[From Bill Powers (2011.02.19.1310 MST)]
At11:11 AM 2/19/2011 -0500, David M. Goldstein wrote:
Classical Conditioning and PCT
DMG: PCT View: The input function is changed so that environmental stimulation which would not ordinarily be a disturbance to a control system, becomes a disturbance. For example, a bell will produce salivation.
Question: Sometimes this seems to happen without the person wanting it to happen. Is it a counterexample to the PCT view that a person controls his/her experiences?
BP: Which system in the hierarchy is the one you're calling "the person?" There are many systems and many levels within the physical object we see as a person, including more than one "self." The awareness is in contact with some but not all of these at a given moment, and can attend to control processes at other levels, too.
Salivation does not occur because we selected that output to produce; it occurs when some system is trying to control (for example) the perception of dryness of food in the mouth. We may or may not be aware of producing salivation as a means toward that end. One way to produce salivation is to stick your tongue out and bring the glue side of the flap of an envelope into contact with the tongue. Or just by sucking gently on your tongue, you can start the flow. You're not aware of how you do this, just as you aren't aware of the processes that make a muscle get tense. We don't sense output signals.
DMG: Answer: A person does not always know what experience will become a disturbance.
BP: It's not ever necessary to know what caused a controlled variable to change, though of course we can often perceive what caused the change. The main thing we have to know about is the controlled variable itself, and whether it matches the reference condition. That is enough to make control possible, because we can act directly on the controlled variable in a direction opposite to the change. It's not necessary to know what caused the change, though sometimes that knowledge is helpful.
DMG: This seems to be somewhat unpredictable. Example-- I survived a plane crash on takeoff. It exploded and burned. I experienced burn, pain and soft tissue injuries. Afterwards, I developed PTSD symptoms to things I was not afraid of before�people lighting cigarettes, being in a moving car, loud sounds, taking an elevator, the smell of gasoline. If you gave people a list of these things I became afraid of and asked what sort of experience they all had in common, I am pretty sure that most people would not be able to identify the common origin of them. Behaviorists have a concept of "stimulus generalization", but that is just a description of the phenomena, not an explanation.
BP: Right on.
DMG: We have no control over what will be a disturbance to a CV, but once it becomes a disturbance, the ordinary ways of managing the experience come into play.
BP: Yes. This is easiest to describe just by saying that all we need to know is that the CV changed, not why it changed. The change generates an error signal which is already hooked up, in most cases, to cause an action that produces an effect on the CV opposing the change. If not, we reorganize until it does.
Best,
Bill