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Introduction

 

Lecture 07

Philosophical Issues in Behavioural Science

A telegraphic preview ...
If you ask scientists about action, they will tell you a story about motor representations and processes. And if you ask philosophers, they will tell you a story about intentions and practical reasoning.
Both stories seem reasonably compelling, and there is even evidence for one of them.
The stories have different strengths: In cognitive science ... little to say about actions whose purposes involve things the motor system doesn’t care about---your motor system doesn’t care whether the plane you are stepping is headed for Milan or for Rome, but this sort of difference can affect whether your actions succeed or fail.
You might just say that the two disciplines are talking past each other, or you might say that they are offering two complementary but independent models of action.
Call this the ‘Two Stories View’ (or divorced, but living together).
[Alt: quick version --- Ask a phil about action and they'll tell you a story about intentions and processes of practical reasoning. Ask a psych ... Do we need to connect these largely separate stories or is it fine for each discipline to tell its own story about action? Let's see ...]
How are the two stories related? One possibility is that they are two ways of talking about a single thing.
But this doesn't seem right because the stories explain different, if overlapping, phenomena. The philosophers are interested in everything from extremely large scale actions which may take days, like the action of competing in the Tour de France to very small scale actions such as the action of turning a crank.
The psychologists, by contrast, are mostly interested in the small and very small scale actions. So there is some overlap in actions like turning a crank, breaking an egg, taking and eating a biscuit.
How are the two stories related if they are not using different words for the same thing? Another possibility is that they are just completely unconnected. One is about the ‘space of reasons’, another about the space of something else.
But this possibility is hard to square with the idea that intentions are causal elements in processes which, often enough, result in the body moving. It seems that the practical reasoning has to influence the motor processes, and perhaps conversely too. As Elisabeth suggested in a ground-breaking ‘dynamic theory of intentions’ (Pacherie, 2008, p. 181ff.), it is plausible that motor representations can inherit goals from, and be influenced by, intentions (pp.~186--7).
Just here we face a practical problem. Because of the separation of concerns, there very little research on how the two stories---the one about intentions and practical reasoning, and the one about motor representations and processes---might join up.
So it is that the interface problem falls into the gap between philosophers’ concerns with practical reasoning and scientists’ concerns with motor control. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

compatible stories about different things?

This is how I think many philosophers implicity see things.
It is attractive insofar as you think of motor representatoins as concerned with mere joint displacements and bodily configurations.
You can therefore say that what the motor representations are related to are not actions at all.

contradictory stories about one thing?

This would be fatal, I think, because the stories have complementary strengths and limits.

aspects of a single larger story?

So we would ideally find a way to combine them as aspects of a single larger story. But, as we will see, that is not straightforward at all. In fact I do not know how this can be done and I will set this as a research question for you.

very roughly, action comprises

goal selection

(habitual vs goal-directed)

and

goal execution

(???)

Note that you need also lecture 09 for some of these questions (the material for them is not contained in just one lecture)
∞todo return to these later!

essay questions related to todays lecture

How, if at all, should a philosophical theory of action incorporate scientific discoveries about the control of action?

Could some motor representations be intentions?

Which psychological structures enable agents to coordinate their plans? What if anything do these mechanisms reveal about how acting together differs from acting in parallel but merely individually?

How, if at all, should a philosophical theory of acting together incorporate scientific discoveries about the interpersonal coordination of action?

problem of action problem of joint action we do need shared intention Bratman's planning theory Pacherie's team reason- ing theory collective goals we don't need shared intention dyadic motor plans we do need intention motor representa- tion habitual processes we don't need intention } }
This is one thing we will explore using material from today in letcure 9
Will need to do this, but first ...

problem of action

‘The history of philosophical reflection on action gives the distinction between activity and passivity different names, and attempts to explain the distinction in different ways.

But philosophers circle the distinction repeatedly [...].

Aristotle wants to know the difference between being cut and cutting.

Hobbes wants to know the difference between vital motions, like the motion of the blood, and voluntary motion, as in bodily action.

Wittgenstein wants to know the difference between my arm going up and my raising it.’

(Shepherd, 2021, p. 1)

‘Now what is an action? Not one thing, but a series of two things: the state of mind called a volition, followed by an effect. The volition or intention to produce the effect, is one thing; the effect produced in consequence of the intention, is another thing; the two together constitute the action.’

Mill, System of Logic (1.3.6) quoted in Hyman (2015, p. 218)

instrumental actions can have parts
which are themselves instrumental actions

Intention to produce the effect
Speech actions also complex ...
And those component actions are instrumental ...
Each phonetic gesture involves a complex, coordinated movement of lips, larynx, tounge and velum that is sensitive to context.

Jusczyk (1997, p. 44)

A \emph{very small scale action} is one that is typically distantly related as a descendent by the means-end relation to the actions which are sometimes described as ‘small scale’ actions, such as playing a sonata, cooking a meal or painting a house (Bratman, 2014, p. 8).

instrumental actions

Small Scale

Very Small Scale

adding the egg to the mix

grasping the egg

uttering a word

making a phonetic gesture

Why care about very small scale instrumental actions?

Josh’s book mentions reaching just a few times, and more often in a metaphorical sense than in a literal one.
John’s book mentions grasping only in a metaphorical sense.
But we should care about them because (i) they are instrumental actions (they have a goal and can succeed or fail relative to that goal); (ii) they typically involve complex, temporally extended coordination; and (iii) there is a tricky question to answer about them ...

What is the relation between an instrumental action and the outcome or outcomes to which it is directed?

We encountered this question when discussing instrumental action at the start of the course. Ayesha ends up soaking Zak's trousers. She says 'The goal of my action was not to soak your trousers but to fill your glass'. The question is what makes that true. Why is this action—the filling of the glass—the goal and note some other action?
light
smoke
open
pour
tilt
soak
scare
freak out
fill
intention or habitual process
or ???
coordinates
specifies

What is the relation between an instrumental action and the outcome or outcomes to which it is directed?

The same question arises for very small scale actions.
To illustrate ... on the left you see an actor pushing a ball; on the right you see an actor part way through grapsing a ball. But what makes it true that these actions are directed to those outcomes?
You might say: well it's just a matter of what the outcomes are. But of course you can be attempting to grasp something and accidentally end up pushing it (and conversely).

intention

The outcome is related to the action via an intention.

The intention specifies an outcome.

The intention causes the actions in a way that would normally increase the probability of the specified outcome ocurring.

<-- does not work for very small scale actions

(in general, there may be some exceptions)

(also, habitual processes will not solve this)

Because there are cases where the very small scale actions do not involve habitual processes at all (and also because, in habitual processes, the stimulius–outcome links can specify outcomes at a more complex level than the very small scale.)
(Can make some progress by having chains of actions linked together by habitual processes; but will still bottom out in very small scale instumental actions.)

plan

1. What is the relation between a very small scale instrumental action and the outcome or outcomes to which it is directed?

2. How, if at all, does answering this question challenge the Standard Answer to the Problem of Action?

3. Is there a parallel set of issues concerning joint action?

Any questions about the plan? Take a break.