Call for Posts

[Richard_Marken]

[From Rick Marken (950517.0915)]

While it's nice that Hans, Martin and others are willing to clearly lay out
the many misconceptions people have about the nature of control and control
systems so that we can set them straight, I think it would be nice if we
could spend more time on this net talking about what people are actually
doing with PCT. Of the 80+ people who receive posts from this list there must
be some who are actually trying to study what this list is about -- living
control systems. I don't mean abstract systems of equations; I mean the real
thing: flesh and blood living organisms (like people) that are out there
controlling all the time.

I would be especially interested in hearing reports from people who have
tried to figure out what perceptual variables an organism (such as another
person) is controlling. Aren't there "applied" PCTers out there who can
describe examples of using some version of The Test (right out there in the
"real world" -- where the rubber meets the road) to determine what someone
is controlling for?

I think all the "high tech" discussion we been having diverts our attention
somewhat from the fact that there are real controllers out there controlling
real (actual) variables all the time. I thnk it is fairly easy to get
reasonable estimates of what organisms are controlling in real life
situations. But in order to test hypotheses about what organisms are
controlling we have to learn to view behavior from a completely new
perspective -- the PCT perspective. I think examples of real life efforts to
determine what organisms are controlling will help both the technical and
non- technical "lurkers" understand the basic goals of PCT science.

So this is a "call for posts" from anyone out there who has formally or
informally done The Test for the Controlled Variable. It would be nice if we
could get descriptions of the use of The Test that include enough detail so
that others can try it out for themselves.

Best

Rick

[Henry_James_Bicycles]

From [Hank Folson (950518)]

(Rick Marken (950517.0915)

>I think it would be nice if we could spend more time on this net talking
>about what people are actually doing with PCT.
>
>I would be especially interested in hearing reports from people who have
>tried to figure out what perceptual variables an organism (such as
another
>person) is controlling.

Funny you should ask! One area in which I have been practicing the
principles of PCT is the CSGnet itself. My personal reference levels for
CSGnet would be met with a mix of posts on PCT applications and PCT
research. As your post implies, there is not much in the way of
application examples on CSGnet. I, too, would like to see more.

But what created a more important problem for me was my perception that I
saw little sign of the researchers who post regularly to the CSGnet
applying the principles of PCT in their posts and research techniques
(and presumably in their own personal/work lives). The assumed benefits
would be faster more effective communication and faster development of
PCT. It appeared to me, as an _outside observer_, that to the
stereotypical PCT researcher, PCT is an abstract theoretical concept,
rather than a working reality that applies to everyone, including
researchers of PCT.

I think the key thing that led to a big personal error signal for me was
my naive assumption that people who understood the basics (and well
beyond) of perceptual control theory would naturally apply the lessons of
PCT.

So I began to look more closely at what was going on. This is not as easy
as it sounds, as one of the axioms of PCT is that you cannot directly
tell what variables someone is controlling by watching their
'behavior'/actions.

The first step in my application of the principles of PCT in this case
was to re-examine the posts by Bill Powers. I was quite relieved to see
on closer examination that Bill Powers does practice what he preaches
(most of the time, anyway). He does it in a subtle, practiced way, and I
simply had not observed what he was doing.

With the other researchers, the topics of discussion are always PCT
related, but the styles and techniques of communication _appear_ on the
surface to be primarily pre-PCT in nature.

An axiom of PCT is that you cannot control what you do not perceive. So
the next step was to determine how PCT researchers perceived communications
between living control systems. I posted to CSGnet asking if anyone
had diagrammed controlling via written communications between two people
as the interaction of two independent control systems with a time lag. I
included broad hints about the indirect nature of this sort of
communication making controlling very difficult for the control systems
involved. There was a good response. The test results:
1. Everyone said they had long ago done such a diagram.
2. No one commented on the significance of this control system diagram!

The first result made it clear that these researchers could perceive the
difficulties of communication. The second result raised more problems for
me: Did they not care?? Were they controlling just to make statements and
not to communicate and exchange ideas??

...To be continued...

Hank Folson
HANKFOLSON@MCIMAIL.COM

[Paul_Stokes]

[From Paul Stokes (950518.1040)]

Rick,

I have not been assiduously following all recent posts to this list
so I may have missed something but I am intriqued by your reference
to The Test for the Controlled Variable.

What is this 'test' and how is it carried out? If there is actually
something to this I would be keen to try it out in the sociological
domain. Since my last post to this list I have actually managed to tie
down what can be meant by relational control in social relationships (with
thanks to Thomas Scheff for this) and am keen to demonstrate
controlling behaviour around this topic.

Make any sense?

Cheers,

Paul Stokes

···

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Paul A. Stokes
University College Dublin
Belfield
Dublin 4
Ireland

Tel: +353-1-706.2431

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Henry_James_Bicycles]

[From Hank Folson (950518)]

Rick Marken (950518.2045) and
Bill Powers (950518.2020 MDT)

One of the reasons why I did not name any names in my post (950518) was
that I knew my name belonged on any list of ineffective communicators, as
Rick & Bill's responses to my post proves! Before responding to your
posts, I will try and get the communications flowing:

We are in total agreement that we are living control systems, and we are
always controlling according to whatever the rules are for the
functioning of living control systems. Further, we agree that we normally
do not think about how we are functioning as living control systems.

This next set of statements is my personal understanding which I think is
a correct interpretation of existing perceptual control theory. I don't
know how correct these are, or how much you would agree with them:
1. Written communication is the action/output part of a control process.
2. Our genetic code does not pass on to us any correct way to
    communicate, i.e. control via communication.
3. From birth we are taught (by parents, teachers, TV, etc) _CULTURAL_
   communication rules which range from effective to ineffective.
4. In conjunction with 3, we learn _FUNCTIONAL_ rules from our
   experiences. By this I mean that we try to control via communication,
   and being control systems, we develop techniques that allow us to
   achieve our goals most of the time. (FUNCTIONAL rules may contradict
   CULTURAL rules, although we may not be aware of it.)
5. The communication techniques of any person are unique to that person
   as their life history, their communication goals, and their abilities
   vary.
6. We have no absolute way of evaluating the effectiveness of our
   communication techniques. If our communications are effective to the
   level of our expectations (reference levels?) for effectiveness, we
   consider our communication techniques successful and correct.
7. If we think our communication techniques are helping us to achieve our
   related goals, we will not attempt to improve our communication
   techniques any further as we have no error signals. Any outside
   attempt to influence us to improve our communication techniques will
   be perceived as a disturbance, and being good control systems, we will
   resist this disturbance. [As you guys are doing. ]
8. If we are satisfied with our communication techniques, the only way we
   will improve upon them is if we "go up a level". An example
   (admittedly self-serving): If a researcher perceives that by
   controlling to improve his communication skills (which he is otherwise
   content with) he can achieve his higher level goal of speeding up
   research work in his field of interest which is heavily dependent on
   communication with other researchers, he may work on improving his
   communication skills.
9. To make ongoing improvement at any level of our internal hierarchy, we
   must have a higher level that is not satisfied even though the lower
   level has matched its reference level. - This statement is poorly
   worded, but it is a most important one. I need some help here!
   Perhaps this is an example of what I am trying to say: If I write the
   statement, "I thinc i communikate wel.", the reader will probably
   understand what I am trying to say, but if my spelling were better,
   the understanding might be even better. A higher level goal to spell
   correctly by using a dictionary to improve the understandability of my
   writing would make this happen. But if my controlling via poorly
   spelled written communication works for me, I will never improve my
   spelling unless I have a higher level goal to do so. If I don't
   perceive I have a problem, I don't have a problem.

I can't tell if you guys agree with the basic ideas in these statements
or if my post did not communicate my ideas clearly. Please delete,
correct, improve, modify and extend these statements to match your
understanding of controlling via communication in terms of PCT. Then I
can see better what your understanding is, and perhaps see where my
understanding is flawed.

Hank Folson
HANKFOLSON@MCIMAIL.COM

[Bill_Leach1]

<[Bill Leach 950520.02:03 U.S. Eastern Time Zone]

[From Hank Folson (950518)]

1. Written communications is the action/output part of ...

It is one of many possible action/outputs, yes.

2. ... genetic code ...

I believe that it is more correct to say that we don't _assert_ that your
statement is true rather it is assumed to be true barring evidence to the
contrary. We "know" that we indeed are predisposed to many things as a
result of our genetic coding but it is also true that "many" does not
include most of what is generally attributed to such. The idea that one
should first attempt to determine if observed behavioural characteristics
are "just" a result of normal response by a closed loop negative feedback
control system in a particular environment _first_ and then only if that
attempt fails should we resort to saying that _maybe_ the phenomenon is a
result of genetic coding will indeed result in a greater understanding of
living system behaviour.

3. ... we are taught ... _CULTURAL_ ...

&

4. ... we learn _FUNCTIONAL_

You may need to elaborate upon these for me. In a sense we are not
"taught" anything but rather we learn. I can even conceive of an alleged
"functional" rule for communications that is not also "cultural"
(assuming that I understand what you mean by "cultural").

5. ... unique ...

Certainly see no problem with this one but I doubt that stating it is
necessary on this forum.

6.a We have no absolute way of evaluating the effectiveness of our

     communication techniques.

I don't think that I can agree with this one even slightly. You have
some justification or arguement in support of this contention?

6.b If our communications are effective to the level of our expectations

     (reference levels?) for effectiveness, we consider our communication
     techniques successful and correct.

Absolutely.

7. ... Any outside attempt to influence us to improve our communication

    techniques will be perceived as a disturbance, and being good control
    systems, we will resist this disturbance.

It won't be _perceived_ as a disturbance... it either will BE one or it
will just be an (uncontrolled) perception. If it is _only_ a disturbance
then it will NOT be perceived but will be resisted.

I think that what you are talking about is an incredibly complex issue.
If and "outside attempt" is a disturbance to a controlled perception for
something like quality of communications it will certainly be "resisted".
However, you are presuming that the output function has to be a "denial
mode" function and I don't agree that such is necessarily the case. If
the disturbed perception actually is for quality communications then the
control mechanism for that perception should have the means to improve
communication so that the perception again matches the reference.

The "outside attempt" could also disturb a controlled perception for
"self-worth" or "ego" if you prefer. In this case the output function
may not be appropriate to improving communications but rather be a
"defense mechanism".

It is also possible that an "outside attempt" is also perceived as an
assault or attack. Again, the output function for whatever controlled
perception is disturbed determines what happens next. I think that it is
highly probable that an attempt by one person to "improve" another's
communcations skills will invariably involve disturbance to at least
several controlled perceptions as well as provide additional uncontrolled
perceptual inputs.

I don't think that we have dealt much with specific examples of multiple
disturbance and internal conflict. This is an example of a situation
where there is _very_ loose coupling in the CEV portion of the loop.

8. If we are satisfied with our communication techniques, the only way

    we will improve upon them is if we "go up a level". ...

I suppose that this is the same thing as what you are saying but the only
way that we will "improve" upon anything is if there is an error existing
for the reference value for that "thing". It is definately NOT necessary
to "go up a level" to improve control in all cases even though it is
possibly true for your particular concern.

For one to "improve" one's communications techniques, one must have a
reference for "quality of communications" and the perception must not be
matching the reference.

Presumably this situation could exist as a result of "feedback"
["feedback" in this case is referring to either or both explicit comment
and the perception that some other person has not understood an attempted
communications effort] from someone else (such as yourself) resulting in
a perception "change" that results in an error, or the subject changes
the reference because of a "new" relational understanding between
communication and other goals.

9. To make ongoing improvement at any level of our internal hierarchy,

    we must have a higher level that is not satisfied even though the
    lower level has matched its reference level. - This statement is
    poorly worded, but it is a most important one. I need some help here!

I suspect that you may need help in that the statement is probably just
plain not true. In the domain in which I perceive that you are thinking
the statement is possibly correct but as a flat assertion of a general
truth it would seem that the evidence does not support you.

-bill