I think there’s a distinction that should be made explicit between “a theory” and “our human mental model of a theory.” The theory is the same, but we rightfully try to interpret it in the simplest possible way, to make it clearer to think about.
Usually, two different mental models necessarily imply two different theories, so it’s easy to conflate the two, but sometimes (in mathematics especially) that’s just not true.
I think there’s a distinction that should be made explicit between “a theory” and “our human mental model of a theory.” The theory is the same, but we rightfully try to interpret it in the simplest possible way, to make it clearer to think about.
Usually, two different mental models necessarily imply two different theories, so it’s easy to conflate the two, but sometimes (in mathematics especially) that’s just not true.