[From: Bruce Nevin (Thu 950316 14:20:21)]
( Bill Leach 950315.18:39 EST(EDT) ) --
since there is a complete
science and engineering discipline that already use most of our terms
properly, it seem to me that it is an error to change.
What are you doing here? What do you want to accomplish by it?
Is what you're doing accomplishing what you want to accomplish?
I personally have no complaint about using "control" with a specialized
definition within PCT discourse. But I spend very little time trying to
teach or communicate PCT to others, and that seems to be the big
rubber-to-road interface for this particular issue.
If we were really 'successful' I can just see it now:
"How to govern children; a ten step guide."
"Governing the workforce" by I. B. Smart
"Effective use of rewards to govern your staff"
ad nausum
Any word in common usage will be misused, from our perspective. Bill
Powers dissected the problem I think quite nicely. Either face the
prospect of trying to convince the majority of people again and again
that "control" doesn't mean what they know it to mean, or come up with a
new term. That's what technical terms are for. When people find them
useful and use them they come into more and more common usage.
Since you don't agree with Bill Powers' request to come up with a new
term, it isn't surprising that you stopped reading in the middle, and I
don't think that you will be interested in looking back and finding out
the term that I actually did propose. (It wasn't "govern".) But thanks
for the comments. I agree.
Bruce