Communication problem?

[William_T_Powers2]

[From Bill Powers (940928.1835 MDT)]

Bruce Buchanan (940927.2045 EDT) --

A gestalt is of the essence for a systems approach. And this may mean
that whatever tugs on the interconnections may require attention.

It is a fact, I think, that the basic notion of PCT concerning the
control of behavior by perception is so true and fundamental that it
has always been understood by some people, and has appeared in various
forms in many ages and fields, although not in its present rigorous
formulation until recent decades.

The notion of the control of behavior by perception is, as you say, an
old one that has appeared in many forms in many fields. However, that is
not what PCT says. I don't know whether you're suffering from repeated
slips of the keyboard, whether you have in mind some definition of
"behavior" other than what we can see other people doing, or whether
there's one last little shred of the old concept of behavior that
refuses to lie down behind your hippocampus and die.

For a PCTer to be congratulated on the idea that perception controls
behavior is much like Copernicus being told " Way to go, Babe, that sun
really does go around the earth."

I like your attempts to put PCT into a coherent system concept, but it
is very distracting to keep running across statements that sound like a
basic misunderstanding of PCT.

You say:

I think PCT might examine more seriously, perhaps even with some
opinion/reaction type of study, possible problems with simple
communication of its ideas to the uninitiated, including problems with
its own terminology e.g. Behavior (does this include actions resulting
in unintended consequences, or not) and Perception (as inclusive of all
experience and inferred concepts, etc.)

From this, I gather that by behavior you mean, as we do, overt actions

by the organism that affect its surroundings, and that by perception you
mean, again in agreement with PCT, the inner representation of what lies
outside the organism. But that makes the following even harder to
reconcile with the PCT view:

Has PCT anything of interest to say to advertising theorists and
agencies concerning the role of fantasy and perception as these may
control behavior?

We really have to get this worked out, whether it is a real conceptual
difference or only a language difference. To put the PCT view as plainly
as I know how:

Organisms vary their output effects on the world as a means of
controlling selected perceptions: that is, as a means of bringing
perceptions to specific preselected states, and maintaining them in
those states despite independent disturbances. Behavior is the means of
control; that which is controlled is a perceptual representation of the
world.

Do you see that this is just the opposite of "the control of behavior by
perception" and "the role of fantasy and perception as these may control
behavior?"

Before we can talk about the interesting questions of how to present PCT
and what its role in society might be, we have to make certain we are

talking about the same thing. Sorry if I am misreading you, but at the
moment I can't see how.

···

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Best,

Bill P.

[Bruce_Buchanan1]

[From Bruce Buchanan (940929.14:00 EDT)]

Bill Powers (940928.1835 MDT) --

I don't know whether you're suffering from repeated
slips of the keyboard, . . . , or whether
there's one last little shred of the old concept of behavior that
refuses to lie down behind your hippocampus and die.

Rick Marken (940928.1600)

Just based on your words, I
would conclude that you still have not grasped the basic insight of PCT; that
behavior is the control OF perception. It sounds like you still think that
behavior is controlled BY perception.

Bill Leach 940928.18:50 EST(EDT)

Bruce, I still [think] that you are confusing "conscious" perception with

perception.

Thanks to Bill Powers, Rick and Bill Leach for their various and
considerate comments to my note on PCT goals!

Clearly, my language does reflect a continuing uncertainty and perhaps
confusion. I have tended to see a circular causal or reciprocal feedback
relationship between behavior and perception. I have had the idea that to
say that behavior controls perception does not exclude the notion that
perception also influences (although it does not control) behavior.

For example, the notion of setting goals and then acting to achieve them
has made sense to me in terms of establishing the perceptual references
variables which are then to be controlled e.g. by behavior. Now, one may
say that behavior which appears to be goal-directed is simply inherent in
the operation of the control systems, i.e. as behavior controlled by
perception. But I am also thinking of the operation of higher levels, and
the reference variables for anticipatory behaviors related to the autonomy
of the organism, with responsibility in some sense for its own behavior. So
there may be more than "one last little shred" of concepts that I need to
reconsider - as well as terminological inexactitudes :-).

I may also be confusing primary phenomenological awareness (conscious
processes, as Bill Leach suggests) with the objectified approach of an
external observer.

There are likely other considerations which I am too close to and have
overlooked, but which may be recognized by old hands in this business.
In any case I am not looking for further comments at this point. I have
just come into possession of the copy of B:CP which I had ordered, and I
will read and try to digest this, before offering too many more comments
that may require "back to basics" responses!

The opportunity provided for discussion by participants in cgs-l is really
nothing short of wonderful! I just hope that my remarks have sufficient
content to be of some general interest.

Cheers and thanks.

Bruce B.

[Tom_BOURBON3]

Tom Bourbon [940930.0826]

[Bruce Buchanan (940929.14:00 EDT)] replied to a salvo of comments
about his statements that "perception controls behavior."

Bill Powers (940928.1835 MDT) --
Rick Marken (940928.1600)
Bill Leach 940928.18:50 EST(EDT)

Thanks to Bill Powers, Rick and Bill Leach for their various and
considerate comments to my note on PCT goals!

Clearly, my language does reflect a continuing uncertainty and perhaps
confusion. I have tended to see a circular causal or reciprocal feedback
relationship between behavior and perception. I have had the idea that to
say that behavior controls perception does not exclude the notion that
perception also influences (although it does not control) behavior.

Yes, Bruce, in the phenomenon of control, perception and behavior occur as
elements in a loop, but the key to understanding PCT lies in the fact that
the one element that is held nearly constant, in spite of perturbations to
all other elements, is "perception." As broadly defined in PCT, perception
is that which is represented in the PCT model as the "perceptual signal."
The loop is indeed a loop, but not one of the popular "loopy" loops in which
people use nice sounding, but untested (as in the simulation of a model),
phrases such as "circular causality" or "reciprocal feedback" or "principle
of reciprocity." A functional perceptual control loop controls the
perceptual signal, which is brought to and kept at the level or state
specified by the reference signal.

For example, the notion of setting goals and then acting to achieve them
has made sense to me in terms of establishing the perceptual references
variables which are then to be controlled e.g. by behavior. Now, one may
say that behavior which appears to be goal-directed is simply inherent in
the operation of the control systems, i.e. as behavior controlled by
perception. But I am also thinking of the operation of higher levels, and
the reference variables for anticipatory behaviors related to the autonomy
of the organism, with responsibility in some sense for its own behavior. So
there may be more than "one last little shred" of concepts that I need to
reconsider - as well as terminological inexactitudes :-).

I think that "last little shred" is acting like sand in the gears. It
must go! In HPCT, we model the higher levels with more of the same
simple loops we use for the lowest level. From top to bottom and side to
side, in every loop it is control of (the specified) perceptions. That
is so even if I control my perceptions of "acting in anticipation of"
something. I don't make "anticipatory behaviors;" I can be modeled as a
system controlling my present perceptions relative to present reference
signals that pertain to my present desire to avoid something I presently
expect will happen later -- reference perception = perceive myself getting
ready for the impending hurricane; present perception = what I am doing
right now; compare those two perceptions and act. To an observer, that
example of present-time control looks like "anticipatory behavior," but
the perceptions (reference ones and present-time ones) are in the present
and so is the behavior.

. . . I have
just come into possession of the copy of B:CP which I had ordered, and I
will read and try to digest this, before offering too many more comments
that may require "back to basics" responses!

Wonderful. Up to now your many insightful comments and stimulating
questions came without benefit of your having read B:CP. I can hardly wait
to see what happens next!

Later,

Tom