct a model, or an image; but then, all too often, we forget what we have done, and we confuse the image with reality.
		p. 186
John Gribbin	Schrodinger's Kittens and the Search for Reality Back Bay Books, 1995