[From Kenny Kitzke (2002.10.24)]
<Bill Williams UMKC 23 September 2002 3:00 AM CST>
<When I said I thought internal conflict was the source of most of the
un-wanted
emotions that we experience, what I had in mind was unneccesary unpleasant
emotions that are generated as a result of our having contradictory goals.>
I can understand that having contradictory goals/reference perceptions
(especially mutually exclusive references at the same level of perception)
results in Internal Conflict and perhaps dynamic loop instability. This
would have a person in a state of unresolvable error, where no amount of
action on the environment (externally observable behavior) can eliminate
error in both control loops.
It appears we are giving a name to such experienced Internal Conflict:
Emotion. Further, we have many different names for different kinds of
Emotions. Apparently, they are different because of the magnitude of the
unresolvable error, the perceptual level, the specific reference variable,
etc.
You have classified some emotions as "unwanted." Further, some emotions are
unpleasant and you claim, or hope, are also unnecessary. Thus, you desire
that PCT would help us control our emotions. And, in this construct, if we
can eliminate incompatible goals, say by "going up a level," we could reduce
or eliminate these unwanted emotions.
Bravo, Bill! I think I understand you better and this makes some good PCT
sense. Contrary to <<Byran Thalhammer's>> initial sharp disagreement with
your desire to control our unwanted emotions.
<<Sadly, I cannot disagree more. We have said that PCT is not about the
control of behavior. Emotions are behavioral outputs of systems that are
experiencing error. They may be at first internal, but we identify them
most when they are observed externally, from our own outputs or someone
else's. Both are disturbances to our perceptions, after all is said and
down. So, PCT is not about the control of emotions, but the perception of
them.>>
The fallacy in this reasoning is, according to the PCT Master, Bill Powers,
that emotions are not behavior; at least they are not outputs or actions in
the PCT loop model. Yet, these emotions do seem to have observable actions
and certain physiological phenomena closely associated with them. I
purposely avoid saying that emotions cause such measurable phenomena or
certainly such observable actions.
Yet, it is easy to understand why people do conclude that emotions cause and
precede behavior in sequence. An example is Adele B. Lynn, a highly praised
and successful consultant and trainer, whose Emotional Intelligence Seminar I
attended and commented upon on CSGNet.
Emotion driving behavior seems like another behavioral illusion that can only
be corrected by putting on PCT glasses. Or, is it possible that PCT/HPCT
does not adequately deal with emotions and how they fit into human nature and
behavior?
<<So, emotions are NOT what is unwanted, rather, we are controlling a
perception of ourselves in action, let's say, where the reference is a
certain result of our inputs to a discussion, interaction, or other
activity.>>
Bryan makes another point here that may not be so easily refuted. Is anxiety
or fear or anger really unwanted emotions? He adds a concept about our
emotions being relevant to seemingly helping us control a [reference]
perception of ourselves. I can see some sense and science in that idea as
well.
You too make what seems to be a similar observation.
<In your example below you use the example of a tornado as an example of an
_external_ source of emotion of fear. But, I don't think of the fear
potentially associated with a tornado as being "un-wanted." If one doesn't
experience fear when confronted with a tornado then maybe something is
functionally wrong with the way one's emotions are being geneated. A tornado
it seems to me _ought_ to be experienced as a threat to one's intrinsic
reference levels, and fear therefore seems to me in this context to be a good
thing.>
Here, you seem to imply a link between the emotion of fear and
self-preservation. This is closer to my concept of the phenomena of
emotions. Emotions seem to always relate to one's self interest, their
reference purposes for being themselves.
<But, most, it seems to me, of the distressing emotions we experience
are not the result of some disturbance to our intrinsic reference levels.
Instead they have there source in internal conflict and thus can potentially
be
eliminated by changing our internal, non-intrinsic goals.>
Here we begin leaning on Bill Power's concepts of Intrinsic quantities,
states, signals, errors, etc., and their relationship to the mysterious
"reorganization system." The speculative fuzziness here has never been
convicting for me here as the basics of PCT for explaining observable
behavior and internal human mechanisms.
<There is a current best selling novel Jonathan Franzen's 2001 _The
Corrections_
which I think illustrates my point. The family in the corrections experiences
a
lot of unpleasnt feelings, such as a "revenge dinner" in which the mother, on
purpose fixes a loathsome meal "to get back at" the husband who has been away
because his job requires it. And, the husband because he is a "real man" eats
the dinner without complaint. ANd, the wife is furious-- furious because he
won't fight. Almost none of the bad stuff that happens, and lots does, is
because of external circumstance.
But, they are consistently doing their "best"
to humiliate each other. And, sometimes it appears that they are sufficiently
confused that they are intentionally doing stuff to themselves that will be
humiliating. But, they do so by using other people, and then they blame the
other people for humiliating them. Tornados are not a big item in the list of
problems these folks have-- almost all of which they create for themselves.>
In the case of a tornado, or a husband who is away from home, or a wife who
serves a loathsome meal, I see them as quite the same phenomena. External
perceptions related to internal conflict, related to emotions, related to
actions. Here again, this has that apparent PCT loathsome linear
cause-effect illusion included. In the closed loop, our actions on the
environment certainly can create unwanted problems for ourselves.
<But, even in your case of the funnel cloud, it seems to me that the emotion
of
fear _is_ internally generated rather than created by an external source.>
Yes, I think we agree that emotions are always internal, sensed phenomena and
not behavior; certainly not outputs of a control loop. And, you seem to
acknowledge that at least some emotions may come about without conflicting
goals? Is that correct?
I can conceive that the perceptions leading to internal conflict can come
from the external environment or our internal imagination. Is this
reasonable?
<There may well be some fundamental defect in control theory, but I don't see
as
yet any evidence for thinking that there is. And, it seems obvious to me that
many of the problems experienced in applying control theory to social problems
have the source in people attempting to use control theory to achive some
extraneous goal.>
My perception is not that PCT has some fundamental defect; as in being
inaccurate. It seems to me that it is still a rather incomplete theory of
human behavior and certainly an incomplete theory of human nature. I think
even Bill Power's humbly admits there are many unexplored and undocumented
aspects of human behavior not yet explained or modeled by PCT and especially
HPCT.
Because it remains incomplete, I think PCT is not picked up by those who
think they can explain human behavior with their own pet theory, like Adele
using here Emotional Intelligence theory. People *buy* her theory in part
because it more explicitly, and apparently more plausibly, addresses such
aspects of the human condition as emotions and how they relate to human
behavior.
I find this sad. Oops, there goes one of those unwanted emotions. Now what?
Do I have two conflicting goals?
