From > Mr REMI COTE 960327.1320
To > [Martin Taylor 960314 14:10]
Your dictionnary of emotion according to PCT is a good start.
Interesting stuff.
You:
Personally, I like the PCT approach better than saying "God will provide
what is necessary, and we will know that it was necessary because God
provided it."
Me: I am sorry, I always take for granted that people are infused with
Darwin's basic principle, so I take short cut and I always regret it...
Of course I wasn't implying spontaneous generation, when I said that
language wouldn't had appear if it wasn't a necessity. I should have
wrote, to be more precise, language wouldn't be selected if it wasn't
an advantage (necessity).
You:
But there is a clear advantage in being able to say things like
"The danger is a snake" as opposed to "the danger is a lion" (as baboon
guards do when they alert the main pack), or to say "Joe go around the
back and Bob to the right; I'll take this side and we'll drive the beast
over the cliff." Animals that can communicate this kind of stuff--and that
share out the benefits after the hunt--have a clear advantage over similar
animals that can't collaborate in this way.
me: I agree, and I add that a more complex and articulate language became
an advantage (a necessity to be winner in competition against other
hominid group) only in a fire world, that is a technological world.
Babbling are sufficient for baboons, not for first hominid who dealt
with complex task of manipulating fire and combustible. I think
that fire increase dependancy between hominid. That the main point
of _my_ thesis, if there is one. So the principal emergence of
language is precisely the increase in social dependency brought by
fire. The equation fire = increase social dependancy is really the
fruit of Goudsblom genius, when he simply argue that the task to get
combustible was the first real organised work to appear. The community
depend on the way this task was fulfilled. (The first hominid didn't
know how to light the fire, that explain 6 meters layer of ashes, and
the recent (40000 years) of sapiens sapiens in the territory of sapiens
neanderthalis who may had more trouble lighting their fire at will...)
This dependency was really the engine of technology, and technology
brought a lot more dependency, that is a good example of positive
feedback.
I agree with you that even ant has language, but I dont agree at all
that you can say that: without a high level of dependency, any complex
language is necessary. Language has to be an advantage over competition
to be selected. And I don't think it can be an advantage in a species
where individual can be independant.
Ask me what you don't understand, tell me exactly what you don't like
about this, and why, it will help me.
You:
Me: Chiken-egg infinite loop. To be avoided.
How so "chicken-egg"?
me: It seem fruitless to me to argue about what came first, technology
or aggressivity. It is a process, implying as I said positive feedback
that explain all the exponentiality that is so caracteristic about
human behavior and evolution. In this process, aggressivity lead to
technology that lead to more aggressivity that lead to more technology...
But:
I think finally that you are right, after all we are not really more
agressive than every other species. Because of teck, when we get
agressive we can destroy the life of 17 child like it happen in Scottia.
Without our weapon, we would be agressive, but consequence would be
far less important. So I mixed up consequence of technology with cause.
But:
I still hold to be true that we are the more helpless creature on
earth, simply because in nature, helpless creature died, and we don't.
It is a proof by absurd, but a proof.
ยทยทยท
____________________
You:
The enhanced _power_ of technology increases the number of people
influenced by any action you do, and increases the amount by which any
one person is influenced. It is also likely to increase the _proportion_
of your influence on the world that is in side effects. All of which can
be handled by increasing the rigidity of social convention, or by reducing
overall control system gains (tolerating rather than countering the
disturbances due to the actions of other people).
Me: So you are saying that teck bring conformity, which I consider a form
of violence. According to you, which human are happier, the one who
live life in a high conformity society or the one that live in a low
conformity group. So I am a bit right when I say that tech bring bad
thing to human, like conformity. And you are right when you say that
tech can be use to conteract these side effects. So in itself tech.
is not bad, I admit it... (took me two weeks to admit this...)
The trouble with tech can be centered around the concept of dependency.
When we see publicity about refridgerator or car, we often see the
word "dependable", Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance, was
a book about plannification, awareness of the multifacet of dependancy.
I had an image or a vision of our ramide ancestor (ape), I saw them
like animal with no plannification at all, There was no need for that
in the animal world.
I guess I am right. And technology change that fact. I am right there also.
Where I am wrong is when I am saying that tech bound us to misery.
I was wrong because we can always regress, such our tumb like some
catatonic and automaticaly transform ourselve like bird, with no
planning.
_________________________
You:
You are saying that agressivity are what the species need do be more
competitive.
I don't know when I said that, or what I said that leads to such a
conclusion.
ME:
Well here are your more exact terms:
">>I interpret what is externally observed as "aggression" to be a manifestation
of relatively high gain control systems. They work hard to attain their
goals, and in particular they work hard against conflicting control systems.
I suggest the possibility that it is the aggressive primate that is more
likely to discover fire--and if that aggressive primate can also talk,
more likely to pass the knowledge on to other members of the group,
and to following generations.
+++++++
I once killed a northern pike with a short bat. I was anxious, yes, but
the fish was anxious too. On my first hit, I guess I miss the brain...
I was still holding him or it (depending if you read the life of St-Francois)
I felt his nervousness.
You:
Are you sure you did not just feel the output actions of the fish that had
a reference perception relating to swimming away, a perception that could
not be produced by any of the fish's actions?
Me:
I guess you gave me a good explanation. I thank you again, I guess
I still have homework to do in PCT, but I feel I understand it better
thank's to you.
Question:
1)Do you have text about reorganisation, the latest conceptualisation
of it? I would be please to see if my understanding of it is o.k.
2)Stroop = internal confict
internal conflict happen on one same layer of control hierarchy?
3)Is there any writing about who we memorise new stuff, according to PCT?
Thank again, sorry for the big delay, REMI
One Last question. How do you explain the anxiety and or difficulty
generated by the stroop task, in PCT term?
Conflict.
Must rush. A colleague came to ask why I was not at the meeting we set up
to start half an hour ago.
Martin