How Do Computational Models in the Cognitive and Brain Sciences Explain?
Eur J of Neuroscience. 2025-01-01; 61(2):
DOI: 10.1111/ejn.16655
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ABSTRACTThe nature of explanation is an important area of inquiry in philosophy of science. Consensus has been that explanation in the cognitive and brain sciences is typically a special case of causal explanation, specifically, mechanistic explanation. But recently there has been increased attention to computational explanation in the brain sciences and to whether that can be understood as a variety of mechanistic explanation. After laying out the stakes for a proper understanding of scientific explanation, we consider the status of computational explanation in the brain sciences by comparing the mechanistic proposal to computational accounts advanced by Piccinini, Milkowski, Cao, Chirimuuta and Ross. We argue that many of these accounts of computational explanation in neuroscience can satisfy the same explanatory criteria as causal explanations, but not all. This has implications for interpretation of those computational explanations that satisfy different criteria.