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In late twentieth century philosophy of science, the term “mechanism” came to stand for a kind of theoretical structure according to which some capacity or behavior of a whole or an endstate of a process is explained in terms of the organization and activities of components or antecedents.
To that end, funding agencies, including the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, ... Working across subfields, this fact can be a barrier to developing a consistent definition of mechanism. In systems neuroscience, I think the definition implied by mechanism is one of a more strictly physical causal chain, whereby ...
: a doctrine that holds natural processes (as of life) to be mechanically determined and capable of complete explanation by the laws of physics and chemistry. 4. : the fundamental processes involved in or responsible for an action, reaction, or other natural phenomenon.
Bechtel and Abrahamsen: ‘A mechanism is a structure performing a function in virtue of its component parts, component operations, and their organization. The orchestrated functioning of the mechanism is responsible for one or more phenomena.’ (Bechtel and Abrahamsen 2005 p423.)
In biology, a mechanism is a system of causally interacting parts and processes that produce one or more effects. [1] Phenomena can be explained by describing their mechanisms. For example, natural selection is a mechanism of evolution; other mechanisms of evolution include genetic drift, mutation, and gene flow.
Defined as the combination of components working together to achieve a specific function or movement, mechanisms play a crucial role in various fields, from explaining natural phenomena in science to designing intricate systems in engineering.
Mechanisms at a Glance. Mechanisms allow us to understand complex systems (e.g., physiological or social systems) and can help us to explain, predict, and intervene. An important subclass of mechanisms is characterised by the following working definition:
Molecules move within the cell or from one cell to another through different strategies. Transport may be in the form of simple diffusion, facilitated diffusion, active transport, osmosis, endocytosis, exocytosis, epithelial transport, or glandular secretion. This tutorial provides elaborate details on each of these mechanisms. Find out how. ..
historical perspective of the concept of mechanism as well as detailed case studies of biological mechanisms (such as apoptosis). It develops a new position, Methodological Mechanism, according to which mechanisms are to be viewed as causal pathways that are theoretically described and are underpinned by networks of di erence-making relations.
MECHANISM meaning: 1 : a piece of machinery a mechanical part or group of parts having a particular function; 2 : a process or system that is used to produce a particular result