[From Bruce Abbott (2015.11.21.1200 EST)]
Rick Marken (2015.11.20.1935) –
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Bruce Abbott (2015.11.19.1730 EST)–
RM: The reference for weather is “rain” and the reference for height is “6 ft”. In these cases I think the only controlling done in these cases is done only in imagination…
BA: If I believe it will rain, then I want it to rain? If I believe (estimate) that someone is 6 ft tall, then I want him to be 6 ft tall? If these are examples of control (even if only in imagination), then merely perceiving something is equivalent to controlling it.
RM: I don’t think so. You can perceive passively without controlling (in fact and in theory); but, in theory anyway, you can’t imagine without controlling because imagination (according to PCT) is controlling for an imagined perception that is a replay of the reference that is a specification for that imagined perception. At least that is the theory of imagination per PCT.
That’s not what Bill Powers had in mind with his proposal for an “imagination connection.� This proposal was designed to explain how a person could control “in imagination,� basically running a mental simulation rather than having the control system output to the level 1 systems that produce overt behavior. I can imagine a nail sticking up from a plank. I can imagine setting a reference for “height of nail above plank� to zero and can imagine engaging in actions (e.g., hammer blows) that drive the nail. I’m “controlling in imagination.� But to my mind that is a different animal entirely from defining the term “imagination� as identical to controlling for an imagined perception.
BA: Belief to me is a subjective measure of confidence in the veracity of a perception.
RM: Then it means something to you that is not part of PCT. The “veracity of a perception” is not a concept in PCT. You can believe (imagine) that a particular perception will occur (like the perception of “X getting PCT”) and then find that that perception doesn’t happen. But you can’t tell whether a perception is “true” in the sense that it is a reflection of what is really “out there” on the other side of your senses.
That’s why I suggested that belief could be a “meta-perception� – a perception of a perception. If so, then beliefs are just a kind of perception and can be controlled (given appropriate means) like any other perception.
BA: Science is a way of developing and testing beliefs based on their ability to withstand logical analysis and critical scrutiny.
RM: And, most importantly, experimental test.
BA: Such beliefs are subjected to empirical tests and (ideally) are subject to being discarded or revised in the light of the evidence.
RM: Right!
BA: The problem with strongly held beliefs (their veracity is unquestioned by the believer) arises when the belief is untrue.
RM: I would say that strongly held beliefs are a problem whether they are true or untrue. “Truth” is always tentative. All we know is whether or not a perception we are controlling for in imagination (a perception that we believe) corresponds to the “reality” that we perceive. Of course, it’s a problem if people believe in perceptions that don’t correspond to this reality, such as the belief that the earth is flat. But it’s also a problem if people believe strongly in perceptions that do consistently correspond to this reality, such as the perception of the Newtonian model of the universe. Fortunately, Einstein was willing to believe in this perceptoin less strongly than others and was able to imagine another perception – of a relativistic universe – that ended up corresponding to more of our perceptual reality, such as the time taken for mercury to transit across the sun – than the Newtonian belief.
So you subscribe to the reality of “beliefs,� yet you deny that they are a part of PCT. Seems like an important omission . . .
BA: So how do beliefs comport with PCT? Our control systems generally rest on the assumption, implicitly or explicitly, that our perceptions are accurate.
RM: I don’t think the idea of “accuracy of perception” has anything to do with the PCT model. All the model cares about is controlling a perception. The control system has no knowledge or interest in what it is “out there” in the reality on the “other side” of our senses that corresponds to this perception or allows control of it to occur.
Yes, I get that. But belief in the accuracy (or perhaps a better term would be “validity�) of our perceptions is something that distinguishes human beings from the simple control mechanisms of PCT. We often act on the basis of our beliefs, not just our current sensory inputs the way a thermostat does.
BA: Many perceptions we control for are not the direct products of sensory experience. They may be inferences drawn from the facts as we know them – from our own observations, from the conclusions others havee drawn that we have convinced ourselves are true, or from pure imagination.
RM: I don’t think so. I think all perceptions are derived (constructed) from sensory experience. But if you could point me do a perception I can have that is an inference, for example, I’d be interested in seeing (or hearing or tasting, etc) it.
Perhaps so, but that does not contradict my assertion that “many perceptions we control are not the direct products of sensory experience.�  The alternative I had in mind is that they are the indirect products of sensory experience, essentially inferences drawn from sensory evidence. Scientists believed that space was just the place where stuff happens until observations confirmed that light was bent by a gravitational field. Now they believe that space is like a fabric that can be bowed and twisted. They believed that time flowed at the same constant rate everywhere until precise measurements of time onboard satellites circling the earth revealed that time onboard those satellites passed more slowly relative to clocks on earth. Now they believe that time and space are a single continuum (the space-time continuum) and that time slows the faster an object travels relative to the speed of light. The orignal beliefs were inferences based on sensory evidence, and were modified by new sensory evidence. Scientists control for the truth of their beliefs, and when new evidence acts as a disturbance to a given belief (such as the constancy of time), then either they will discount the evidence (thus maintaining their perception of the truth of that belief) or change the belief so that it is again perceived to be true. (See Fesinger’s “cognitive dissonance� theory.) One thing that is supposed to distinguish scientific beliefs from other kinds is that the scientists is supposed to maintain an attitude of skepticism, a willingness to change a belief if the evidence demands it.
BA: Those are the beliefs most likely to be wrong. Where these are beliefs about the natural world (as opposed to religious or mystical beliefs), they are subject to correction through the application of scientific methods. But how does one change those other beliefs that are not based on observation and rational analysis? Where such beliefs threaten our own lives, the current solution is to kill or incarcerate the believer.
RM: I don’t think you can change another person’s beliefs through the application of the scientific method or any other way. People have to be willing to change their beliefs themselves.
What is “willingness to change beliefs,� and what is the “self� that must be so willing?
Bruce A.
