CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege of age, to rant using the persona of "grumpy old fossil".

I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have, accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted. Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits (except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter). It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized scientist, I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through rose-coloured memory glasses).

Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned -- or perhaps "driven" is a better word -- away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today's CSGnet. Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of "according to PCT", rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of "science", rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

I suppose my problem is that I don't think of science as a game with winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do wonders and are safe when they don't and aren't, or that burning carbon doesn't affect the climate.

I can't do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based. So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

I have no problem with erroneous statements -- I make lots of them and expect everyone else to do so. I don't like them when other people make them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But "to err is human" and mistakes can't be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

End of an old fossil's rant.

Martin

Thank you Martin. I think that most of us need a reminder now and then that civil behavior is an important aspect of what we do and say.

And of course Happy Birthday!

Best, Bill

···

On 06/14/2017 09:04 PM, Martin Taylor wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege of age, to rant using the persona of "grumpy old fossil".

I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have, accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted. Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits (except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter). It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized scientist, I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through rose-coloured memory glasses).

Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned -- or perhaps "driven" is a better word -- away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today's CSGnet. Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of "according to PCT", rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of "science", rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

I suppose my problem is that I don't think of science as a game with winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do wonders and are safe when they don't and aren't, or that burning carbon doesn't affect the climate.

I can't do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based. So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

I have no problem with erroneous statements -- I make lots of them and expect everyone else to do so. I don't like them when other people make them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But "to err is human" and mistakes can't be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

End of an old fossil's rant.

Martin

[From Fred Nickols (2017.06.15.0514 ET)]

I tend to agree with you, Martin. The list has become rather combative.
However, I think that owes to what I would characterize as "strongly-held
views by strong people." And, of course, a PCT analysis of that combat
might prove interesting. In any case, Happy Birthday. I will be 80 later
this year so you and I are both "old codgers."

Fred Nickols

···

-----Original Message-----
From: Martin Taylor [mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net]
Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2017 11:05 PM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege
of age, to rant using the persona of "grumpy old fossil".

I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want to
perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference values
over the last few years, and some of my contributions have, accordingly,
become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a place to
which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which I think
it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by asking
questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted. Questions
were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits (except when
Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing
why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter). It
was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn a new
science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized scientist,
I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in
Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal
science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through
rose-coloured memory glasses).

Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer
the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned -- or perhaps
"driven" is a better word -- away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I
think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to
Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our
interactions outside of CSGnet.

Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today's CSGnet.
Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of "according to PCT",
rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away
feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of "science",
rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

I suppose my problem is that I don't think of science as a game with winners
and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept payment
from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce papers
proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do wonders and
are safe when they don't and aren't, or that burning carbon doesn't affect
the climate.

I can't do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed about
them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status within at
least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does in
chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based. So it
also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for the purpose
of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are redefined to
create publications. And I can at least try do do something about issues
affecting PCT as perceived by others.

I have no problem with erroneous statements -- I make lots of them and
expect everyone else to do so. I don't like them when other people make
them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But "to err is human"
and mistakes can't be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or
anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and
can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by
argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are
more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are
beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning
the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

End of an old fossil's rant.

Martin

[From Rick Marken (2017.06.15.1140)]

···

Martin Taylor (2016.06.14.00.05)–

MT: Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege of age, to rant using the persona of “grumpy old fossil”.

RM: Happy birthday and may you have many more.Â

MT: I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have, accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

RM: My perception is that CSGNet has been about the same all along. Maybe it seems different now because Bill is gone.Â

MT: I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted. Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits (except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter). It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized scientist, I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through rose-coloured memory glasses).

RM: I think your glasses may be a tad rose-colored but I share your desire that CSGNet be a place where “advances and lacunae in Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal science”. Â Â

MT: Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?Â

BestÂ

Rick

Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today’s CSGnet. Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of “according to PCT”, rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of “science”, rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

I suppose my problem is that I don’t think of science as a game with winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do wonders and are safe when they don’t and aren’t, or that burning carbon doesn’t affect the climate.

I can’t do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based. So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

I have no problem with erroneous statements – I make lots of them and expect everyone else to do so. I don’t like them when other people make them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But “to err is human” and mistakes can’t be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

End of an old fossil’s rant.

Martin


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[From Rick Marken (2017.06.16.1750)]

···

Â

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

BestÂ

Rick


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Martin Taylor (2016.06.14.00.05)–

MT: Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?Â

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.16.22.53]

[From Rick Marken (2017.06.16.1750)]

I had not intended to discuss this in public, but was preparing a

private message to you. I have drafted and thrown away a couple of
versions, but as a student of PCT I am seeking a way of disturbing
some perception you control that you will counter by actions that
might modify the kind of behaviour that I see as problematic. When I
draft my response and look at it, what I see is something that is
more likely to induce conflict. That is counterproductive.

So I'll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century

or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer
a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the
further development of PCT, and who have left after being
effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think
back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the
semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

Martin
···

RM: Am I ever going to get
an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  Martin Taylor

(2016.06.14.00.05)–

                  MT: Over the

years many clever people from other disciplines
who seemed to offer the possibility of important
advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps
“driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet,
though not always from PCT. I think most recently
of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done
currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose
acumen I have learned to admire from our
interactions outside of CSGnet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?

My perception matches Martin’s: I was so excited by PCT until I spent some real time at CSGnet – me being an ex-christian, this really sounds to me too much as past experiences: “I loved Jesus so much until the Bishops started to tell me what I should and should not believe”. So now I am happy to do without the fucking dogmatism of the orthodox morons. Same here.

···

RM: Am I ever going to get
an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  Martin Taylor

(2016.06.14.00.05)–

                  MT: Over the

years many clever people from other disciplines
who seemed to offer the possibility of important
advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps
“driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet,
though not always from PCT. I think most recently
of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done
currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose
acumen I have learned to admire from our
interactions outside of CSGnet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?

(From Kent McClelland 2017.06.17.1130)

A couple of the prominent sociologists who embraced PCT in the early 90s have told me privately that they pulled back from participation in CSG because of what they perceived as a cult-like atmosphere, where any divergence from the ideas of the
charismatic leader opened you up to attacks that felt personal.

I myself stopped monitoring CSGnet for a decade or more in my mid-career because I didn’t feel I had time in my life for the sometimes vitriolic back-and-forth of the CSGnet postings.

···

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

Martin Taylor (2016.06.14.00.05)–

MT: Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of
Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

···

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

Â

MT: So I'll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century

or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer
a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the
further development of PCT, and who have left after being
effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think
back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the
semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

          RM: Am I ever going to get

an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?Â

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.Â

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================
[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.Â

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?Â

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about  it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

BestÂ

Rick


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[Bruce Nevin (201.06.17.16:19 ET)]

Rick Marken (2017.06.15.1140)–

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?Â

Rick Marken (2017.06.16.1750)

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150) –

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet?Â

Rick,

Martin didn’t bring it up.Â

There is nothing in Martin’s ‘birthday curmudgeon’ post (Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05) that says or implies "Rick Marken is to blame for driving people away from CSG-net. The closest thing to it is his mention of one episode (“Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter”).

I see no need to personalize this.

You have in past years sometimes written things in ways that could be read as intemperate, inconsiderate, insensitive, tone-deaf, snarky, or any of innumerable other labels for things at which people take offense. In my view since I have resumed following CSG-net the tone of your contributions has seemed much more clear of such entanglements.

(Like Kent, I stopped reading CSG-net for a number of years, and for similar reasons. So I can’t speak for the interim, but I do perceive a difference in comparison to what I remember.)

I read Martin’s post differently from you, and I agree with what I understand him to be saying. There is a recurrent problem of tone and manner on CSG-net.Â

I want us to focus on how to fix it.

Partly, a contentious, dogmatic, offense-taking tone is hard to avoid in a strictly textual medium. Email is notorious for it. Twitter is even worse, by all accounts. (I don’t tweet or follow tweets.)

Partly, this problem arises because our ways of conceptualizing behavior and our linguistic means for talking about such concepts are imbued root and branch with the naive behaviorism of our ancestors. By ancestors I don’t just mean behaviorists beginning in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Assumptions about rewards and punishments pervade our culture, from pedagogy to penal code. This makes it all too easy to misstate even when our understanding of PCT is correct. A marked characteristic of CSG-net is a ‘PCT-correct’ pouncing on such errors.Â

I’ll suggest again that we might do well to cultivate as a habit discourse in our CSGnet culture things likeÂ

"You said X. That sounds like . Is that what you intended?"Â

orÂ

"You said X. Did you mean X’ by that? (Because X could be misinterpreted as ."Â

The posts from Bill and Mary that you quote are exemplary, as you say, and we should take them as examples of constructive conduct.

But please don’t insist on perceiving this as a personal conflict between you and Martin. It’s bigger than both of you. And we need both of you.Â

/Bruce
···

On Sat, Jun 17, 2017 at 2:51 PM, Richard Marken rsmarken@gmail.com wrote:

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

Â

MT: So I'll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century

or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer
a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the
further development of PCT, and who have left after being
effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think
back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the
semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

          RM: Am I ever going to get

an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?Â

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.Â

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================
[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.Â

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?Â

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about  it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

BestÂ

Rick


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Martin

···

-----Original Message-----
From: Martin Taylor [mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net]
Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2017 5:05 AM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege
of age, to rant using the persona of "grumpy old fossil".

HB : Congratulations Martin. If you did it till this age, there is no
problem of doing it 2x as that :slight_smile:

MT : I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want
to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference
values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have,
accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a
place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which
I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

HB : Yes I noticed that you become better. Like wine.
But I think it's not just problem whether people should learn about PCT, but
also start thinking how they will upgrade PCT.

MT : I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by
asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted.
Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits
(except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in
lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a
non-starter).

HB : This is what I was talking about. New ideas and new approaches to
development of PCT. I know Rick is brake to PCT. Because his "Behavior is
control" and "Controlled variable" in environment and speccially his
invention "Controlled Perceptual Variable" (CPV) is getting PCT slowly into
"lumber room". Not slowly. Faster then I thought.

MT : It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn
a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized
scientist,

HB : I looked at your picture on Internet. You look quite young.

MT : I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in
Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal
science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through
rose-coloured memory glasses).

HB : Yes normal scientific PCT discussions is also what I miss.

MT : Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to
offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned -- or
perhaps "driven" is a better word -- away from CSGnet, though not always
from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done
currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to
admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

HB : Eetu is special member of CSGnet forum. But I'm afraid that Rick will
confuse him too much. He just perfectly understood PCT. And now I don't know
anymore.

MT : Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today's CSGnet.
Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of "according to PCT",
rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away
feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of "science",
rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

HB : Agree. The main figure seems to be Rick with his joystick playground
behind computer. Like a child.

MT : I suppose my problem is that I don't think of science as a game with
winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept
payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce
papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do
wonders and are safe when they don't and aren't, or that burning carbon
doesn't affect the climate.

MT : I can't do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed
about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status
within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does
in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based.

HB : It hink that PCT could have status in various sciences if Rick wouldn't
be pushing his "Behavior is control" into foreground of PCT occurance.

MT : So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for
the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are
redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something
about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

HB : Well there are not just self-contradictory positions and mathematical
redefinition of problems about PCT which are published. There were also
published (by Rick) such physiological nonsensce about nervous system that I
can hardly beleive there is such ignorance in 21. Century.

MT : I have no problem with erroneous statements -- I make lots of them and
expect everyone else to do so. I don't like them when other people make
them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But "to err is human"
and mistakes can't be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or
anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and
can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by
argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are
more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are
beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning
the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

HB : I think it's not just problem in being "scientific poison", they repeat
all the time. Some don't learn from their mistakes. They do it all the time.

MT : End of an old fossil's rant.

HB : Once again congratulations Martin.

Martin

RJRobertson 20170620
Well, as far as age goes, May 4 was my ninety first birthday, so as curmugeons go you have a bit of a go to catch up with me. But you have the advantage that people listen to your posts. Nobody ever replies to mine.

Dick Robertson

···

On Tue, Jun 20, 2017 at 12:19 AM, Boris Hartman boris.hartman@masicom.net wrote:

Martin

-----Original Message-----

From: Martin Taylor [mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net]

Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2017 5:05 AM

To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu

Subject: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege

of age, to rant using the persona of “grumpy old fossil”.

HB : Congratulations Martin. If you did it till this age, there is no

problem of doing it 2x as that :slight_smile:

MT : I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want

to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference

values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have,

accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a

place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which

I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

HB : Yes I noticed that you become better. Like wine.

But I think it’s not just problem whether people should learn about PCT, but

also start thinking how they will upgrade PCT.

MT : I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by

asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted.

Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits

(except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in

lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a

non-starter).

HB : This is what I was talking about. New ideas and new approaches to

development of PCT. I know Rick is brake to PCT. Because his "Behavior is

control" and “Controlled variable” in environment and speccially his

invention “Controlled Perceptual Variable” (CPV) is getting PCT slowly into

“lumber room”. Not slowly. Faster then I thought.

MT : It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn

a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized

scientist,

HB : I looked at your picture on Internet. You look quite young.

MT : I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in

Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal

science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through

rose-coloured memory glasses).

HB : Yes normal scientific PCT discussions is also what I miss.

MT : Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to

offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or

perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always

from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done

currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to

admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

HB : Eetu is special member of CSGnet forum. But I’m afraid that Rick will

confuse him too much. He just perfectly understood PCT. And now I don’t know

anymore.

MT : Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today’s CSGnet.

Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of “according to PCT”,

rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away

feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of “science”,

rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

HB : Agree. The main figure seems to be Rick with his joystick playground

behind computer. Like a child.

MT : I suppose my problem is that I don’t think of science as a game with

winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept

payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce

papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do

wonders and are safe when they don’t and aren’t, or that burning carbon

doesn’t affect the climate.

MT : I can’t do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed

about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status

within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does

in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based.

HB : It hink that PCT could have status in various sciences if Rick wouldn’t

be pushing his “Behavior is control” into foreground of PCT occurance.

MT : So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for

the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are

redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something

about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

HB : Well there are not just self-contradictory positions and mathematical

redefinition of problems about PCT which are published. There were also

published (by Rick) such physiological nonsensce about nervous system that I

can hardly beleive there is such ignorance in 21. Century.

MT : I have no problem with erroneous statements – I make lots of them and

expect everyone else to do so. I don’t like them when other people make

them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But “to err is human”

and mistakes can’t be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or

anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and

can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by

argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are

more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are

beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning

the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

HB : I think it’s not just problem in being “scientific poison”, they repeat

all the time. Some don’t learn from their mistakes. They do it all the time.

MT : End of an old fossil’s rant.

HB : Once again congratulations Martin.

Martin

[From Rick Marken (2017.06.20.0930)]

···

On Tue, Jun 20, 2017 at 8:38 AM, Robertson, Richard r-robertson@neiu.edu wrote:

RJRobertson 20170620
Well, as far as age goes, May 4 was my ninety first birthday, so as curmugeons go you have a bit of a go to catch up with me. But you have the advantage that people listen to your posts. Nobody ever replies to mine.

Hi DickÂ

How wonderful to hear from you. I don’t recall seeing a post from you on CSGNet. But if you did post and I didn’t reply it could only have been because it created no “pushing away” type disturbance to anything I was controlling. But if you post anything from now on (including this post, of course) I promise to reply, even if I agree with it (which I probably will;-)

BestÂ

RickÂ

Â

Dick Robertson

On Tue, Jun 20, 2017 at 12:19 AM, Boris Hartman boris.hartman@masicom.net wrote:

Martin

-----Original Message-----

From: Martin Taylor [mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net]

Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2017 5:05 AM

To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu

Subject: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05]

Today June 14 2017 is my 82nd birthday, and I am hereby claiming a privilege

of age, to rant using the persona of “grumpy old fossil”.

HB : Congratulations Martin. If you did it till this age, there is no

problem of doing it 2x as that :slight_smile:

MT : I have a concept, perhaps a vector of reference values, for how I want

to perceive CSGnet. I think it has been getting less like my reference

values over the last few years, and some of my contributions have,

accordingly, become stronger and more vehement. I would like CSGnet to be a

place to which I could point people who would like to learn about PCT, which

I think it was, and which for a few years it has not been.

HB : Yes I noticed that you become better. Like wine.

But I think it’s not just problem whether people should learn about PCT, but

also start thinking how they will upgrade PCT.

MT : I was pointed to CSG-L in 1991 or 1992 and started to learn PCT by

asking questions and proposing ideas that could be shot down or accepted.

Questions were courteously answered and ideas considered on their merits

(except when Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in

lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a

non-starter).

HB : This is what I was talking about. New ideas and new approaches to

development of PCT. I know Rick is brake to PCT. Because his "Behavior is

control" and “Controlled variable” in environment and speccially his

invention “Controlled Perceptual Variable” (CPV) is getting PCT slowly into

“lumber room”. Not slowly. Faster then I thought.

MT : It was a nice environment for an experienced scientist trying to learn

a new science, and I believe also for students. As that now-fossilized

scientist,

HB : I looked at your picture on Internet. You look quite young.

MT : I would like CSGnet again to be a place where advances and lacunae in

Perceptual Control Theory can be discussed in ways that conform to normal

science, as it was ten or twenty years ago (at least as seen through

rose-coloured memory glasses).

HB : Yes normal scientific PCT discussions is also what I miss.

MT : Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to

offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or

perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always

from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done

currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to

admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

HB : Eetu is special member of CSGnet forum. But I’m afraid that Rick will

confuse him too much. He just perfectly understood PCT. And now I don’t know

anymore.

MT : Persons with different ideas seem to be a problem on today’s CSGnet.

Novel ideas are dismissed with words along the lines of “according to PCT”,

rather than being considered dispassionately, and the persons go away

feeling that PCT is a private toy preserve with its own rules of “science”,

rather than finding out why their ideas might be wrong (if they are).

HB : Agree. The main figure seems to be Rick with his joystick playground

behind computer. Like a child.

MT : I suppose my problem is that I don’t think of science as a game with

winners and losers. I get very annoyed at so-called scientists who accept

payment from tobacco companies, drug companies, or oil companies to produce

papers proving that tobacco has no health effects, particular drugs do

wonders and are safe when they don’t and aren’t, or that burning carbon

doesn’t affect the climate.

MT : I can’t do anything about those, which is probably why I get annoyed

about them. But I also believe that PCT could and should have the status

within at least psychology, economics, and sociology that atomic theory does

in chemistry, as a foundational principle on which all else is based.

HB : It hink that PCT could have status in various sciences if Rick wouldn’t

be pushing his “Behavior is control” into foreground of PCT occurance.

MT : So it also annoys me when self-contradictory positions are taken for

the purpose of winning arguments, and when aspects of mathematics are

redefined to create publications. And I can at least try do do something

about issues affecting PCT as perceived by others.

HB : Well there are not just self-contradictory positions and mathematical

redefinition of problems about PCT which are published. There were also

published (by Rick) such physiological nonsensce about nervous system that I

can hardly beleive there is such ignorance in 21. Century.

MT : I have no problem with erroneous statements – I make lots of them and

expect everyone else to do so. I don’t like them when other people make

them, and still less do I like them when I make them. But “to err is human”

and mistakes can’t be avoided. We can take an erroneous statement I make (or

anyone else makes), with which someone disagrees or finds questionable, and

can correct it, perhaps by experiment, perhaps by logic, perhaps by

argument. But we cannot do this with self-contradictory statements that are

more than transient mistakes in the process of being corrected. They are

beyond error. They are scientific poison. And I perceive them as poisoning

the well for scientists who might otherwise drink the elixir of PCT.

HB : I think it’s not just problem in being “scientific poison”, they repeat

all the time. Some don’t learn from their mistakes. They do it all the time.

MT : End of an old fossil’s rant.

HB : Once again congratulations Martin.

Martin

Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.20.13.58]

RJRobertson 20170620
Well, as far as age goes, May 4 was my ninety first birthday, so as curmugeons go you have a bit of a go to catch up with me. But you have the advantage that people listen to your posts. Nobody ever replies to mine.

Dick Robertson

Here's a reply, and congratulations. Let's have a replay 10 years from now, eh!

Usually, people reply to posts that they see, but I haven't seen any of yours for a long time, and I wondered if you had given up interest. So after seeing your message I went back through my personal archives. I found one message from you in 2016, and group of them in 2014, but all of those messages were commending or congratulating people for various things, and not likely to disturb many perceptions in ways that would be countered by posting a reply.

I'll bet that if you posted on some of the topics that you know so well, you would get plenty of replies.

All the best, older curmudgeon.

Martin

Hi,

Still searching through past posts J

···

From: Richard Marken [mailto:rsmarken@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, June 17, 2017 8:52 PM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: Re: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

HB : You should »google« through CSGnet archives what you’ve been doing for centuries. One of members you want to see »disapear« from CSGnet was also Martin. »Google« in 2007. You also insulted him quite some times. You »pushed« from CSGnet quite some members with your rude attitude to them. Go »Google«…

Boris

MT: So I’ll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the further development of PCT, and who have left after being effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to apply it in his work. Just think.

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================

[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

Best

Rick

Richard S. Marken

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
–Antoine de Saint-Exupery

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.21.07.56]

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

As you might expect, I see some of that history differently. But I'm

not going to set up a conflict on that score. Instead, I want to
consider the positive points here.

[RM] "But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just

Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless."

[MT] I imagine that is true. This doesn't mean that the view or the

tool at that time understood by the newbie as important and useful
would have actually been wrong and useless once the newbie began to
fully understand PCT (as if that were possible:-). If they had been
encouraged, in the manner you describe for Bill, to see why what
they were espousing was not useful within PCT, while PCT was useful
in the domain of their interest, some, I think, would have stayed
and by now would have been smart enough to have developed PCT in
ways none of us now can guess.

[RM] "You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools

as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this
is because you disagreed with my arguments."

[MT] I doubt it. Why? Because an argument is something with which

one cannot disagree. One can disagree with a conclusion, especially
if it masquerades as an argument, and I have often disagreed with
your conclusions. An argument, however, is something one can
explore. One can examine premises for agreement or disagreement (as
I have been doing with Bruce Nevin recently). One can examine
whether an argument follows logically (or even reasonably) from
agreed premises. Not all arguments can be resolved easily, but they
are at least openings for learning, even when the end result remains
disagreement over conclusions.

[MT] What does PCT tell us, at least at the most obvious level? It

is that people act to control perceptions, bringing them nearer
their reference values. And what is likely to be a controlled
perception among people whose actions can be labelled “research”? I
would guess that one such would be a perception of self as
understanding the way the world works (and the perception is that
one does not, in some respect). Why would such a person want to
investigate PCT? Could it be that what that person has learned so
far in life does not seem to be reducing the error in that
controlled perception, at least not fast enough? When the person
controls in imagination (planning), might they not have imagined
combining PCT with what they already know, to increase their
understanding of how the world works?

[MT] Let's do some imagining here, and imagine that such people are

not greeted with “PCT doesn’t need what you know”, but with “What
are you really hoping to achieve by investigating PCT. How can we
help? Maybe you will find a new way to do what you want, without
forgetting your tools. Perhaps when you have learned to appreciate
what PCT might do for you, you will find that you are thinking
differently and will discard your old ideas – or maybe you won’t,
and will be able to see ways that with those tools and PCT together,
you can advance your (and our) knowledge of the way the world
works.”

[MT] PCT isn't an actor in and of itself. The people who practice it

are controllers of their own perceptions. Some have reference values
for perceptions of what a psychological science should be, and for
some of those, the reference values are described in the writings of
Bill Powers. Some want to find out what a psychological science
should be, with reference values that are based on the concordance
between what the science says Nature should do and what they observe
that Nature does. When a newbie investigating PCT is told that they
are wrong simply because what they say disagrees with PCT, the
teller is showing that they belong to the first class of PCT
practitioner.

[MT} If, however, the newbie is asked whether they can see why what

they say is incompatible with PCT, but that maybe PCT might serve
their purposes at least as well as what they already understand,
perhaps they might be readily drawn into learning more about PCT. In
the end, each individual researcher must decide for him- or herself
whether there are deep inconsistencies between what they knew or
thought they knew and PCT, or whether by changing viewpoint they can
see how what they knew and PCT strengthen and reinforce each other
in a greater synthesis.

[MT] I have no doubt that this is your perception. The question

isn’t whether what you say is as others perceive the history, but
whether you were and are controlling for bringing people with new
ideas and different tools to a state where they want to learn more
about PCT. If you are, then I would ask you whether you perceive
your actions to have been successful in bringing that perception
nearer its reference value. FWIW, my perception, using the “random
disturbance” observational version of the TCV, is that you control
for NOT having new people introducing new possibilities and new
views that might augment PCT.

[MT] Quite possibly. Going back to before my first encounter with

Bill P at CSG-93, I have talked about “The Bomb in the Hierarchy”,
which is the inherent possibility that a hierarchy reorganized in a
stable environment may explode erratically (in a child I call the
explosion a “temper tantrum”) when in an environment that works
differently, exposing positive feedback loops that might cascade up
the hierarchy in the same way that a “sandpile avalanche” cascades
down the sandpile slope. I can’t speak for Alex, but I imagine he
has developed his “researcher” part of his hierarchy in an
environment in which logic is taken seriously. When he encountered
an environment in which that is not true (as he perceived it – as
do I), the Bomb did explode.

[MT] Not by doing that, but by ignoring both common sense and

mathematical logic.

[MT] No. I suspect there may be subtle ways in which one can detect

a ticking “Bomb”, but I think it doubtful that CSGnet is a medium in
which they are easily observed, if they exist at all.

[MT] I believe both. But I also believe that "people's

misconceptions" are as you perceive them. I ask you to think about
your own behaviour when someone tries to correct your own
“misconceptions” as they are perceived by the one trying to correct
you. Since you use Alex as an example (I agree that I used his name
first), let’s just ask about one misconception among many in your
Power Law paper – the idea that the curvature at a point on a curve
is a function of time. Alex tried to point out to you within hours
of your first mentioning it on CSGnet that this cannot be true. Your
only “argument” for months, culminating in a publication, was a flat
statement that it is true. Never, ever, have you actually made an
argument to support the idea.

[MT] Alex has not had the breadth of experience in encountering such

conclusions masquerading as arguments as some of us have. So his
hierarchy has no way of dealing with it and was suscptible to the
Bomb (nor, I think does my hierarchy have sufficient resilience to
avoid such outbursts from time to time, even though I perceive them
– from the Analyst’s viewpoint – to be counterproductive.)

[MT] Might it not be better to ask a person whether property "X" of

PCT is compatible with what they think they know, and do a kind of
MoL approach to seeing whether, at a higher level, a conflict you
perceive might have a resolution. Maybe the “correction” is
unnecessary, and the person would discover it by learning PCT
better. Maybe it’s unnecessary because you yourself don’t understand
what is being told by the person (as, I continue to believe, is the
case with information theory).

[MT] What makes you think I don't think that? But also what makes

you think I don’t go up a level to ask why those insulting and
sometimes profane replies occur?

[MT] Is Boris a troll? I suppose it depends on your definition. I

conceive of trolls as posting what they do in order to generate
conflict. They control a perception of power with a reference of
having some and a perception that they don’t. By having the power to
create a conflict, they bring their perceptions closer to their
reference values.

[MT] I don't see Boris that way. I perceive him as being like you,

in having a serenely confident sense of knowing exactly how PCT
works, and wanting everybody to see that THIS is the way PCT works,
by “correcting” every deviation from the way you or he perceive PCT
to work. The problem is that Boris’s perception differs from yours,
and neither of you use argument to analyze which, if either, is
closer to what Nature (as opposed to Bill Powers) says.

[MT] Anyway, to answer your question, I do think that irresolvable

arguments are likely to lead people to perceive that PCT is a poor
relation to science, and therefor not worth pursuing. For many years
I have wished that there was some forum to which I could point
potential PCT learners, so that they could learn by asking questions
and by observing carefully constructed arguments in the way I
initially learned “back in the day”. It’s part of the reason several
of us started ECACS, that we thought we could provide such a forum
when CSGnet had ceased to be a possibility.

Martin
···

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

          RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am

solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If
you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT
by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive
step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think
I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t
want to be driving people away.

            MT: So I'll just ask you to try

going back over the last quarter century or so and think
of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer a
different view or a different tool that might have
benefited the further development of PCT, and who have
left after being effectively told by you “We don’t serve
your kind here.” Just think back over the years, and
most recently in your interactions with the semiotician
who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

                        RM: Am I

ever going to get an answer to this, Martin?
I’d really like to know what I’m doing that
is driving people away from CSGNet.

                                RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving

away people. Could you tell me what
I could have done differently to not
drive these people away?

          RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart

who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of
these people did offer a different view of or tool for
studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen
(usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong
and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these
people very upset and they left. But others (like
yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments
against these views and tools as effectively saying “We
don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you
disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with
Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that
Bill made his arguments in a way that was less
contentious.

        RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as

well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally
made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more
consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to
argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general
my arguments were always substantive and reflected my
understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum
argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have
largely succeeded.

        RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting

posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing
against me.

        A relatively recent example that comes to mind was

Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the
power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had
specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law.
When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be
a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private
if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him
only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem,
we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put
it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving
people away by doing that?

        Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to

profanity and insult?

        RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I

am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions
about it.

        So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away

when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So
again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I
don’t drive people away?

        And why don't you think that some of the blame for

driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often
insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts.

        Don't you think posts like those from Boris might have

more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine
do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have
come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

Sorry Rick. In past post I’ve wrote that you’ve been doing something for centuires. I thought decades. But you understood ?

Boris

···

From: Richard Marken [mailto:rsmarken@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, June 17, 2017 8:52 PM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: Re: CSGnet future and the future of PCT

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

MT: So I’ll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the further development of PCT, and who have left after being effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to apply it in his work. Just think.

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================

[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

Best

Rick

Richard S. Marken

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
–Antoine de Saint-Exupery

R J Robertson, 20179621

Hppy Midsummar day to all on CSGnet. And thanks to Rick and Martin for allowing my curmugeon precedence. As to my posts, yes, I was most often congratulating someone for their efforts in PCT discussions and all. I do sometimes find things that (especially) newcomers bring up, based on their contrimporary experience that shows their grasp of PCT could bear strengthening. I usualy like Rick’s efforts to set them straight. I do agree that he does not have the light touch at correcting someone that Bill and Mary had. I put the difference in diference in backgrounds. I have been in other discussion groups where I suspect the members were much more comfortable with heated discussions, insults etc. and could go away without feeling deeply affected by even the most virulent (seeming) remarks.

So I think it would be a good idea for all of us to ask a commentator whether he or she found some one of [my] remarks cut more into the ego than into the discussion.

Best,

Dick R

···

On Sat, Jun 17, 2017 at 3:20 PM, Bruce Nevin bnhpct@gmail.com wrote:

[Bruce Nevin (201.06.17.16:19 ET)]

Rick Marken (2017.06.15.1140)–

RM: Ah, so it’s me that’s driving away people. Could you tell me what I could have done differently to not drive these people away?Â

Rick Marken (2017.06.16.1750)

RM: Am I ever going to get an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150) –

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet?Â

Rick,

Martin didn’t bring it up.Â

There is nothing in Martin’s ‘birthday curmudgeon’ post (Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05) that says or implies "Rick Marken is to blame for driving people away from CSG-net. The closest thing to it is his mention of one episode (“Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter”).

I see no need to personalize this.

You have in past years sometimes written things in ways that could be read as intemperate, inconsiderate, insensitive, tone-deaf, snarky, or any of innumerable other labels for things at which people take offense. In my view since I have resumed following CSG-net the tone of your contributions has seemed much more clear of such entanglements.

(Like Kent, I stopped reading CSG-net for a number of years, and for similar reasons. So I can’t speak for the interim, but I do perceive a difference in comparison to what I remember.)

I read Martin’s post differently from you, and I agree with what I understand him to be saying. There is a recurrent problem of tone and manner on CSG-net.Â

I want us to focus on how to fix it.

Partly, a contentious, dogmatic, offense-taking tone is hard to avoid in a strictly textual medium. Email is notorious for it. Twitter is even worse, by all accounts. (I don’t tweet or follow tweets.)

Partly, this problem arises because our ways of conceptualizing behavior and our linguistic means for talking about such concepts are imbued root and branch with the naive behaviorism of our ancestors. By ancestors I don’t just mean behaviorists beginning in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Assumptions about rewards and punishments pervade our culture, from pedagogy to penal code. This makes it all too easy to misstate even when our understanding of PCT is correct. A marked characteristic of CSG-net is a ‘PCT-correct’ pouncing on such errors.Â

I’ll suggest again that we might do well to cultivate as a habit discourse in our CSGnet culture things likeÂ

"You said X. That sounds like . Is that what you intended?"Â

orÂ

"You said X. Did you mean X’ by that? (Because X could be misinterpreted as ."Â

The posts from Bill and Mary that you quote are exemplary, as you say, and we should take them as examples of constructive conduct.

But please don’t insist on perceiving this as a personal conflict between you and Martin. It’s bigger than both of you. And we need both of you.Â

/Bruce

On Sat, Jun 17, 2017 at 2:51 PM, Richard Marken rsmarken@gmail.com wrote:

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

Â

MT: So I'll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century

or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer
a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the
further development of PCT, and who have left after being
effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think
back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the
semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

          RM: Am I ever going to get

an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?Â

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.Â

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================
[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.Â

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?Â

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about  it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

BestÂ

Rick

Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Hello Richard. Nice to »hear« from you. It’s a privilege to talk to such an experienced man. I noticed your age.

R J Robertson, 20179621

Hppy Midsummar day to all on CSGnet. And thanks to Rick and Martin for allowing my curmugeon precedence. As to my posts, yes, I was most often congratulating someone for their efforts in PCT discussions and all.

HB : Nice to »hear« that you are following what’s going on CSGnet.

I do sometimes find things that (especially) newcomers bring up, based on their contrimporary experience that shows their grasp of PCT could bear strengthening. I usualy like Rick’s efforts to set them straight.

HB : Ricks’ efforts are usually unsuccesfull (although there are exceptions) because Rick should be straghtening himself not others.

I do agree that he does not have the light touch at correcting someone that Bill and Mary had.

HB : It would be good if he would be near Bill and Mary. I exposed Bills and Marys’ Thesis about PCT and he even didn’t wrote whether he agree with these Thesis or not. Did you see them ? Can you answer me whether you agree with them or not ?

I put the difference in diference in backgrounds.

HB : It would be good if you would recognize the differences between Bills’ PCT (Perceptual Control Theory) and Ricks RCT (Ricks’ Control Theory) because that is the essence of conflicts on CSGnet.

I have been in other discussion groups where I suspect the members were much more comfortable with heated discussions, insults etc. and could go away without feeling deeply affected by even the most virulent (seeming) remarks.

HB : It’s good that you are active and universal. It will keep your mind powerfull.

So I think it would be a good idea for all of us to ask a commentator whether he or she found some one of [my] remarks cut more into the ego than into the discussion.

HB : Well I’m not sure that I understand what you wanted to say. I’m not perfect with your language. But if I understood right you were more turned into discussion.

Best,

Boris

Best,

Dick R

[From Rick Marken (2017.06.22.1700)

···

Bruce Nevin (201.06.17.16:19 ET)

BN: There is nothing in Martin’s ‘birthday curmudgeon’ post (Martin Taylor 2016.06.14.00.05) that says or implies "Rick Marken is to blame for driving people away from CSG-net. The closest thing to it is his mention of one episode (“Rick rather strongly accused me of trying to improve PCT in lieu of showing why whatever the suggested improvement was was actually a non-starter”).

 RM: Well, there was also this:Â

BN Over the years many clever people from other disciplines who seemed to offer the possibility of important advances to PCT have been turned – or perhaps “driven” is a better word – away from CSGnet, though not always from PCT. I think most recently of Alex Gomez-Marin and I see it being done currently to Eetu Pikkarainen, a person whose acumen I have learned to admire from our interactions outside of CSGnet.

RM: Â I was the only one who apparently drove Alex away with my PCT interpretation of the power law; everyone else seemed to agree with Alex that my analysis was “bullshit”. I believe I am also the one who corrected Eetu’s misconceptions about PCT so I’m pretty sure I’m the one Martn had in mind as the one currently driving Eetu away.

BN: I read Martin’s post differently from you, and I agree with what I understand him to be saying. There is a recurrent problem of tone and manner on CSG-net.Â

RM: It seems pretty clear to me that what Martin believed was driving people away from CSGNet was not the uncivil tone of the discussions but, rather, the fact that there was disagreement about the merits of proposed contributions to PCT made by newcomers to CSGNet. If it were the tone that bothered Martin I don’t think I would have been the only one he mentioned in his post. I may be bad (I don’t think I am but you can’t control the way people perceive you) but surely there are others who are as bad or even worse in terms of tone. But more on this when I reply to some other posts on this thread that I am way behind on. Â

BN: I want us to focus on how to fix it.

RM: I would love to hear specific suggestions.Â

BestÂ

RickÂ

Partly, a contentious, dogmatic, offense-taking tone is hard to avoid in a strictly textual medium. Email is notorious for it. Twitter is even worse, by all accounts. (I don’t tweet or follow tweets.)

Partly, this problem arises because our ways of conceptualizing behavior and our linguistic means for talking about such concepts are imbued root and branch with the naive behaviorism of our ancestors. By ancestors I don’t just mean behaviorists beginning in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Assumptions about rewards and punishments pervade our culture, from pedagogy to penal code. This makes it all too easy to misstate even when our understanding of PCT is correct. A marked characteristic of CSG-net is a ‘PCT-correct’ pouncing on such errors.Â

I’ll suggest again that we might do well to cultivate as a habit discourse in our CSGnet culture things likeÂ

"You said X. That sounds like . Is that what you intended?"Â

orÂ

"You said X. Did you mean X’ by that? (Because X could be misinterpreted as ."Â

The posts from Bill and Mary that you quote are exemplary, as you say, and we should take them as examples of constructive conduct.

But please don’t insist on perceiving this as a personal conflict between you and Martin. It’s bigger than both of you. And we need both of you.Â

/Bruce


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

On Sat, Jun 17, 2017 at 2:51 PM, Richard Marken rsmarken@gmail.com wrote:

[From Rick Marken (2016.06.17.1150)]

Martin Taylor (2017.06.16.22.53)–

MT: I had not intended to discuss this in public,

RM: Then why bring it up? Just to tell people that I am solely responsible for driving people away from CSGNet? If you really think I alone am imperiling the future of PCT by driving people away from CSGNet then I think a positive step would be for you to tell me, publicly, what you think I could do to stop driving people away. I certainly don’t want to be driving people away.

Â

MT: So I'll just ask you to try going back over the last quarter century

or so and think of the people who seemed smart, who seemed to offer
a different view or a different tool that might have benefited the
further development of PCT, and who have left after being
effectively told by you “We don’t serve your kind here.” Just think
back over the years, and most recently in your interactions with the
semiotician who is trying to get a deep understanding of PCT to
apply it in his work. Just think.

          RM: Am I ever going to get

an answer to this, Martin? I’d really like to know what
I’m doing that is driving people away from CSGNet.

                  RM: Ah, so it's me that's driving away people.

Could you tell me what I could have done
differently to not drive these people away?Â

RM: OK, I can think of many people who were very smart who came to CSGNet and eventually abruptly left. Most of these people did offer a different view of or tool for studying PCT. But in all cases the different view was seen (usually by just Bill, Tim Bourbon and myself) as wrong and the tool useless. This, of course, made some of these people very upset and they left. But others (like yourself) didn’t leave. You may have heard my arguments against these views and tools as effectively saying “We don’t serve your kind here”. My guess this is because you disagreed with my arguments. But you also disagreed with Bill’s (and Tom’s) arguments so I think it may be that Bill made his arguments in a way that was less contentious.Â

RM: I’ve gone back through a few of the old posts on CSGNet (that’s how I was reminded that Tom Bourbon was involved in the old discussions, his arguments virtually always being consistent with those of Bill and me). Doing this reminded me that Bill was very good at what might be called “cordial conflict”. One of the ways he did this was by beginning a post with praise for the person to whom he was responding before knocking down their arguments. Apparently Mary Powers picked up on this approach and did the same when she would post (which was rare but always brilliant). Here are the beginnings of two examples of this technique, one from Bill and one from Mary:

===========================
[From Bill Powers (921219.0130)]

Re: Martin Taylor (921218.1830) –

BP: Your remarks about the predictability of the world and PCT are

mostly cogent. This is particularly true if you include the

predictability of the output effectors as well.

BP: I can quibble, however, about a number of points…

======================

[from Mary Powers 980329 and 980402]

Re: Jeff Vancouver:

MP: Some comments on your chapter “Self-Regulation in Occupational Psychology: A Tale of Two Paradigms”.

MP: First I want to say that I really admire your patience and diligence in

doing the research for this chapter (and your other papers)- I would love to

see a lot of your references for myself but getting them and reading them

must have been a huge project, and is beyond me.

MP: Now to the chapter:

MP: To begin with, I believe that the tale you tell here of the development of

self-regulation theories seriously distorts the position of PCT in relation to other theories.

======================

RM: Looking back over the history of CSGNet, in memory as well as in the archive, I can recall having occasionally made angry outbursts that I regret and I wish I had more consistently adopted the “cordial conflict” approach to argumentation of Bill and Mary. But I think that in general my arguments were always substantive and reflected my understanding of PCT. I have tried to avoid ad hominum argumentation and personal insults and I believe I have largely succeeded.Â

RM: My impression is that the most angry and insulting posts have come from those who were (and are) arguing against me. A relatively recent example that comes to mind was Alex’s repeatedly saying that my PCT interpretation of the power law was “bullshit”. This was after Alex had specifically asked how PCT would interpret the power law. When I realized that the PCT interpretation was likely to be a huge disturbance to Alex I actually asked him in private if it would be OK for me to put it on CSGNet, telling him only that he might find it troubling. He said no problem, we’re doing science here (or something like that) so I put it on the net and all hell broke loose. So was I driving people away by doing that? Should I have known that my proposal would drive Alex to profanity and insult?Â

RM: So you think I am driving people away and I think I am trying to teach PCT and correct people’s misconceptions about  it. So it looks to me like you see me as driving people away when I correct them; you probably see it differently. So again, I ask what would you have me do differently so that I don’t drive people away? And why don’t you think that some of the blame for driving people away from CSGNet might be in the often insulting and sometimes profane replies I get to my posts. Don’t you think posts like those from Boris might have more to do with driving people away from CSGNet than mine do? Trolls are not a recent invention, you know. They have come and gone on CSGNet from the start.

BestÂ

Rick


Richard S. MarkenÂ

"Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you
have nothing left to take away.�
                --Antoine de Saint-Exupery