The authors propose a practical test for theories of mind and brain: specify how the world would look differently if mental efficacy were absent. They suggest that the influence of intentions might show up not as clearer patterns but as extra unpredictability in brain activity. By measuring changes in information-theoretic entropy, researchers could treat certain kinds of variability—formerly dismissed as noise—as a signal of goal-directed processes. The paper names this intentional contribution “irruption,” providing a way to quantify what was previously uncaptured.
For anyone interested in human potential, this idea has immediate implications. If meaningful aspects of thought can be detected through their effect on variability, new methods might better track learning, creativity, or clinical recovery. Follow the full article to see how this reframing could change experiments, influence therapies, and open paths to more inclusive measures of mental life that respect both brain data and lived experience.
Abstract
Cognitive neuroscience faces a measurement problem: core features of the human mind cannot be directly observed in the brain. For example, intentions are efficacious in behavior generation yet cannot be reduced to the sub-personal quantities of neural activity without losing their purpose-driven, normative character. This instrumental limitation is fundamental yet remains insufficiently recognized. To bring this issue to the forefront and reorient the field toward a solution, this brief commentary argues that theories of the mind–brain relation must meet the “Participation Criterion”: they must specify what measurable difference the presence of mental efficacy produces compared to its absence. When the Participation Criterion is accepted alongside the measurement problem, a feasible solution arises: the dynamical relevance of unobservable mental efficacy may manifest indirectly as increased unpredictability of observable brain activity, quantifiable via information-theoretic entropy. The concept of “irruption” is introduced to specifically formalize this efficacy-derived part of unexplained variability, thereby reframing context-dependent “noise” in the brain as a key signature of the intentional mind at work. The theoretical proposal offers new avenues for research in cognitive science and clinical interventions.
