category perception

CSGnet Archive CSG1995
1

[From: Bruce Nevin (Thu 950306 11:08:16 EST)]

To each level of the perceptual hierarchy, the level below it is the
environment.

On the level of intensity perceptions we live in a world of sensory
inputs from the environment beyond our sensory organs.

On the level of sensation perceptions, we live in a world of intensities.

On the level of configuration (or transition) perceptions, we live in a
world of sensations.

On the level of transition (or configuration) perceptions, we live in a
world of configurations (or transitions).

On the level of event perceptions, we live in a world of transitions (or
configurations).

On the level of relationship perceptions, we live in a world of events.

On the level of event perceptions, we live in a world of relationships.

On the level of category perceptions, we live in a world of events.

On the level of ...

Now wait a minute. The experience of yellow light is a sensation
perception. Is the category "yellow" about sensation perceptions like
this, or is it about some event? If an event, how?

One might make a series of statements. If he repeatedly and variously
undoes what I do, I am disturbing a perception that he is controlling.
He repeatedly and variously undoes what I do. Therefore I am disturbing
a perception that he is controlling. This is an experience on the level
of logic or "programming". Is the category "modus ponens", of which this
argument is an example, about logic perceptions like this, or is it about
some event? If an event, how?

Am I overreaching? Is this picture of the relationship of levels too
strictly ordered? Or does it support what Martin is saying about
category perception?

    Bruce

2

[From Oded Maler (950307)]

(Bruce Nevin (Thu 950306 11:08:16 EST)

Am I overreaching? Is this picture of the relationship of levels too
strictly ordered? Or does it support what Martin is saying about
category perception?

One man's ceiling is another man's floor. For me it is clear that the
location of various categories in the perceptual hierarchy is a
completely private matter. The process of category formation depends
on the personal history of experience of every person (which includes
all the historical and technological context). The category of, say,
mouse and window (in the computer context), will be realized lower in
the hierarchy of my children than in mine. What I preceive of the
mountain where I live is not located at the same level as it is
located in the hierarchy of a French farmer living by. I look at the
mountain and the clouds with my perception standing on the shoulders
of what I know of Math, vision processing, genral geographical
knowledge, chaos, PCT and what not.

Words, which are are greatest invention, are also the most confusing,
because they denote such a diversity of perceptual variables which
might have very little in common except for the latters and sound.
(As noted before in this forum, this is a reason for many of the
great debates in this forum).

There are probably also some genetic factors in certain propeties of
neurons that tend to influence the type of perceptual variables that
the individual is likely to form.

Haug,

--Oded

3

<[Bill Leach 950307.20:54 EST(EDT)]

[Bruce Nevin (Thu 950306 11:08:16 EST)]

Humm... that first part is pretty good I think Bruce.

Now wait a minute. The experience of yellow light is a sensation
perception. Is the category "yellow" about sensation perceptions like
this, or is it about some event? If an event, how?

Well, lets see. Did you just see the yellow light come on? If so then;

It is a set of intensity perceptions.
The set is further perceived as:
               the color yellow
               AND has an intensity
               AND has a size
               AND has a relative location

It also has a temporal sequence as an event, 'was not on but now is'.
It may also have a perceived relationship to other events, sequences,
configurations and the like.

One might make a series of statements. If he repeatedly and variously
undoes what I do, I am disturbing a perception that he is controlling.
He repeatedly and variously undoes what I do. Therefore I am disturbing
a perception that he is controlling. This is an experience on the level
of logic or "programming". Is the category "modus ponens", of which
this argument is an example, about logic perceptions like this, or is it
about some event? If an event, how?

Bruce, I think I might have 'lost you' in the second, third and fourth
sentences unless "he" is a subject and you are applying the TEST.

I would conclude that there is insufficient information for a conclusion
other than the one that you made -- There IS a disturbance to a
controlled perception since someone 'repeatedly and variously undoes'
what you do.

In applying the TEST, sometimes mention is made of vector. If you
postulate a controlled variable and then disturb an environmental
variable but the correction is not almost exact then you have not
identified the controlled variable exactly (or it has changed).

If you can disturb an environmental variable and get a 'correction' but
not quite exact then you HAVE disturbed a controlled variable but you
don't know what it is -- only that it is somehow related to the change
that occurred in the environmental variable.

If you create a list and someone always reorders your list the same way
then that someone's perception of 'configuration' for the list is
disturbed.

I realize that I am not very experienced with this sort of thinking and
am not at this moment able to think of how one could disturb the 'program
level' of perception. I take no little comfort in remarks made by Bill
P. concerning his discomfort with the entire idea of a program level.

It seems that to disturb a 'program' you would have to induce sufficient
disturbance that no learned sequencing could reduce error. I think of
the cat appearently trying to get out of a cage:

He usually bolts at the cage door (probably most likely since that is the
was that he entered) and that does not work - error still high. He trys
different walls, maybe jumping, clawing etc. As each attempt fails his
'program level' error is probably increasing.

Have you even been locked into a building unexpectedly? While I'll admit
that some people 'panic immediately' most don't panic when the 'normal
door' fails to work -- they don't panic until they find that all doors
are secured tightly, window barred and can't find a working phone. I
suggest that this is an 'increasing program level error' type problem.

-bill