Mechanism (biology)

In the science of biology, a mechanism is a system of causally interacting parts and processes that produce one or more effects. Scientists explain phenomena by describing mechanisms that could produce the phenomena. For example, natural selection is a mechanism of biological evolution; other mechanisms of evolution include genetic drift, mutation, and gene flow. In ecology, mechanisms such as predation and host-parasite interactions produce change in ecological systems. In practice, no description of a mechanism is ever complete because not all details of the parts and processes of a mechanism are fully known. For example, natural selection is a mechanism of evolution that includes countless, inter-individual interactions with other individuals, components, and processes of the environment in which natural selection operates.

Many characterizations/definitions of mechanisms in the philosophy of science/biology have been provided in the past decades. For example, one influential characterization of neuro- and molecular biological mechanisms is as follows: mechanisms are entities and activities organized such that they are productive of regular changes from start to termination conditions (Peter Machamer, Lindley Darden, & Carl Craver 2000; 'MDC' hereafter). Other characterizations have been proposed by Stuart Glennan (1996, 2002), who articulates an interactionist account of mechanisms, and William Bechtel (1993, 2006), who emphasizes parts and operations (cf. MDC).

The MDC characterization is as follows: mechanisms are entities and activities organized such that they are productive of changes from start conditions to termination conditions. There are three distinguishable aspects of this characterization:

Mechanisms in science/biology have reappeared as a subject of philosophical analysis and discussion in the last several decades because of a variety of factors, many of which relate to metascientific issues such as explanation and causation. For example, the decline of Covering Law (CL) models of explanation, e.g., Hempel's deductive-nomological model, has stimulated interest how mechanisms might play an explanatory role in certain domains of science, especially higher-level disciplines such as biology (i.e., neurobiology, molecular biology, neuroscience, and so on). This is not just because of the philosophical problem of giving some account of what "laws of nature," which CL models encounter, but also the incontrovertible fact that most biological phenomena are not characterizable in nomological terms (i.e., in terms of lawful relationships). For example, protein biosynthesis does not occur according to any law, and therefore, on the DN model, no explanation for the biosynthesis phenomenon could be given.

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