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PreprintCC BY 4.0arXiv

Statistical mechanics of spontaneous behavior

  • Daniel Y. Takahashi
  • Ahmed El Hady
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Abstract

Why do a few behaviors fill most of an animal's time? The usual answer is that these behaviors are started more often, because learning and reinforcement favor them. Here we show that how long a behavior lasts can, by itself, explain much of what is observed. We consider a system that runs until it meets a constraint, such as a wall, and then resets. The fraction of time it spends in each behavior then follows the Boltzmann law, and the partition function is the mean time between resets. The four laws of thermodynamics follow as theorems from four postulates, and critical points that act as bottlenecks become the most occupied states. In 47 multi-day recordings of fruit flies, the dominant behavior accounts for only 13% of bout starts yet fills 49% of the time, and its typical duration identifies the individual fly. These results lay the groundwork for a statistical mechanics of behavior.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@misc{takahashi2026statistical,
  title = {{Statistical mechanics of spontaneous behavior}},
  author = {Daniel Y. Takahashi and Ahmed El Hady},
  howpublished = {arXiv},
  year = {2026},
  month = nov,
  doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2611.02220},
  eprint = {2611.02220},
  archivePrefix = {arXiv},
  url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.02220},
  note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY  - UNPB
TI  - Statistical mechanics of spontaneous behavior
AU  - Daniel Y. Takahashi
AU  - Ahmed El Hady
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/11/01
PB  - arXiv
DO  - 10.48550/arxiv.2611.02220
UR  - https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.02220
AB  - Why do a few behaviors fill most of an animal's time? The usual answer is that these behaviors are started more often, because learning and reinforcement favor them. Here we show that how long a behavior lasts can, by itself, explain much of what is observed. We consider a system that runs until it meets a constraint, such as a wall, and then resets. The fraction of time it spends in each behavior then follows the Boltzmann law, and the partition function is the mean time between resets. The four laws of thermodynamics follow as theorems from four postulates, and critical points that act as bottlenecks become the most occupied states. In 47 multi-day recordings of fruit flies, the dominant behavior accounts for only 13% of bout starts yet fills 49% of the time, and its typical duration identifies the individual fly. These results lay the groundwork for a statistical mechanics of behavior.
ER  -