We argue that the robustness analysis of idealized models can have confirmational power. This responds to concerns recently raised in the literature, according to which the robustness analysis of models whose idealizations are not discharged is unable to confirm the causal mechanisms underlying these models, and the robustness analysis of models whose idealizations are discharged is unnecessary. In response, we make clear that, where idealizations sweep out, in a specific way, the space of possibilities— which is sometimes, though not always, (...) the case—they can be holistically discharged. In turn, this can be used to show that the robustness analysis of idealized models can have confirmational force after all. (shrink)

Fodor argue that Darwinism cannot be true on the grounds that there are no laws of selection to support counterfactuals about why traits are selected-for. Darwinian explanations, according to this objection, amount to mere ‘plausible historical narratives’. I argue that the objection is predicated on two problematic assumptions: A nomic-subsumption account of causation and causal explanation, and a fine-grained view of the individuation of selected-for effects. Against the former, I argue that Darwinian explanations are a historical species of mechanistic explanation (...) and that mechanisms are causally productive and counterfactual supporting in the absence of appropriate laws. Once this mechanistic framework is in place, the demand for laws of selection vanishes and the historical cum causal coherence of Darwinism is restored. As for the second assumption, I argue that it is an artefact of the teleosemantic program with no basis in evolutionary biology and that properly understood, Darwinian evolutionary biology shows just why teleosemantics cannot succeed. (shrink)

Part–whole causation (PWC) is the thesis that some causes are part of their effects. PWC has been objected to because of its incompatibility with the criterion that causes not be spatially included within their effects and the criterion that causes and effects are ontologically distinct in some sense. This paper serves to undermine the sufficiency of these ways of objecting to PWC by showing that for each criterion either cause-effect relationships need not satisfy it or part–whole relationships can. A case-study (...) of the collapse of Bridge 9340 is employed to facilitate the discussion. (shrink)

Part–whole causation is the thesis that some causes are part of their effects. PWC has been objected to because of its incompatibility with the criterion that causes not be spatially included within their effects and the criterion that causes and effects are ontologically distinct in some sense. This paper serves to undermine the sufficiency of these ways of objecting to PWC by showing that for each criterion either cause-effect relationships need not satisfy it or part–whole relationships can. A case-study of (...) the collapse of Bridge 9340 is employed to facilitate the discussion. (shrink)

One of the central aims of the philosophical analysis of mathematical explanation is to determine how one can distinguish explanatory proofs from non-explanatory proofs. In this paper, I take a closer look at the current status of the debate, and what the challenges for the philosophical analysis of explanatory proofs are. In order to provide an answer to these challenges, I suggest we start from analysing the concept understanding. More precisely, I will defend four claims: understanding is a condition for (...) explanation, unificatory understanding is a type of explanatory understanding, unificatory understanding is valuable in mathematics, and mathematical proofs can contribute to unificatory understanding. As a result, in a context where the epistemic aim is to unify mathematical results, I argue it is fruitful to make a distinction between proofs based on their explanatory value. (shrink)

The interventionist account of causal explanation, in the version presented by Jim Woodward, has been recently claimed capable of buttressing the widely felt—though poorly understood—hunch that high-level, relatively abstract explanations, of the sort provided by sciences like biology, psychology and economics, are in some cases explanatorily optimal. It is the aim of this paper to show that this is mistaken. Due to a lack of effective constraints on the causal variables at the heart of the interventionist causal-explanatory scheme, as presently (...) formulated it is either unable to prefer high-level explanations to low, or systematically overshoots, recommending explanations at so high of a level as to be virtually vacuous. (shrink)

It is widely believed that neural elements interact by communicating messages. Neurons, or groups of neurons, are supposed to send packages of data with informational content to other neurons or to the body. Thus, behavior is traditionally taken to consist in the execution of commands or instructions sent by the nervous system. As a consequence, neural elements and their organization are conceived as literally embodying and transmitting representations that other elements must in some way read and conform to. In opposition (...) to this conception, growing approaches such as enactivism and ecological psychology hold that neurons are not in the business of representing. However, by insisting that neural causation is not of a representational kind, these anti-representationalist approaches seem to be left with only one rather implausible alternative, viz. that behavior is the result of nothing but basic physical causation such as push-pull forces. In this paper it is argued that a third form of causation—termed “modulation”—exists and is at work in the coordination of animal behavior. Modulation is the quasi-direct guidance of dynamical systems through specific yet emerging trajectories. By setting the constraints that coordinate the free interaction of multi-element systems, modulation influences without forcing nor representing goal states. The basic properties of modulatory causation are analyzed and shown to be present in some fundamental aspects of neural and bodily interaction. (shrink)

A leading theoretical framework for naturalistic explanation of mind holds that we explain the mind by positing progressively "stupider" capacities ("homunculi") until the mind is "discharged" by means of capacities that are not intelligent at all. The so-called homuncular fallacy involves violating this procedure by positing the same capacities at subpersonal levels. I argue that the homuncular fallacy is not a fallacy, and that modern-day homunculi are idle posits. I propose an alternative view of what naturalism requires that reflects how (...) the cognitive sciences are actually integrating mind and matter. (shrink)

Many empirically minded philosophers have used neuroscientific data to argue against the multiple realization of cognitive functions in existing biological organisms. I argue that neuroscientists themselves have proposed a biologically based concept of multiple realization as an alternative to interpreting empirical findings in terms of one‐to‐one structure‐function mappings. I introduce this concept and its associated research framework and also how some of the main neuroscience‐based arguments against multiple realization go wrong. *Received October 2009; revised December 2009. †To contact the author, (...) please write to: Department of Philosophy, 260 English‐Philosophy Building, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242; e‐mail: carrie‐[email protected]. (shrink)

This paper investigates the relationship between structural explanation and the New Mechanistic account of explanation. The aim of this paper is twofold: firstly, to argue that some phenomena in the domain of fundamental physics, although mechanically brute, are structurally explained; and secondly, by elaborating on the contrast between SE and mechanistic explanation to better clarify some features of SE. Finally, this paper will argue that, notwithstanding their apparently antithetical character, SE and ME can be reconciled within a unified account of (...) general scientific explanation. (shrink)

This paper looks at the question of what it means for a psychological test to have construct validity. I approach this topic by way of an analysis of recent debates about the measurement of implicit social cognition. After showing that there is little theoretical agreement about implicit social cognition, and that the predictive validity of implicit tests appears to be low, I turn to a debate about their construct validity. I show that there are two questions at stake: First, what (...) level of detail and precision does a construct have to possess such that a test can in principle be valid relative to it? And second, what kind of evidence needs to be in place such that a test can be regarded as validated relative to a given construct? I argue that construct validity is not an all-or-nothing affair. It can come in degrees, because both our constructs and our knowledge of the explanatory relation between constructs and data can vary in accuracy and level of detail, and a test can fail to measure all of the features associated with a construct. I conclude by arguing in favor of greater philosophical attention to processes of construct development. (shrink)

The mechanistic framework traditionally comes bundled with a multi-level view. Some ascribe ontological weight to these levels, whereas others claim that characterising a higher-level entity and the corresponding lower-level mechanism are only different descriptions of the same thing. The goal of this paper is to develop a consistent metaphysical picture that can underly the latter position. According to this flat view, wholes and their parts are embedded in the same network of interacting units. The flat view preserves the original virtues (...) of the mechanistic approach and is able to avoid the problems associated with the multi-level view. (shrink)

This article provides a detailed analysis and explores the prospects of the arguments for higher-level causal autonomy available for the proponents of the mechanistic framework. Three different arguments are distinguished. After clarifying previously raised worries with regard to the first two arguments, the article focuses on the newest version of the third argument that has recently been revived by William Bechtel. By using Bechtel’s own case study, it is shown that not even reference to constraints can establish the causal autonomy (...) of higher mechanistic levels. (shrink)

This paper tracks the commitments of mechanistic explanations focusing on the relation between activities at different levels. It is pointed out that the mechanistic approach is inherently committed to identifying causal connections at higher levels with causal connections at lower levels. For the mechanistic approach to succeed a mechanism as a whole must do the very same thing what its parts organised in a particular way do. The mechanistic approach must also utilise bridge principles connecting different causal terms of different (...) theoretical vocabularies in order to make the identities of causal connections transparent. These general commitments get confronted with two claims made by certain proponents of the mechanistic approach: William Bechtel often argues that within the mechanistic framework it is possible to balance between reducing higher levels and maintaining their autonomy at the same time, whereas, in a recent paper, Craver and Bechtel argue that the mechanistic approach is able to make downward causation intelligible. The paper concludes that the mechanistic approach imbued with identity statements is no better candidate for anchoring higher levels to lower ones while maintaining their autonomy at the same time than standard reductive accounts are, and that what mechanistic explanations are able to do at best is showing that downward causation does not exist. (shrink)

Although there is a substantial philosophical literature on dynamical systems theory in the cognitive sciences, the same is not the case for neuroscience. This paper attempts to motivate increased discussion via a set of overlapping issues. The first aim is primarily historical and is to demonstrate that dynamical systems theory is currently experiencing a renaissance in neuroscience. Although dynamical concepts and methods are becoming increasingly popular in contemporary neuroscience, the general approach should not be viewed as something entirely new to (...) neuroscience. Instead, it is more appropriate to view the current developments as making central again approaches that facilitated some of neuroscience’s most significant early achievements, namely, the Hodgkin–Huxley and FitzHugh–Nagumo models. The second aim is primarily critical and defends a version of the “dynamical hypothesis” in neuroscience. Whereas the original version centered on defending a noncomputational and nonrepresentational account of cognition, the version I have in mind is broader and includes both cognition and the neural systems that realize it as well. In view of that, I discuss research on motor control as a paradigmatic example demonstrating that the concepts and methods of dynamical systems theory are increasingly and successfully being applied to neural systems in contemporary neuroscience. More significantly, such applications are motivating a stronger metaphysical claim, that is, understanding neural systems as being dynamical systems, which includes not requiring appeal to representations to explain or understand those phenomena. Taken together, the historical claim and the critical claim demonstrate that the dynamical hypothesis is undergoing a renaissance in contemporary neuroscience. (shrink)

I propose a dynamic causal approach to characterizing the notion of a mechanism. Levy and Bechtel, among others, have pointed out several critical limitations of the new mechanical philosophy, and pointed in a new direction to extend this philosophy. Nevertheless, they have not fully fleshed out what that extended philosophy would look like. Based on a closer look at neuroscientific practice, I propose that a mechanism is a dynamic causal system that involves various components interacting, typically nonlinearly, with one another (...) to produce a phenomenon of interest. (shrink)

In this essay I propose that what design principles in systems biology and systems neuroscience do is to present abstract characterizations of mechanisms, and thereby facilitate mechanistic explanation. To show this, one design principle in systems neuroscience, i.e., the multilayer perceptron, is examined. However, Braillard contends that design principles provide a sort of non-mechanistic explanation due to two related reasons: they are very general and describe non-causal dependence relationships. In response to this, I argue that, on the one hand, all (...) mechanisms are more or less general, and on the other, many design principles are causal systems. (shrink)

Stem cell biology and systems biology are two prominent new approaches to studying cell development. In stem cell biology, the predominant method is experimental manipulation of concrete cells and tissues. Systems biology, in contrast, emphasizes mathematical modeling of cellular systems. For scientists and philosophers interested in development, an important question arises: how should the two approaches relate? This essay proposes an answer, using the model of Waddington’s landscape to triangulate between stem cell and systems approaches. This simple abstract model represents (...) development as an undulating surface of hills and valleys. Originally constructed by C. H. Waddington to visually explicate an integrated theory of genetics, development and evolution, the landscape model can play an updated unificatory role. I examine this model’s structure, representational assumptions, and uses in all three contexts, and argue that explanations of cell development require both mathematical models and concrete experiments. On this view, the two approaches are interdependent, with mathematical models playing a crucial but circumscribed role in explanations of cell development. (shrink)

This review surveys three central issues in philosophy of stem cell biology: the nature of stem cells, stem cell experiments, and explanations of stem cell capacities. First, I argue that the fundamental question ‘what is a stem cell?’ has no single substantive answer. Instead, the core idea is explicated via an abstract model, which accounts for many features of stem cell experiments. The second part of this essay examines several of these features: uncertainty, model organisms, and manipulability. The results shed (...) light on the form of our emerging knowledge of stem cells: mechanistic explanations. The third part of the essay sketches some key features of these explanations, which are constructed by a collaborative experimenting community. (shrink)

This paper examines a case of failed interdisciplinary collaboration, between experimental stem cell research and theoretical systems biology. Recently, two groups of theoretical biologists have proposed dynamical systems models as a basis for understanding stem cells and their distinctive capacities. Experimental stem cell biologists, whose work focuses on manipulation of concrete cells, tissues and organisms, have largely ignored these proposals. I argue that ‘failure to communicate’ in this case is rooted in divergent views of explanation: the theoretically-inclined modelers are committed (...) to a version of the covering-law view, while experimental stem cell biologists aim at mechanistic explanations. I propose a way to reconcile these two explanatory approaches to cell development, and discuss the significance of this result for interdisciplinary collaboration in systems biology and beyond. (shrink)

Neural structural representations are cerebral map- or model-like structures that structurally resemble what they represent. These representations are absolutely central to the “cognitive neuroscience revolution”, as they are the only type of representation compatible with the revolutionaries’ mechanistic commitments. Crucially, however, these very same commitments entail that structural representations can be observed in the swirl of neuronal activity. Here, I argue that no structural representations have been observed being present in our neuronal activity, no matter the spatiotemporal scale of observation. (...) My argument begins by introducing the “cognitive neuroscience revolution” (Sect. 1 ) and sketching a prominent, widely adopted account of structural representations (Sect. 2 ). Then, I will consult various reports that describe our neuronal activity at various spatiotemporal scales, arguing that none of them reports the presence of structural representations (Sect. 3 ). After having deflected certain intuitive objections to my analysis (Sect. 4 ), I will conclude that, in the absence of neural structural representations, representationalism and mechanism can’t go together, and so the “cognitive neuroscience revolution” is forced to abandon one of its commitments (Sect. 5 ). (shrink)

There is a growing consensus among philosophers of science that scientific endeavors of understanding the human mind or the brain exhibit explanatory pluralism. Relatedly, several philosophers have in recent years defended an interventionist approach to causation that leads to a kind of causal pluralism. In this paper, I explore the consequences of these recent developments in philosophy of science for some of the central debates in philosophy of mind. First, I argue that if we adopt explanatory pluralism and the interventionist (...) approach to causation, our understanding of physicalism has to change, and this leads to what I call pluralistic physicalism. Secondly, I show that this pluralistic physicalism is not endangered by the causal exclusion argument. (shrink)

In this comment, I first point out some problems in McCauley's defense of the traditional conception of general analytical levels. Then I present certain reductionist arguments against explanatory pluralism that are not based on the New Wave model of intertheoretic reduction, against which McCauley is arguing. Reductionists that are not committed to this model might not have problems incorporating research on long-term diachronic processes in their analyses. In the last part of the paper, I briefly compare Robert N. McCauley's conception (...) of reduction to some other current accounts, highlighting the differences between them. (shrink)

Recently the functional model of reduction has become something like the standard model of reduction in philosophy of mind. In this paper, I argue that the functional model fails as an account of reduction due to problems related to three key concepts: functionalization, realization and causation. I further argue that if we try to revise the model in order to make it more coherent and scientifically plausible, the result is merely a simplified version of what in philosophy of science is (...) known as mechanistic explanation. Hence, instead of analyzing reduction in philosophy of mind in terms of functional reduction, it should be analyzed in terms of mechanistic explanation. (shrink)

The idea of levels of organization plays a central role in the philosophy of the life sciences. In this article, I first examine the explanatory goals that have motivated accounts of levels of organization. I then show that the most state-of-the-art and scientifically plausible account of levels of organization, the account of levels of mechanism proposed by Bechtel and Craver, is fundamentally problematic. Finally, I argue that the explanatory goals can be reached by adopting a deflationary approach, where levels of (...) organization give way to more well-defined and fundamental notions, such as scale and composition. (shrink)

Philosophical accounts of scientific explanation are broadly divided into ontic and epistemic views. This paper explores the idea that the lexical ambiguity of the verb to explain and its nominalisation supports an ontic conception of explanation (Salmon 1989; Craver 2007). I analyse one argument which challenges this strategy by criticising the claim that explanatory talk is lexically ambiguous (Wright, European Journal of Philosophy of Science 2(3), 375–394, 2012). I propose that the linguistic mechanism of transfer of meaning (Nunberg, Journal of (...) Semantics 12(2), 109–132, 1995) provides a better account of the lexical alternations that figure in the systematic polysemy of explanatory talk, and evaluate the implications of this proposal for the debate between ontic and epistemic conceptions of scientific explanation. (shrink)

We argue that artificial networks are explainable and offer a novel theory of interpretability. Two sets of conceptual questions are prominent in theoretical engagements with artificial neural networks, especially in the context of medical artificial intelligence: Are networks explainable, and if so, what does it mean to explain the output of a network? And what does it mean for a network to be interpretable? We argue that accounts of “explanation” tailored specifically to neural networks have ineffectively reinvented the wheel. In (...) response to, we show how four familiar accounts of explanation apply to neural networks as they would to any scientific phenomenon. We diagnose the confusion about explaining neural networks within the machine learning literature as an equivocation on “explainability,” “understandability” and “interpretability.” To remedy this, we distinguish between these notions, and answer by offering a theory and typology of interpretation in machine learning. Interpretation is something one does to an explanation with the aim of producing another, more understandable, explanation. As with explanation, there are various concepts and methods involved in interpretation: Total or Partial, Global or Local, and Approximative or Isomorphic. Our account of “interpretability” is consistent with uses in the machine learning literature, in keeping with the philosophy of explanation and understanding, and pays special attention to medical artificial intelligence systems. (shrink)

This is a largely expository review of Thomas Polger’s and Laurence Shapiro’s The Multiple Realization Book (Oxford Press 2016).

Philosophers almost universally believe that concepts of supervenience fail to satisfy the standards for physicalism because they offer mere property correlations that are left unexplained. They are thus compatible with non-physicalist accounts of those relations. Moreover, many philosophers not only prefer some kind of functional-role theory as a physically acceptable account of mind-body and other inter-level relations, but they use it as a form of “superdupervenience” to explain supervenience in a physically acceptable way. But I reject a central part of (...) this common narrative. I argue that functional-role theories fail by the same standards for physicalism because they merely state without explaining how a physical property plays or occupies a functional role. They are thus compatible with non-physicalist accounts of that role-occupying relation. I also argue that one cannot redeploy functional-role theory at a deeper level to explain role occupation, specifically by iterating the role-occupant scheme. Instead, one must use part-whole structural and mechanistic explanations that differ from functional-role theory in important ways. These explanations represent a form of “superduperfunctionalism” that stand to functional-role theory as concepts of superdupervenience stand to concepts of supervenience. (shrink)

I use Carl Gillett’s much heralded dimensioned theory of realization as a platform to develop a plausible part–whole theory. I begin with some basic desiderata for a theory of realization that its key terms should be defined and that it should be explanatory. I then argue that Gillett’s original theory violates these conditions because its explanatory force rests upon an unspecified “in virtue of” relation. I then examine Gillett’s later version that appeals instead to theoretical terms tied to “mechanisms.” Yet (...) I argue that it too violates the desiderata, since it defines realization for mechanisms in terms of two undefined ideas whose explanatory credentials have not been established—“implementation” and “grounds.” Thus I drop those ideas in favor of an explicit constraint that the parts and properties provide a mechanistic explanation. I also distinguish a special mechanistic theory from a preferred general theory that incorporates other kinds of part–whole explanations that target causal powers or capacities. The result is a theory that has the explanatory virtues of mechanistic theories as well as a broader scope desired by Gillett. I also compare the result to a similar idea from Robert Cummins that has been neglected in recent discussions of realization, namely, his general property analysis rather than his functional analysis. Finally, I defend the preferred general theory against possible objections that attempt to show a conflict between metaphysical demands on a theory of realization versus facts about good scientific explanation. (shrink)

Recent years have seen growing interest in modifying interventionist accounts of causal explanation in order to characterise noncausal explanation. However, one surprising element of such accounts is that they have typically jettisoned the core feature of interventionism: interventions. Indeed, the prevailing opinion within the philosophy of science literature suggests that interventions exclusively demarcate causal relationships. This position is so prevalent that, until now, no one has even thought to name it. We call it “intervention puritanism” (I-puritanism, for short). In this (...) paper, we mount the first sustained defence of the idea that there are distinctively noncausal explanations which can be characterized in terms of possible interventions; a position we call “intervention liberalism” (I-liberalism, for short). While many have followed James Woodward (2003) in committing to I-puritanism, we trace support for I-liberalism back to the work of Jaegwon Kim (1974). Furthermore, we analyse two recent sources of scepticism regarding I-liberalism: debate surrounding mechanistic constitution; and attempts to provide a monistic account of explanation. We show that neither literature provides compelling reasons for adopting I-puritanism. Finally, we present a novel taxonomy of available positions upon the role of possible interventions in explanation: weak causal imperialism; strong causal imperialism; monist intervention puritanism; pluralist intervention puritanism; monist intervention liberalism; and finally, the specific position defended in this paper, pluralist intervention liberalism. (shrink)

The Free Energy Principle (FEP) states that all biological self-organizing systems must minimize variational free energy. The acceptance of this principle has given rise to a popular and far-reaching theoretical and empirical approach to the study of the brain and living organisms. Despite the popularity of the FEP approach, little discussion has ensued about its ontological status and implications. By understanding physicalism as an interdisciplinary research program that aims to offer compositional explanations of mental phenomena, this paper articulates what it (...) would mean for the FEP approach to be part of research program physicalism and to corroborate a physicalist outlook. In doing so, this paper contributes both to philosophical discussions regarding the FEP approach and to the literature on physicalism. It does the former by explicating the metaphysical standing of the FEP approach. It does the latter by showing how cutting-edge research in the empirical sciences of the mind can inform our attitudes regarding physicalism. (shrink)

Processes produce changes: rivers erode their banks and thunderstorms cause floods. If I am right that organisms are a kind of process, then the causally efficacious behaviours of organisms are also examples of processes producing change. In this paper I shall try to articulate a view of how we should think of causation within a broadly processual ontology of the living world. Specifically, I shall argue that causation, at least in a central class of cases, is the interaction of processes, (...) that such causation is the exercise of a capacity inherent in that process and, negatively, that causation should not be understood as the instantiation of universal laws. The approach I describe has substantial similarities with the process causality articulated by Wesley Salmon and Phil Dowe for physical causation, making it plausible that the basic approach can be applied equally to the non-living world. It is an approach that builds at crucial points on the criticisms of determinism and universal causality famously articulated by Elizabeth Anscombe. (shrink)

En épistémologie des sciences sociales, Jon Elster est connu pour sa défense de l’individualisme méthodologique et sa critique des explications de haut niveau. Cette note critique la plus récente formulation de sa position . D’une part, nous montrons que les problèmes relatifs aux explications au niveau agrégé s’appliquent également aux explications en termes de mécanismes psychologiques, privilégiées par Elster. Si les mécanismes psychologiques contribuent à l’explication en sciences sociales, ce n’est pas parce qu’ils font explicitement référence à des états intentionnels, (...) mais parce qu’ils rendent mieux compte que les autres hypothèses de ce qui fait la différence entre deux faits ou événements. D’autre part, nous soutenons que l’individualisme ne doit pas servir d’idéal régulateur dans la recherche en sciences sociales. Si l’explication des comportements individuels est souvent essentielle pour produire une bonne explication, il existe des situations où elle est susceptible de nuire à la qualité de celle-ci en introduisant des éléments inadéquats.In epistemology of the social sciences, Jon Elster is well known for his defense of methodological individualism and his criticism of high-level explanations. This note criticizes the most recent version of his position . First, I argue that the problems related to explanations at the aggregate level also pertain to explanations in terms of psychological mechanisms, favored by Elster. If psychological mechanisms contribute to explanation in the social sciences, it is not because they explicitly refer to intentional states, but rather because they account better than alternative hypotheses for the difference between two facts or events. Second, I contend that individualism should not be taken as a regulative ideal for research in the social sciences. If accounts of individual behavior are often essential to good explanations, there are situations in which they are likely to be detrimental to them by encouraging the introduction of irrelevant factors. (shrink)

Philosophers have traditionally treated physicalism as an empirically informed metaphysical thesis. This approach faces a well-known problem often referred to as Hempel’s dilemma: formulations of physicalism tend to be either false or indeterminate. The generally preferred strategy to address this problem involves an appeal to a hypothetical complete and ideal physical theory. After demonstrating that this strategy is not viable, I argue that we should redefine physicalism as an interdisciplinary research program seeking to explain the mental in terms of the (...) physical that encompasses the physical sciences, the psychological and brain sciences, and philosophy. Redefining physicalism in this way improves upon previous reconstructive accounts while avoiding the indeterminacy associated with orthodox forms of futurist physicalism. (shrink)

The measurement problem concerns an apparent conflict between the two fundamental principles of quantum mechanics, namely the Schrödinger equation and the measurement postulate. These principles describe inconsistent behavior for quantum systems in so-called "measurement contexts." Many theorists have thought that the measurement problem can only be resolved by proposing a mechanistic explanation of (genuine or apparent) wavefunction collapse that avoids explicit reference to "measurement." However, I argue here that the measurement problem dissolves if we accept Humeanism about laws of nature. (...) On a Humean metaphysics, there is no conflict between the two principles, nor is there any inherent problem with the concept of "measurement" figuring into the account of collapse. (shrink)

The goal of this paper is to present and defend an empiricist, neo-Hempelian account of scientific explanation as ampliative, specialized embedding. The proposal aims to preserve what I take to be the core of Hempel’s empiricist account, by weakening it in some respects and strengthening it in others, introducing two new conditions that solve most of Hempel’s problems without abandoning his empiricist strictures. According to this proposal, to explain a phenomenon is to make it expectable by introducing new conceptual/ontological machinery (...) and using special, and non-ad hoc, non-accidental regularities. The new conditions are elaborated making essential use of two central structuralist ideas, namely T-theoreticity and specialization. I first introduce and qualify the project, then present the new account in detail and assess it vis-à-vis its rivals, and finally discuss some possible objections, concluding that the account fares better than its monistic rivals and well enough to qualify as a promising neo-Hempelian account. Even for those unpersuaded by its monistic goals, it has the merit of calling attention to two new necessary conditions not explicitly emphasized thus far and showing how they serve to answer many of the criticisms addressed against Hempel’s account. (shrink)

We argue that there is no general theory of explanation that spans the sciences, mathematics, and ethics, etc. More specifically, there is no good reason to believe that substantive and domain-invariant constraints on explanatory information exist. Using Nickel (Noûs 44(2):305–328, 2010 ) as an exemplar of the contrary, generalist position, we first show that Nickel’s arguments rest on several ambiguities, and then show that even when these ambiguities are charitably corrected, Nickel’s defense of general theories of explanation is inadequate along (...) several different dimensions. Specifically, we argue that Nickel’s argument has three fatal flaws. First, he has not provided any compelling illustrations of domain-invariant constraints on explanation. Second, in order to fend off the most vehement skeptics of domain-invariant theories of explanation, Nickel must beg all of the important questions. Third, Nickel’s examples of explanations from different domains with common explanatory structure rely on incorrect formulations of the explanations under consideration, circular justifications, and/or a mischaracterization of the position Nickel intends to critique. Given that the best and most elaborate defense of the generalist position fails in so many ways, we conclude that the standard practice in philosophy (and in philosophy of science in particular), which is to develop theories of explanation that are tailored to specific domains, still is justified. For those who want to buy into a more ambitious project: beware of the costs! (shrink)

Explanatory pluralism is the view that the best form and level of explanation depends on the kind of question one seeks to answer by the explanation, and that in order to answer all questions in the best way possible, we need more than one form and level of explanation. In the first part of this article, we argue that explanatory pluralism holds for the medical sciences, at least in theory. However, in the second part of the article we show that (...) medical research and practice is actually not fully and truly explanatory pluralist yet. Although the literature demonstrates a slowly growing interest in non-reductive explanations in medicine, the dominant approach in medicine is still methodologically reductionist. This implies that non-reductive explanations often do not get the attention they deserve. We argue that the field of medicine could benefit greatly by reconsidering its reductive tendencies and becoming fully and truly explanatory pluralist. Nonetheless, trying to achieve the right balance in the search for and application of reductive and non-reductive explanations will in any case be a difficult exercise. (shrink)

In what follows, I suggest that it makes good sense to think of the truth of the probabilistic generalizations made in the life sciences as metaphysically grounded in stochastic mechanisms in the world. To further understand these stochastic mechanisms, I take the general characterization of mechanism offered by MDC :1–25, 2000) and explore how it fits with several of the going philosophical accounts of chance: subjectivism, frequentism, Lewisian best-systems, and propensity. I argue that neither subjectivism, frequentism, nor a best-system-style interpretation (...) of chance will give us what we need from an account of stochastic mechanism, but some version of propensity theory can. I then draw a few important lessons from recent propensity interpretations of fitness in order to present a novel propensity interpretation of stochastic mechanism according to which stochastic mechanisms are thought to have probabilistic propensities to produce certain outcomes over others. This understanding of stochastic mechanism, once fully fleshed-out, provides the benefits of allowing the stochasticity of a particular mechanism to be an objective property in the world, a property investigable by science, a way of quantifying the stochasticity of a particular mechanism, and a way to avoid a problematic commitment to the causal efficacy of propensities. (shrink)

This chapter examines the history of philosophy of psychology and philosophy of psychiatry as subfields of philosophy of science that emerged in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. The chapter also surveys related literatures that developed in psychology and psychiatry. Philosophy of psychology (or philosophy of cognitive science) has been a well-established subfield of philosophy of mind since the 1990s and 2000s. This field of philosophy of psychology is narrowly focused on issues in cognitive psychology and cognitive science. Compared (...) to the thriving subfield of philosophy of cognitive science, there has been a lack of corresponding interest among philosophers of science in broader methodological questions about different paradigms and fields of study in psychology. These broader methodological questions about psychology have been addressed in the field of theoretical psychology, which is a subfield of psychology that materialized in the 1980s and 1990s. Philosophy of psychiatry emerged as a subfield of philosophy of science in the mid-2000s. Compared to philosophy of psychology, the philosophy of psychiatry literature in philosophy of science engaged with issues examined in an older and more interdisciplinary tradition of philosophy of psychiatry that developed after the 1960s. The participation of philosophers of science in the literature on theoretical psychology, by contrast, has been limited. (shrink)

In light of the recent credibility crisis in psychology, this paper argues for a greater emphasis on theorizing in scientific research. Although reliable experimental evidence, preregistration, methodological rigor, and new computational frameworks for modeling are important, scientific progress also relies on properly functioning theories. However, the current understanding of the role of theorizing in psychology is lacking, which may lead to future crises. Theories should not be viewed as mere speculations or simple inductive generalizations. To address this issue, the author (...) introduces a framework called “cognitive metascience,” which studies the processes and results of evaluating scientific practice. This study should proceed both qualitatively, as in traditional science and technology studies and cognitive science, and quantitatively, by analyzing scientific discourse using language technology. By analyzing theories as cognitive artifacts that support cognitive tasks, this paper aims to shed more light on their nature. This perspective reveals that multiple distinct theories serve entirely different roles, and studying these roles, along with their epistemic vices and virtues, can provide insight into how theorizing should proceed. The author urges a change in research culture to appreciate the variety of distinct theories and to systematically advance scientific progress. . (shrink)

A long-standing problem in understanding goal-directed systems has been the insufficiency of mechanistic explanations to make sense of them. This paper offers a solution to this problem. It begins by observing the limitations of mechanistic decompositions when it comes to understanding physical fields. We argue that introducing the field concept, as it has been developed in field theory, alongside mechanisms is able to provide an account of goal directedness in the sciences.

The topic of this dissertation is the nature of linguistic competence, the capacity to understand and produce sentences of natural language. I defend the empiricist account of linguistic competence embedded in the connectionist cognitive science. This strand of cognitive science has been opposed to the traditional symbolic cognitive science, coupled with transformational-generative grammar, which was committed to nativism due to the view that human cognition, including language capacity, should be construed in terms of symbolic representations and hardwired rules. Similarly, linguistic (...) competence in this framework was regarded as being innate, rule-governed, domain-specific, and fundamentally different from performance, i.e., idiosyncrasies and factors governing linguistic behavior. I analyze state-of-the-art connectionist, deep learning models of natural language processing, most notably large language models, to see what they can tell us about linguistic competence. Deep learning is a statistical technique for the classification of patterns through which artificial intelligence researchers train artificial neural networks containing multiple layers that crunch a gargantuan amount of textual and/or visual data. I argue that these models suggest that linguistic competence should be construed as stochastic, pattern-based, and stemming from domain-general mechanisms. Moreover, I distinguish syntactic from semantic competence, and I show for each the ramifications of the endorsement of a connectionist research program as opposed to the traditional symbolic cognitive science and transformational-generative grammar. I provide a unifying front, consisting of usage-based theories, a construction grammar approach, and an embodied approach to cognition to show that the more multimodal and diverse models are in terms of architectural features and training data, the stronger the case is for the connectionist linguistic competence. I also propose to discard the competence vs. performance distinction as theoretically inferior so that a novel and integrative account of linguistic competence originating in connectionism and empiricism that I propose and defend in the dissertation could be put forward in scientific and philosophical literature. (shrink)

Evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) is considered a ‘mechanistic science,’ in that it causally explains morphological evolution in terms of changes in developmental mechanisms. Evo-devo is also an interdisciplinary and integrative approach, as its explanations use contributions from many fields and pertain to different levels of organismal organization. Philosophical accounts of mechanistic explanation are currently highly prominent, and have been particularly able to capture the integrative nature of multifield and multilevel explanations. However, I argue that evo-devo demonstrates the need for a (...) broadened philosophical conception of mechanisms and mechanistic explanation. Mechanistic explanation (in terms of the qualitative interactions of the structural parts of a whole) has been developed as an alternative to the traditional idea of explanation as derivation from laws or quantitative principles. Against the picture promoted by Carl Craver, that mathematical models describe but usually do not explain, my discussion of cases from the strand of evo-devo which is concerned with developmental processes points to qualitative phenomena where quantitative mathematical models are an indispensable part of the explanation. While philosophical accounts have focused on the actual organization and operation of mechanisms, properties of developmental mechanisms that are about how a mechanism reacts to modifications are of major evolutionary significance, including robustness, phenotypic plasticity, and modularity. A philosophical conception of mechanisms is needed that takes into account quantitative changes, transient entities and the generation of novel types of entities, feedback loops and complex interaction networks, emergent properties, and, in particular, functional-dynamical aspects of mechanisms, including functional (as opposed to structural) organization and distributed, system-wide phenomena. I conclude with general remarks on philosophical accounts of explanation. (shrink)

It is often argued that constitution and causation are different kinds of metaphysical relations. Constitution, like other grounding relations, is assumed to be synchronic, while causation is diachronic. It is this synchronic-diachronic division that, more than other difference-makers, is argued to distinguish grounding relations such as constitution from causation. This paper develops an account of a species of constitution that happens over time. We call this type of constitution, diachronic constitution. We show how diachronic constitution is a consequence of a (...) common type of causation, often ignored in metaphysical discussions of causation: continuous reciprocal causation. Hence, constitution is not only sometimes like causation; it can also be a form of causation. We argue that temporalising the constitution relation is neither as remarkable nor as problematic as it might initially seem. It is inevitable, given local interactions between microscale and macroscale states in dynamical systems. (shrink)

In this contribution, I comment on Raffaella Campaner’s defense of explanatory pluralism in psychiatry (in this volume). In her paper, Campaner focuses primarily on explanatory pluralism in contrast to explanatory reductionism. Furthermore, she distinguishes between pluralists who consider pluralism to be a temporary state on the one hand and pluralists who consider it to be a persisting state on the other hand. I suggest that it would be helpful to distinguish more than those two versions of pluralism – different understandings (...) of explanatory pluralism both within philosophy of science and psychiatry – namely moderate/temporary pluralism, anything goes pluralism, isolationist pluralism, integrative pluralism and interactive pluralism. Next, I discuss the pros and cons of these different understandings of explanatory pluralism. Finally, I raise the question of how to implement or operationalize explanatory pluralism in scientific practice; how to structure the “genuine dialogue” or shape “the pluralistic attitude” Campaner is referring to. As tentative answers, I explore a question-based framework for explanatory pluralism as well as social-epistemological procedures for interaction among competing approaches and explanations. (shrink)