[FRIAM] Behavior??

[Prof David West]

Glen made a comment,  "humans don't have intention when they wink sarcastically." This triggered a memory of Clifford Geertz channeling Gilbert Ryle. Just before seeing Glen's comment I was reading a book on Influence and encountered some ethology and together they prompted a whole series of questions about behavior.

First a quote from Geertz/Ryle

"Consider two boys rapidly contracting the eyelids of their right eyes. In one, this is an involuntary twitch; in the other, a conspiritorial signal to a friend. The two movements are, as movements, identical; from an I-am-a-camera, "phenomenalistic" observation of them alone, one could not tell which was twitch and which was wink ... Yet the difference, however unphotographical, is vast. ... the winker is communicating ... 1) deliberately, 2) to someone in particular, 3) to impart a particular message, 4) according to a socially established code, and 5) without the cognizance of the rest of the company. That however is just the beginning. Suppose a third boy winks in an amateurish, clumsy, and obvious manner — he is parodying the wink ... not conspiracy, but ridicule is in the air. Complexities are possible, if not practically without end, at least logically so."

Then the ethology material

"Turkey mothers are good mothers—loving, watchful and protective. Virtually all of this mothering is triggered by one thing: the "cheep-cheep" sound of young turkey chicks.  For a mother turkey the polecat is a natural enemy whose approach is to be greeted with squawking, pecking, clawing rage. If a stuffed model of a polecat  is drawn by string to a mother turkey it evokes the appropriate offensive behavior, but if the same model has a hidden tape recorder that emits the "cheep-cheep" sound the mother not only accepts the oncoming polecat, but gathers it beneath her.

This kind of "fixed action pattern" can involve intricate sequences of behavior, such as entire courtship or mating rituals. (see attachement). The interesting aspect of this is how the sequences are activated — with a "trigger feature;" e.g. a particular shade of red or blue chest feathers, but not a perfect replica of a rival bird absent colored chest feathers.

Then my questions.

1- Is a "behavior" always a movement plus an X-factor?
   1A. is the X-factor other nuances of movement, e.g. rippling eyelashes on the contracted eyelid?
   1B. is the X-factor an intentional signal? or is it "meaning." is intention required?

2- Is behavior compositional? e.g. squawking, pecking, clawing behavioral "atoms" compose to an anti-polecat behavioral composition? (thinking of some kind of analog with atom --> molecule --> cell -- organism)

3- If meaning | signalling | intention is a required aspect of behavior, from whence it cometh?

4- is "behaviorism" necessarily a subset of semiology?

5- If behavior is compositional, are there rules or regularities of composition?

6- Can culture be seen as a collection of allowable patterns of composed behaviors?

7- Is it necessary to have a well developed discipline of what is observed outside the black box before attempting to infer what is within and whatever that might be, its relation to what is observed outside?

davew

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