from [Marc Abrams (2003.12.10.2151)]
With finals now out of the way I can start focusing on a few other things.
Bruce Gregory has successfully done this so I'm going to give it a try. I am
going to use this post from Martin to try and make my thoughts, intent, and
reason for asking the questions I do.
First, I would like to say that I am sorry my private conversation with Bill
W became public knowledge. Those 2 posts happen to have been in the middle
of an intense discussion Bill and I were having.
I learned a long time ago that I don't have to accept the 'whole' person. I
love Bill Powers the scientist and deep thinker. I am less enamoured with
Bill Powers the person. I don't have to accept both into my life and I
won't. Bill has hurt me _very_ deeply on two occasions. I won't allow a
third. This is the last I will say on this matter. If Bill cannot, or will
not deal with me as an interested party to his theory, so be it. I don't
need or want a 'personal' relationship with him. I would like a
'professional' one. If Bill cannot make that seperation, we both lose.
I have had _many_ private conversations with people on this net and if
everyone of them became public knowledge, _many_ people would be 'offended',
and not necessarily by what I said. Sometimes these conversations make you
go up a level and help resolve issues and ultimately change your mind about
an issue or person and sometimes they reaffim the way you perceive things.
_Nothing_ was ever said in these conversations for the purpose of inflicting
any kund of pain on anyone else. The conversations I have had have always
been aboout _clarifying_ my thoughts. My exchange with Bill W was no
exception.
Now, on with the post and my life. 
[Martin Taylor 2003.12.10.1734 EST]
Firstly, let's consider what "intrisic variables" might be. They seem
to have become more of a buzzword than a descriptive label. To me, an
"intrinsic variable" is some internal state of the organism that
affects its (vaguely defined) well-being, and that is not subject to
direct perceptual control.
I think this statement needs clarification. Martin when you say 'direct'
perceptual control, I believe you mean 'cognitive' perceptual control. I
will clarify this in the next paragraph.
Consider, for example, blood sugar concentration. Normally, we can't
perceive it directly,
You of course mean 'cognitively'. Our pancreas _can_ perceive the blood
sugar concentration.
but when it changes, we do perceive various things such as dizziness,
hunger, and the like.
Cognitively, but also 'intrinsically' at the same time
Some actions that
influence those perceptions do also influence blood sugar, but others
don't--and other variables influence those overt perceptions, too.
For example, too much spinning can increase dizziness, and stomach
contraction may well cause the hunger perception. Either could happen
when blood sugar is at its normal level.
Again, you speak of 'overt' perceptions and 'direct' perceptions. I think
'cognitive' would be more accurate.
Although either dizziness or hunger could be perceived without having
blood sugar far from its reference value, nevertheless, unless a
different cause is perceived, it is likely that some action such as
eating or having an insulin injection will solve the problem. These
are actions that involve the perceptual control system, not the
intrinsic variable control system, which is colloquially called
"reorganization".
The two 'systems', as you have defined them, are entwined and do not, I
believe, operate independently of one another. 'Reorganization is going on
'continously' in our bodies, sometimes cognitively and sometimes
'intrinsically', and sometimes together.
Reoriganization will not work to allow perceptual control to keep
intrinsic variables near their references unless the environment is
sufficiently stable.
I disagree here. What the body does to control my blood pressure may have no
environmental element involved.
There is a feedback system, for sure. But it
works because a controlled perception correlates with an intrinsic
variable, and because the actions involved with controlling that
perception also have side effects that often affect the intrinisic
variable in a consistent way. Only random reorganization can find the
appropriate side-effects (which I imagine in large part has happened
over evolutionary time-scales rather than within the individual).
I don't beleive for a moment that reorganization is 'random'. It might
_appear_ that way, but I don't believe that it is. If something happens that
does not allow a control system to 'regain' control, than positive feedback
is a possibility, another one maybe a 'replacement' and a new control sytem
put in place. Reorganization does _not_ always work. Just look at our immune
system. In physiology they have a couple of interesting concepts. One is
called 'bistability' and the other is 'allostatic regulation'. The phenomena
that these two concepts are used to explain, I feel, would be better served
by the PCT control model. Bistability is used to explain a 2 level
hierarchical control system. Allostatic regulation tosses homeostatis out
the window and says that reference conditions are _not_ set points but are
variable and can and do change over time and conditions. One of those
conditions might be a failed attempt at reorganization.
The big perceptual control hierarchy, according to this view of
reorganization, developed because successive refinements of the
criteria for perceptual control improved the precision with which
perceptual control side-effects had the appropriate influence on the
intrinsic variables. One lives longer if one stops when confronted
with a patch of red, if one can identify that patch as belonging to a
traffic light rather than to an autumnal maple tree.
Now to the question of the hierarchy. As I understand it, and if my
interpretation is wrong, please point it out to me. The first few levels are
intended to represent the physical (i.e. for example, receptors -> dorsal
horn -> Thalamus - Cotrex, or any number of other paths that might be
involved). How does that correlate to the hierarchy proposed by Bill? For
instance, is he saying that level 3 (configurations) is associated with the
thalamus? If not, what is it associated with? If so, what data does he have
to support this view?
_This_ is why I beleive the hierarchy cannot work this way. I believe the
hierarchy is a _COGNITIVE_ construct, useful for understanding other
cognitive constructs. But perceptions are much more than a simple one-one
translation of our sensory inputs. I think both emotions and imagination
play an extremely important role here. I refer you to Rick's post [From Rick
Marken (2003.12.09.2030)]. Here Rick's imagination and emotions played a key
role in his perceptions. When he 'went-up-a-level' he 'observed' his
imagining's and changed what he stored in memory and 'emotionally' saw
things differently.
So, if there are many intrinsic variables, presumably survival (or
rather, preferential propagation of the genes) involves many
interactions and interaction loops among them. The complexity of
these interactions requires corresponding complexity in the
perceptual control hierarchy that acts on the environment so as to
maintain the intrinsic variables near their (genetically determined)
reference values.
Martin, as you have said in the past, a 'hierarchy' with 'loops' is _not_ a
hierarchy. It's a network.
What, then, does it mean to say "how closely the perception is
coupled to intrinsic variables"? And how would the answer relate to
the case under discussion?
'Intrinsic variables' have perceptions. The question becomes to what extent
are we aware of our intrinsic variables and the answer is usually not much,
unless there is quite a bit of error, and then we become cognitively aware
of them through our emotions and feelings and they in turn help determine
what we will 'feel' next.
Folks, I have no answers here. I have lots of thoughts, ideas, and
inventions. Until we have some empirical data to support a particular view,
I feel comfortable asking these questions.
As Lee Smolin, Physicist and author says in trying to explain why Newtonian
physics has some holes, and his solution in part is; "In science, detective
movies, love or any other area of life, when one is confronted with a
situation in which the old assumptions are no longer working [ he is
referring here to a 20 year lull in particle physics, with no new
discoveries, for the first time in 100 years] as they used to, it is perhaps
time to look for new questions to ask. But how does one search, not for new
answers, but for new questions? Perhaps the first thing to do is to try to
look around us with fresh eyes and examine the evidence that is close at
hand. Sometimes a crucial piece of evidence lies right in front of us that
has up till now lacked any significance. Looked at in a new way, our
familiar world can all of a sudden reveal new meanings."
In conjunction with this he also said, and I am adding here:
""...It is possible, indeed I would argue, necessary, to speculate. Because
we cannot invent what we cannot conceive, the construction of a new theory
must involve, or perhaps be preceded by, attempts to imagine the outcome."
These speculations, both mine & Smolin's, are fantasy, frank speculations.
These speculations are inspired by diverse sources and issues, some
physical, some biological & Physiological, and others philosophical. Until
these ideas and hypotheses are sufficiently tested they cannot be considered
part of science. This holds true for HPCT or any other theory as well.
Marc