There are different ways of knowing how to do something - you can think you know how to do it, and understand everything about how you should do it properly in your mind, but when it comes to doing it, it doesn't actually work out that way. This is important because it shows different ways of understanding how the world works, one way is a practical one and the other way is an internal one that you can think about to yourself.
For example, when you are doing something that you know how to do, you might do it automatically without thinking, or you may pause and think about how to do it or what you are doing throughout the process.
People seek reasons and explanations for their intentions. When you intend to do something, you usually know why you want to do it, however you might also seek additional reasons and explanation. Sometimes you are in a state of mind where it is more appropriate to seek reasons. If you are intending to do something, then you might be looking for additional reasons why you want to do it.
When you intend to do something, some combination of beliefs and facts goes through your mind. You have reasons to do it, and you are thinking about the beliefs and facts that you will use when you do it. For instance even something simple, like turning on a light switch, you have the belief that switching it on will turn on the light, and you have the fact that almost every time you did that before the light did indeed turn on. That is a simple example, there are much more complicated and even unconscious beliefs and facts that you understand before doing certain actions.
Actions, simple or compound, are events. For instance, anything that happens takes a certain amount of time to happen - this is an event. People label a certain complicated number of things happening into an 'event'- such as a game or a meal or a party. Every action can be a part of a larger whole - drinking is a part of the event 'meal'. The 'meal' is part of the event 'visiting friends'. Everything in life is part of something larger, and everything has its own smaller components. Practically people keep this simple and don't overly analyze the details, but it can be done.
One action may have many significant properties. This would be the different ways of describing events or the parts in them. So for instance while drinking is a part of a meal, the drink tasting good is a property of the drink or 'drinking'. Furthermore, there is a certain relationship between the descriptions - 'tasted good' - and the events - 'drinking'. The relationships are always casual, conventional and circumstantial. In the casual case the drink tasting good is made true because drinks are liquid and liquid often tastes good. In the conventional case drinks taste good because of a rule - all food or liquid has a certain taste. In the circumstantial case the drink tastes good because you happened to find a drink that tasted good. So, as you see, there are these different ways of looking at and analyzing how the properties of an event or action relate to the event or action. Also, these properties are ways of describing the action.
Actions are events that are intentionally performed by agents. Actions are events that are brought about immediately by the agent. If they aren't brought about immediately, then something else is doing the action, and it isn't the action of the original agent, it is the action of the second agent or third or fourth, etc, agent. An action is performed intentionally if it has one intentional description - you can describe how it was the intention of the agent. If you foresee that you are going to do an action, it still wouldn't be intentional unless you desire to do the action (have a pro-attitude about it). If you don't desire to do an action you might knowingly be doing the action, but that doesn't mean that you are intentionally doing it. When you do something with intent, you have a better understanding that you are doing that action - there are many things you could do with little understanding that you are doing it, but then it isn't really intentional. If, on the other hand, you have a desire to do the action, then it is probably more intentional.
Actions may be intentional under various aspects. So one action may be the best option for you, it is more intentional than other things you might have intended. An action might also be partially not intended, for instance some of the action you are doing could be a more automatic process (such as the movements of your muscles), and if viewed that way that part of the action isn't as intentional.
Any intentional description can be quoted in explanation of an action. Explanations are relative to background knowledge. Explanations may start off more basic and simple, and progress towards more complex ones or the final, satisfactory explanation that shows the goal.
An explanation for an action is best when it eliminates the other possible explanations for that action. An explanation should point towards causes, not otherwise irrelevant factors. However, if the background knowledge of the person you are explaining the action to is insufficient, it may fail to count as an explanation because of the way in which it engages with the background knowledge of those seeking enlightenment. A statement which explains an event must give us a casual understanding; and the understanding it gives us must be an advance on the cognitive status quo. In a phrase, the explanation of an event must advance us in the search for the event's causes.
Three sorts of advancement in casual understanding, and there may well be others, can be characterized as causal embedding, casual excavation and casual enrichment. We embed an event casually when we point to its immediate origin; we excavate it when we turn up its remoter springs; and we we enrich it when we see how one or another features is the legacy of its ancestors.
A description provides a good explanation when it advances us in our search for the causes of the action. The first explanation of an action is most simple - it points to its obvious or immediate origin - the further explanations progressively reveal more and more. The explanation of an action also shows how the action was the desire or belief of the person doing the action. They desired to see that action done, that is why it was intentional on their part. It may also be the belief of the person doing the action that the action is being done. Furthermore, as the action progresses, so too will the desires, beliefs and understanding about it progress.
The desires and beliefs people have when performing actions can vary from very simple ones (usually for instance when someone is performing a simple action), to very complex ones (for instance some sort of complex motivation or goal). There is also the potential appeal of promise-keeping. With some actions the goal you have is very strong or motivated, and you 'promise' to yourself that the goal is going to be achieved.
What we seek now is a feature in the perceived appeal of promise keeping which would let us understand the surprising property in the desire it occasions, that the desire prevails over powerful competing urges. What feature in the cause could have passed on this property to the effect?
There are at least four different ways in which the casual enrichment required in this question is provided. All of them have in common that they locate the operative feature of the prompting cause in the agent. The first would relate it in a long term policy or commitment on the agent's part, the second to the agent's motivational profile, the third to his character or personality, and the fourth to his social position. The idea is that the perceived appeal of promise keeping, granted that is has the feature of engaging someone with such and such a policy, profile, personality or position, passes on to the desire occasioned the property of outweighing certain opposed desires. Some remarks will be useful on the invocation of the factors mentioned since the explanations in which they appear constitute the major action accounting varieties over and beyond the explanations, i.e. the explanations of (non-ultimate) desires.
So some motivating factors are long-term policies or commitments on the part of the agent, his or her motivations, character or personality, and their social position. These desires might overcome various opposed desires.
An agent has a policy, such as the policy of keeping promises come what may, when he makes an unconditional judgment in favor of those actions which he sees is future offing for him, that fulfill promises. It is not just that he finds them qua fulfillments of promises attractive or compelling, a state which would leave him free not to perform them, finding them unattractive under other aspects. He selects in all their particularity those actions that he foresees; he decides resolutely for them. Such a policy resembles a state of intending something in this regard. What distinguishes it is that whereas the intending is fulfilled by a single action, however complex, the policy remains intact and directive no matter how many actions have satisfied it.
So, basically, a person has the same motivations for the actions he or she does over time. He intends one thing, and then does many actions that will fill this intention. Even when he accomplishes his intention, the drive behind the intention is still there.
An agents motivational profile is constituted by the state of his emotions and drives. Emotions are passing states of feeling which are not associated with any very restricted class of action: fear and jealousy, shame and joy, despair and sadness, may sensitize agents to any of a number of promptings and may lead to any of a variety of actions. They are associated with characteristic circumstances of arousal and they usually issue in distinctive involuntary expressions. Drives on the other hand are passing states of feeling which are pointed much more definitively towards particular tracks of behavior: avarice and envy, revenge and ambition, hunger and lust, are primarily identified by the promptings to which they make us responsive and the actions which they lead us to perform. Like emotions they have characteristic circumstances of arousal but they do not have such distinctive involuntary expressions. As states of feeling, emotions and drives have in common the fact that it does not make sense, as it would with a policy, to think of an agent revoking them: they are conceived of as unwilled, if sometimes welcome, visitations.
Clearly emotions and drives are going to lead people to do various actions. They would also help motivate and power certain actions while the person is doing them. Drives might prompt us to do things, and emotions might also make us more responsive to our desires to perform actions.
An agents character or personality consists in deeply enduring and only partially controllable habits of mind and heart whereby he may be distinguished from other individuals. It is often described by the use of words associated with certain emotions and drives, the implication being that the agent has a susceptibility to those states. Thus we have fearful and jealous, avaricious and envious, people as well as having the emotions of fear and jealousy and the drives of avarice and envy. Personality is often characterized too, not by habits of the sensibility but by habits of thought. When we speak of someone as obsessional or judgmental, or when we characterize his belief patterns as fascist or xenophobic, we are ascribing personality just as much as when we describe his affective dispositions. In either case we are focusing on something in the agent which, like his policies or her motivational profile, may mean that a given prompting occasions a distinctively powerful desire.
So, depending on a persons personality, different triggers are going to elicit different drives and motivations. When you describe someones beliefs, actions and values you are describing their personality as well. You could label certain characteristics of a response that is associated with certain emotions or drives.
Finally, an agent's social position, in a slightly unusual use of the phrase, is the frame constituted by the relationships with other people which constrain his behavior at any time. The traffic warden seeing children safely across the road, the bank clerk considering a request for credit, the tourist office attendant giving information to visitors: these are examples of people who so long as they exercise the activities described are in highly visibly social positions. Like the other factors mentioned, position is something on the side of the agent which can mean that a given stimulus to desire is exceptionally potent, and that the desire occasioned has the feature of readily prevailing over competitors.
Meaning generation is the way someone interprets the world, the meaning they make from various stimulus. They then can use this meaning as 'meaning action' - which is the behaviors that follow because of the meaning that was generated (or just the action that follows directly from the meaning you interpret).
First, we shall compare the two processes from the viewpoint of eliciting conditions. Whereas meaning action is initiated by the representation of incoming stimuli, meaning generate is initiated either by the initial meaning established through meaning action or by both the stimulus representation and previously established meaning values. The latter is the case when no initial meaning could be established at all, or not to the degree and extent sufficient for eliciting some defensive or adaptive response. Under these circumstances the combination of the meaning values attained through meaning action generally yields such an ambiguous profile, full of gaps and uncertainty nodes, that the representation of the original stimulus, insofar as it still exists or can be reconstructed or reestablished, must be resorted to.[6]
So if you have some sort of meaning that is generated in your mind, then incoming stimulus could trigger a behavioral response - or meaning action. Or a response could be elicited by both your understanding and your previously established understanding. If you cannot establish a new understanding, you probably are going to rely on a previous one. The way your mind interprets everything is so complex that you might just resort to your initial response (or intellectual representation) that you had about the stimulus.
Second, from the viewpoint of function, the task of meaning action is to establish those meaning values which by virtue of their signal or cue function may trigger adequate defensive or adaptive responses, or, alternately, orienting responses. Thus the role of meaning action could not be regarded as providing for a full-fledged identification of the input. Nonetheless, the combination of the meaning values yielded by meaning action makes possible some kind of identification of input. It is, however, a highly restricted or general identification, because it is established merely for the purposes of immediate reaction. As a rule, initial meaning does not include anything that might correspond to a "conception" of the input but only the bare minimum of meaning values with signal value. At its poorest, initial meaning consists only of one meaning value, as in the case of the male stickleback, who in the breeding season attacks within his territory anything with a red patch, the patch sufficing to identify an adult male stickleback with the nuptial marking of an intensely red throat and belly. At its best, however, initial meaning includes a few meaning values that may mediate identification in a pars-pro-toto manner. In contrast, the task of meaning generation is to establish comprehensive meaning, which not only provides for identification of the input on a much broader basis but also includes the personal relevance of the stimulus situation for the individual. By virtue of its orientative contents this comprehensive meaning predisposes the individual toward a certain course of molar action. Thus, comprehensive meaning is anchored in action, unfolds for the sake of action, and directs action to no less degree than initial meaning. But while the orientative impact of initial meaning is much more immediate and direct, the orientative impact of comprehensive meaning is the product of more meaning values, interrelated through more complex relations, and subjected to further cognitive elaborations. Hence the bond of comprehensive meaning to action is less direct and immediate, more complex and equivocal. However, it is evident that molar no less than submolar behavior is directed and shaped by meaning from its origins to its completion, marked by evaluation of its outcomes. Even exploratory behavior is not elicited automatically whenever repeated meaning actions following several evocations of orienting responses have failed to establish an adequate and sufficient initial meaning. As in the case of other forms of molar behavior, its elicitation depends on the products of meaning generation and certain elaborations of these products.
So a stimulus-response could be very simple, like how insects respond to each other. Humans respond sometimes in a similar fashion, they take only one stimulus or trigger and respond based off of just that, without conceptualizing it or interpreting something in a more complex way. There is going to be some sort of personal relevance a stimulus has for the person, this is going to make the response and the mental processing involved much more complicated.
Third, from the viewpoint of processes, meaning action may be described as scanning stored schemata, reconstructing these schemata into meaning values, and matching these reconstructed models against the stimulus representation. This set of processes, designed to establish initial meaning, is enacted at least party in parallel. Meaning generation, too, is anchored in this triad of scanning-reconstructing-matching processes, but each process in the triad is more elaborate than in the case of meaning action. Within the framework of meaning generation more meaning dimensions are used as questions, general hypotheses, or restricted expectations that guide the scanning process. Moreover, the scanning procedures themselves may be more complex. If we assume that there exist search strategies different in complexity and refinement, then meaning action is restricted to the use of the simplest, fastest, and most superficial strategy, whereas meaning generation also utilizes the more elaborate, intensive, and sophisticated ones. Similarly, in meaning action reconstructing is manifested mainly in combining the retrieved elements into some kind of model; in meaning generation it is manifested also in generating the elements to be combined in the model. As a consequence of the relative complexity of scnaning and reconstructing, the product of meaning generation and the matching procedure to which it is subjected iwht regard to the input representation are also far more elaborate. For example, as compared to initial meaning, comprehensive meaning consists of many more meaning values representing many more meaning dimensions. In fact, potentially any of the 21 meaning dimensions may be used. The relations between the meaning values themselves are rendered more complex, for instance, by bonding two meaning values, each reflecting a different meaning dimension, by means of a relation reflecting a third meaning dimension different from those reflected by the bonded meaning values. Also, the complexity of the relations increases in view of the fact that any two meaning values may be related in terms of more than one relation, and may be embedded within the context of several unites of interrelated meaning values. This would exemplify enhanced use of the principle of successive contextual embedding characteristic of meaning. Further, the relations between meaning values and the referent are also richer in the case of comprehensive meaning. Whereas initial meaning makes use primarily of the attributive and comparative relations and perhaps minimally also of the exemplifying-illustrative relation between meaning value and referent, comprehensive meaning also uses to no small extent the metaphoric-symbolic relation. This implies that comprehensive meaning also includes elements of personal-subjective symbolic meanings and not only components of interpersonally shared lexical meaning. Inclusion of personal symbolic components introduces into comprehensive meaning the complex interaction characteristic of this mode of meaning. In sum, both meaning action and meaning generation are sets of processes for the elaboration of meaning. Yet since meaning generation uses more widely and extensively the available possibilities for the elaboration of meaning, the product of meaning generation is richer in contents, more complex and differentiated in structure, as well as stronger and more general in impact than the product of meaning action.
Meaning-action, which is the meaning your mind uses when directing behavior, is more simple than meaning-generation, which is how your mind develops more rich, complex information and meaning. In meaning-action your mind can scan stored ideas that you have and use them in its behaviors, and it uses it for initial meaning. When meaning is generated, the same triad of scanning-reconstructing-matching processes is used, only it is more complex. With meaning-generation, new models are formed, with meaning-action, stored models are used (as this is faster). You generate new meaning when you have to think in new ways, compare different sets of ideas together, look at the information presented to you in a new light. Personal-subjective and metaphoric-symbolic meaning is also interpreted in the overall meaning (or comprehensive-meaning). There are much more advanced processes your mind can use when not directly trying to respond to stimulus as it does with behavior, when it thinks more deeply much more complex constructs are formed.
Fourth, from the viewpoint of major directing factors, it should be stressed that the only focal object of meaning action is the exteroceptive and/or proprioceptive input. Meaning action is designed merely to furnish material for answering the question "What is it?" insofar as it refers to the input. The relation between the resulting answer or absence of answer, on the one hand, and the ensuing response, on the other hand, is regulated either by innate factors or by prior learning. In any case, the meaning values established through meaning action suffice to higher levels of elaboration. Whatever the result, there is clearly no need for assuming a "What-to-do?" question in addition to the basic "What-is-it?" question. In contrast, meaning generation is assumed to establish the comprehensive meaning of the input. This also includes the personal relevance of the input. Hence, meaning generation is regulated by two focal questions, "What does it mean?" and "What does it mean to me and for me?" Whereas the first question is an elaborate form of the central question "What is it?" that guides meaning action, the second question is new and specific to meaning generation. It raises the issues of personal relevance, but only insofar as action is concerned. For the sake of clarifying this question it seems advisable to present it also in some rephrased forms, such as, "Does it affect me at all?", "In what way does it affect me?", "Am I concerned in any way?", "Should I be concerned?", "Am I moved personally?", "Should I be involved?", "Is any action required on my part?", "Am I to act or not?" Foreshadowing concepts and processes explained and discussed later, we venture to introduce yet another more technical rephrasing of the same question: "In which sense(s) does it or may it affect (or concern) my goals, my norms, my beliefs about myself, and my beliefs about the environment or any of its aspects?" Evidently, the formulation "What odes ti mean to me or for me?" is merely a label summarizing these different variants of the question.
So for all the stimuli in your environment (when you see something or when you need to think about something that you become aware of), your mind asks yourself various questions (unconsciously) such as, "Does this involve me personally", "Am I to be moved or not", "What is it", "What does it mean", "Am I to act or not", etc. This is important because, unconsciously without your awareness, you are asking yourself these questions about various inputs and things in your environment all of the time. You are constantly analyzing things and going through a complex thought process that you aren't aware of.
Fifth, from the viewpoint of conditions specifying termination of the process, meaning action and meaning generation again differ markedly. Meaning action either terminates when meaning values are established that trigger innate or conditioned responses, or it develops gradually into meaning generation owing to the occurrence of signals for molar action. The conditions under which meaning generation terminates are far less clearly delineated. All too often the meaning values established in the course of meaning generation do not pertain directly to the referent, that is, the input itself, but to aspects of its meaning established in previous stages of meaning processing. Thus, they are meaning values of meaning values. This is obviously the case with regard to those aspects of comprehensive meaning that relate to the personal relevance of the input. In principle, meaning generation could go on for a very long time. Moreover, even in the next stage of cognitive elaboration, conditions may arise that necessitate repeated meaning generation in order to produce missing information. Thus, in a certain sense, meaning generation overlaps with the next stage, or at least is kept smoldering in anticipation of further possible utilizaiton. Hence the difficulty of specifying precisely when meaning generation stops. In practice, however, meaning generation subsides and is replace by other forms of cognitive activity when sufficient information has accumulated to make possible an answer to the question "What does it mean to me and for me?" insofar as action is concerned. If the answer specifies "action is required," the next stage of cognitive elaboration is initiated by the new question, "What am I to do?" If, however, the answer is "no action required," meaning generation does not necessarily stop. It may continue for a while in order to attain adequate coding for the purpose of memory storage or simply for the sake of curiosity or maintaining cognitive activity. Yet it usually terminates because new inputs may dominate the scene of cognitive processing.
So the thinking process that involves behavior (meaning action) terminates when a behavior response is necessary. So that means that you think, then you stop thinking when you need to respond with a behavior. Or you start thinking about the way in which you are going to actually do the response instead of thinking about the 'meaning' behind it. Meaning generation, on the other hand, can continue in a long string of connected ideas, not necessarily connected to the stimulus. Your mind is kept aware of if this information might be useful in the current world you are in. That would be the question, "What does it mean to me and for me". When people think, that question is always being considered unconsciously. Your mind then asks the questions, "Is action required", and then "What am I to do?".
Beliefs are different from how your mind processes 'meanings':
First, a belief is a cognitive unit and not a behavior or a predisposition to behavior. This is another of the major features distinguishing the concepts of belief and attitude. In contrast to attitude, which is often regarded as a predisposition to action and sometimes as referring to actual emotions, perceptions, or behaviors, belief remains always sharply distinct from the behavioral output. Unlike attitude it cannot even be inferred from any behavioral act other than verbal or nonverbal communication of the belief. Similarly, an important reason that precludes identifying belief with a proposition in the logical sense is that a proposition depends on the possibility of assigning to the statement a truth value, which is often equivalent to the operational implications of the proposition. Nonetheless, belief has behavioral implications, which are reflected in what we call its orientative aspect. Since the orientative value of a belief may change indefinitely in different contexts it makes no sense to us to identify belief with its behavioral implications or, for that matter, with its truth functional value.
Beliefs are less related to actual behaviors than predispositions to behaviors and attitudes. Attitudes are similar to behaviors because they are emotional in the current time, and that is going to influence behavior or be a predisposition to action. You cannot infer or guess beliefs like you can guess someones attitude. Beliefs still have behavioral implications, however. They orient a person towards certain actions - a person with such and such beliefs is likely to perform such and such actions.