>- "identification of conceptual equivalencies among disparate phenomena were foundational to developing previous laws of nature" - what exactly is a "conceptual equivalence"? You mean models?

No, a model is not an "identification of conceptual equivalencies among disparate phenomena". It's a simplified representation of a system.

"identification of conceptual equivalencies among disparate phenomena were foundational to developing previous laws of nature" could be called an analogy, an isomorphism, a unifying framework, etc.

>Unifying disparate observations into models is basic science. Not sure why it is highlighted here as some important insight.

Perhaps because the most important insights are the most basic ones - it's upon those eveything else sits upon.

>At this point, I gave up

If you can't bother beyond the abstract or 1st paragraph, or are perplexed that the abstract has a 10,000ft simplistic introduction into the basics, then it's better that you did :)