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Synthesizing Activities and Interactions in the Concept of a Mechanism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

James G. Tabery
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Abstract

Stuart Glennan, and the team of Peter Machamer, Lindley Darden, and Carl Craver have recently provided two accounts of the concept of a mechanism. The main difference between these two versions rests on how the behavior of the parts of the mechanism is conceptualized. Glennan considers mechanisms to be an interaction of parts, where the interaction between parts can be characterized by direct, invariant, change-relating generalizations. Machamer, Darden, and Craver criticize traditional conceptualizations of mechanisms which are based solely on parts interacting and introduce a new concept—activity. This essay is an attempt at carving out a relationship between these two philosophical interpretations of a mechanism. I will claim that, rather than being in conflict, Glennan's concept of interaction and Machamer, Darden, and Craver's notion of activity actually complement one another, each emphasizing a missing element of the other.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 71 , Issue 1 , January 2004 , pp. 1 - 15
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

I benefited greatly from discussions with Carl Craver, Lindley Darden, and Stuart Glennan regarding their respective positions and my own. Peter Machamer, especially, has provided me with extensive feedback on multiple drafts of this work. Thanks also to Jim Bogen, Ingo Brigandt, Megan Delehanty, Paul Griffiths, Brian Hepburn, Alan Love, Robert Poage, Stathis Psillos, Dirk Schlimm, Daniel Sirtes, and Christian Wüthrich for helpful comments on earlier drafts. Forms of this paper were presented at the 5th Annual CMU/Pittsburgh Graduate Conference in Philosophy (March 2003, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) and the 4th Athens-Pittsburgh Symposium in the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (June 2003, Athens, Greece). Conversations with a number of conference participants helped me to clarify ideas on this topic.

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