Behavior causal explanation

Throughout the ages and in every civilization, people have developed explanations of observed behaviors. These explanations are based on die principle of causality, i.e. every effect has a cause and the same cause produces always the same effect. We call these explanations models. 

Good philosophy of science tells us that since the best predictions and causal explanations are often found at the higher level, the causal mechanisms responsible for events are also often at the higher level. If we look to real scientific methodology to guide us in how we ought to study mental causation, it is clear that we must look at how we best predict and explain behavior in order to best identify the real cause of our behavior. 

He further points out that this is especially true for the description of systems in thermodynamic equilibrium—as was assumed throughout in all of the modeling methods described above. My point here is simply that in fact in the process of explaining the structural features of a molecule by molecular mechanics methods, more is needed than the simulation of its causal behavior.18 While the inner structure of a system may be causal, the capability to correctly describe single causal processes alone is not sufficient to derive a meaningful explanation of any of the systems properties observable by experiment.19... 

The science of psychology, which attempts to predict and explain human behavior in terms of mental states, is committed to the idea that mental states causally influence behavior. If mental states do not cause behaviors, then behaviors caimot be explained in terms of mental states. As Kim says, A science that invokes mental phenomena in its explanations is presumptively committed to their causal efficacy for any phenomenon to have an explanatory role, its presence or absenee in a given situation must make a difference - a causal difference (1998 31). If we cannot account for mental causation, then it seems we also lose human agency and the science of psychology as explanatory science. A good account of mental causation is thus an indispensable part of any successful theory of mind. 

Many of our best predictions and explanations of human behavior come at the higher level of beliefs, desires, and intentions. If we take our cue from philosophy of science, then we want to say that these irreducible higher-level properties are causal properties. We do not need to reduce these mental states to neurological states. Just as real scientific explanations occur at multiple levels of explanation, and just as irreducible higher-level properties are causal in scientific practice, such is often the case with mental causation. Mental causation is just another case of higher-level causation. And just as the causal mechanism often occurs at higher-levels in science, so it often occurs at the level of irreducible mental properties. 

It seems to me that one of the most (if not the most) important things we need from a theory of mind is a good account of mental causation. If we think that the science of psychology, whose job it is to predict and explain human behavior, is a legitimate science, then we need it to be the case that mental properties are causal, fri addition, a great part of our survival as social creatures in this world depends on our ordinary assessment of one another s mental states and our assumption that those mental states are causally responsible for behavior. We regularly make predictions about what others are going to do and offer explanations of why others have behaved as they have based on our belief that mental states cause behaviors. If we want to retain the independently plausible idea that predictions and explanations of behavior in terms of mental states work because mental states are causal, then we need to account for how it is that mental states can be causal. 

We believe there Is a possible commonality between the propensity for endocytotlc veslculatlon and Hjx formation In the plasma membrane of NA protoplasts that Is related to Its lipid composition, and further suggest that the difference In behavior between NA and ACC protoplasts (endocytotlc veslculatlon vs. exocytotlc extrusion and the differential propensity for Hxx formation) Is, In part, a consequence of changes In the lipid composition of the plasma membrane following cold acclimation. Preliminary studies contrasting the cryobehavlor of liposomes prepared from the plasma membrane lipids of NA and ACC rye demonstrate that the differential behavior of the plasma membrane observed In NA and ACC protoplasts Is also apparent In the respective liposomes and provide strong evidence for a causal relationship between alterations In the lipid composition of the plasma membrane and cold acclimation. Our current objectives are to determine the Influence of cold acclimation on the lipid composition of the plasma membrane and to provide a mechanistic explanation for the Increased cryostablllty of the plasma membrane. 

MOUSE-IV was a very different program.It utilized some simple rules of physiochemical behavior to explain the causality of conformational behavior. In most cases the rules learned by MOUSE-III were straightforward and required no explanation. However, systems which exhibited complex conformational behavior often ended up creating a lot of very complicated rules that could be said to be nothing more than a rephrasing of the structural features for tiny subsets of the data. The first stages of MOUSE-IV were not based on MOUSE-III, but upon an earlier version which created a semantic network description of the system. 

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