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Dynamical Systems Theory as an Approach to Mental Causation
Abstract
Dynamical systems theory (DST) is gaining popularity in cognitive science and philosophy of mind. Recently several authors
(e.g. J.A.S. Kelso, 1995; A. Juarrero, 1999; F. Varela and E. Thompson, 2001) offered a DST approach to mental causation as
an alternative for models of mental causation in the line of Jaegwon Kim (e.g. 1998). They claim that some dynamical systems
exhibit a form of global to local determination or downward causation in that the large-scale, global activity of the system governs or constrains local interactions. This form of downward causation is the key to the DST model of mental causation. In this paper I evaluate
the DST approach to mental causation. I will argue that the main problem for current DST approaches to mental causation is
that they lack a clear metaphysics. I propose one metaphysical framework (Gillett, 2002a/b/c) that might deal with this deficiency.
... This would be disputed by many people and it sacrifices the theory neutrality that is a key attraction of a correlates-based approach to consciousness. A number of solutions have been put forward to this problem, including dynamical systems approaches (Van de Laar, 2006), causal overdetermination (Bennett, 2003;Kroedel, 2008), and intralevel causation (Buckareff, 2011). However, the issue remains extremely controversial, and each proposed solution is subject to its own difficulties and limitations. ...
Scientists studying consciousness are attempting to identify correlations between measurements of consciousness and the physical world. Consciousness can only be measured through first-person reports, which raises problems about the accuracy of first-person reports, the possibility of non-reportable consciousness and the causal closure of the physical world. Many of these issues could be resolved by assuming that consciousness is entirely physical or functional. However, this would sacrifice the theory-neutrality that is a key attraction of a correlates-based approach to the study of consciousness. This paper puts forward a different solution that uses a framework of definitions and assumptions to explain how consciousness can be measured. This addresses the problems associated with first-person reports and avoids the issues with the causal closure of the physical world. This framework is compatible with most of the current theories of consciousness and it leads to a distinction between two types of correlates of consciousness.
Recently, a new approach to modeling cognitive phenomena has been gaining recognition: the dynamical systems approach. Proponents of this theory claim to have identified a new paradigm for the study of cognition which is superior to both symbolicism and connectionism. Though dynamicism is a recent addition to cognitive science, its supporters have leveled severe criticism of the theoretical commitments of both symbolicism and connectionism. They wish to remove traditional concepts such as computation and representation from the vocabulary of cognitive scientists. Instead, they wish to discuss cognition in dynamical systems terms, using mathematical concepts such as state space, chaos, and attractor. Through an examination of what is expected of good cognitive theories, and a discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of symbolicism, connectionism and dynamicism, this thesis attempts to situate and evaluate the dynamicist project in the context of current cognitive science. It is conc...
Physicalism, a topic that has been central to modern philosophy of mind and metaphysics, is the philosophical view that everything in the space-time world is ultimately physical. The physicalist will claim that all facts about the mind and the mental are physical facts and deny the existence of mental events and state insofar as these are thought of as independent of physical things, events and states. This collection of essays, first published in 2001, offers a series of perspectives on this important doctrine and brings depth and breadth to the philosophical debate. A group of distinguished philosophers, comprising both physicalists and their critics, consider a wide range of issues including the historical genesis and present justification of physicalism, its metaphysical presuppositions and methodological role, its implications for mental causation, and the account it provides of consciousness.
theory is a branch of philosophy that has relevance for anyone interested in human behavior (including buyer behavior) since its subject matter is the analysis of the whole process by which human action originates and how it is explained, whether in the social sciences or in folkpsychology. Some of the issues of interest are (1) marking the boundary between action and the rest of behavior, (2) the role of reasons as causes and explanations of action, and (3) the question of free will and individual responsibility. The bookoffers the reader an opportunity to question much that we take for granted in researching buyer behavior. Juarrero starts her bookby drawing on the frequently cited contrast (the “wink ” versus the “blink”) used to distinguish action, which, like the wink is voluntary, intentional behavior, from involuntary behavior like the blink. Action is voluntary
I outline reasons for the recent popularity, and lingering suspicion, about 'emergence' by examining three distinct concepts of property emergence, their purposes and associated obligations. In Part 1, I argue 'Strong' emergence is the grail for many emergentists (and physicalists), since it frames what is needed to block the 'Argument from Realization' (AR) which moves from the truth of physicalism to the inefficacy of special science properties. I then distinguish 'Weak' and 'Ontological' emergence, in Part 2, arguing each is a way one may fail to establish the possibility of Strong emergence. But I also show Weak emergence can help the full-blown reductionist and Ontological emergence helps those opposed to physicalism. Lastly, in Part 3, I argue that the Completeness of Physics (CoP) is incompatible with Strong emergence and that rejecting CoP provides hope for the possibility of Strong emergence in a physical world. The result is a notion of Strong emergence offering much to non-reductive physicalism. My final conclusion is that concepts of emergence, when properly understood, have important contributions to make to philosophical debate.
[This collection of essays focuses] on such issues as the nature of causation and events, what dependency relations other than causal relations connect facts and events, the analysis of supervenience, and the mind–body problem. A central problem in the philosophy of mind is the problem of explaining how the mind can causally influence bodily processes. [The author] explores this problem in detail, criticizes the nonreductionist solutions to it, and offers a modified reductionist solution of his own.
Both professional philosophers and their graduate students will find this an invaluable collection. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A major objection to the view that the relation of persons to human animals is coincidence rather than identity is that on this view the human animal will share the coincident person’s physical properties, and so should (contrary to the view) share its mental properties. But while the same physical predicates are true of the person and the human animal, the difference in the persistence conditions of these entities implies that there will be a difference in the properties ascribed by these predicates, with the result that the physical properties that determine the person’s mental states will belong to the person and not to the human animal.
In new experiments on coordinated human movement we demonstrate that the process of intentionally switching from one pattern of coordination to another is governed by the dynamics of the patterns themselves. In particular, the stability of the patterns as established in earlier experiments on instabilities of these coordination patterns, determines the nature of the transient switching process. Measures such as the length of the transient (or switching time) and its distribution closely match theoretical predictions.
We studied subdural recordings from a patient with an unusually focal and stable occipito-temporal epileptic discharge under four experimental conditions. The series of time intervals between successive spike discharges displayed a few (3-5) clusters of periodic values representing statistically significant short-term periodicities when tested against surrogate data. This short-term predictability was modulated during the different experimental conditions by periodicity shifts of the order of 15-30 ms. Correspondingly, there was an increased gamma-band (30-70 Hz) coherence between the epileptic focus and surrounding recording sites. We conclude that the focal epileptic activity is part of an extended network of neural activities which exert a fast modulation reflected in changes of transiently periodic activities.
Recent attempts to clarify the pathogenesis of pharmacoresistant epilepsies arrive at the conclusion that intractable epilepsies might be prevented by earlier, more effective pharmacotherapy. In this paper the problem of intractability is examined from a psychological point of view. Sixteen patients with intractable epilepsies were trained in techniques of self control (SC) in addition to ongoing pharmacological treatment. The SC training consisted of detailed self observation which aimed at identifying warning signals of a beginning seizure and seizure-provoking factors and the development of 'counter measures' (behavioural measures to interrupt a beginning seizure and to neutralize provoking factors). After SC training, all those patients who successfully managed to deal with their identified problems (strong psychic stress and/or poor intuitive SC abilities) achieved a significant improvement of seizure control: 68% obtained 80-100% reduction and 12% obtained 60-70% reduction of seizures. None changed for the worse. These findings suggested that psychological methods of seizure control can contribute to improving long-standing intractable epilepsies. Offered early in the process of epilepsy they may even help to prevent the development of intractability. A new kind of polytherapy is proposed, consisting of a combination of pharmacological and SC therapy.
We propose a new approach to the neuroscience of consciousness, growing out of the 'enactive' viewpoint in cognitive science. This approach aims to map the neural substrates of consciousness at the level of large-scale, emergent and transient dynamical patterns of brain activity (rather than at the level of particular circuits or classes of neurons), and it suggests that the processes crucial for consciousness cut across the brain-body-world divisions, rather than being brain-bound neural events. Whereas standard approaches to the neural correlates of consciousness have assumed a one-way causal-explanatory relationship between internal neural representational systems and the contents of consciousness, our approach allows for theories and hypotheses about the two-way or reciprocal relationship between embodied conscious states and local neuronal activity.
Using a sensorimotor coordination task in conjunction with an array of SQUIDs (Superconducting QUantum Interference Devices) we demonstrate critical instabilities in human brain activity patterns. Analysis of the dominant spatial pattern of the brain and its time-varying amplitude displays a task-dependent geometry characteristic of Sil'nikov-like chaos, which changes qualitatively at the transition. (c) 1995 American Institute of Physics.
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