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    Explanations of behavior in terms of desires are not alwa... — Carmelics
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    Home/Consciousness & Mind
    HistoryEditSee Inverse

    Explanations of behavior in terms of desires are not always necessary or superior to explanations in terms of drives

    Consciousness & Mind
    ?Rate how convincing each reason is below to see the overall strength.
    2 reasons for
    1 reason against

    Reasons For

    2 perspectives
    Reason for 1 of 2
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    • 1.Homeostatic drive models (e.g., Hull's drive-reduction theory) successfully predict motivated behavior without positing propositional attitude content.
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    • 2.Intentional desire-based explanations introduce a layer of representational complexity that violates parsimony when mechanistic drive accounts achieve equal predictive accuracy.
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    • 3.Occam's razor in theory selection favors drive explanations that invoke fewer ontological commitments when empirical adequacy is held constant.
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    Reason for 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Freud's and later Panksepp's affective neuroscience tradition demonstrates that subcortical drive systems generate directed behavior prior to and independent of cortical representational states.
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    • 2.If behavior can be fully caused by non-representational affective drive states, desire-based folk-psychological explanations are post-hoc rationalizations rather than genuine causal accounts.
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    Reasons Against

    1 perspective
    Reason against
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    • 1.Plausible explanations of an agent's behavior in terms of desires can sometimes be replaced by equally good explanations in terms of drives
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    • 2.Drives can be construed in terms of more basic mechanisms without ascribing representational content
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    Consciousness & Mind

    Related

    Drives can be construed in terms of more basic mechanisms without ascribing repr...Freud's and later Panksepp's affective neuroscience tradition demonstrates that ...Homeostatic drive models (e.g., Hull's drive-reduction theory) successfully pred...If behavior can be fully caused by non-representational affective drive states, ...
    +3 moreShow less
    Intentional desire-based explanations introduce a layer of representational comp...Occam's razor in theory selection favors drive explanations that invoke fewer on...Plausible explanations of an agent's behavior in terms of desires can sometimes ...

    Similar

    Plausible explanations of an agent's behavior in terms of desires can ...91%Behavior caused by beliefs and desires is necessary but not sufficient...78%Belief and desire are each necessary but insufficient individually for...78%If reasons are grounded in desires, then reasons are mind-dependent78%

    Source

    AI-extracted1/3 agreementValid
    SEP: agency
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    We have a pervasive tendency to interpret and explain behavior in terms of intentional mental states. We tend, even, to interpret the interaction between animated objects in terms of desires, beliefs, and intentions (Heider and Simmel 1944). This raises the question of when it is appropriate to attribute mental states in the explanation of behavior. According to an instrumentalist stance (Dennett 1987: Ch. 2), the question of when it is appropriate to ascribe mental states cannot be separated fr
    Extraction notes

    Validity: Extracted via Max plan + API grounding/validity checks

    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (2 for, 1 against)
    Edits
    1 edit