[From Bill Powers (2004.05.23.2026 NMDT)]
Bill Williams 23 May 2004 5:45 PM CST --
My principle objection is remains that value is not a substance. I
don't find a materialist argument convincing. Materialism as, I see it,
is perhaps the most , or at least one of the more naive forms of
idealism. Since you define PCT in terms of a materialist conception of
the world, I don't find PCT convincing.
I don't know what all those philosophical "isms" mean, but I'll try to
answer at least one or two of your objections.
My primary axiom is that experience is at the bottom of everything: the
world as it appears to us. Another way of saying this, perhaps a bit
sloganish, is "It's all perception." The point of all sciences is to
explain experience, and experience is the totality of what we perceive.
My preferred method of explaining experience is to construct models of what
might exist in reality that would account for the experiences we have. For
explaining properties of the part of this world that appears to be outside
us, I prefer the models of physics, engineering, and (despite considerable
ignorance) chemistry. These models are highly predictive and mutually
consistent with each other; they have great explanatory power with respect
to interactions in the "external" world. I use quotes because I recognize
that internal and external are themselves perceptual categories. However,
they are useful categories when it comes to physical theories and models.
I simply don't find your materialist preconceptions helpful.
I don't see how that applies to me, since I recognized from the start there
there is only the world of experience, which contains the so-called
material world as well as the so-called mental world, as well as all the
things we think and feel about these worlds. I take reality to be what we
experience. When we try to explain the things we observe, we often have to
guess at mechanisms we can't observe (like electrons and quarks). Perhaps
what makes you think of me as a materialist (if I guess correctly what that
term means) is that I use physical models and neurological models as a
basis for explaining how human beings work. But I recognize that these are
as-if models, not reports on things unseen that somehow, magically, I can see.
My concern is to make all the models we use consistent with each other and
with observations. That, I think, is the approach that has made all of the
successful sciences work as well as they do.
In my opinion,
an adaquate economic theory, or any theory of the social process requires a
pluralist rather than a monistic conception of the process of valuation. As
best I can judge a monistic conception of value theory generates familiar
and characteristic mistakes in application.
I don't know what "pluralist rather than a monistic conception of the
process of valuation" means.
> There is, as you are aware, also a PCT theory of values.
Of course. Not only am I aware that there is such a thing, but I also am to
some extent familar with the errors which it contains. The PCT theory of
values, isn't one that I need to consider adopting.
I'd appreciate an explanation of that conclusion. It's a bit alarming! what
errors? I'd like to correct them.
> I don't know if it's the one you're searching for.
However, to correct a possible misapprehension on your part-- No, a
monistic theory of value is not what I "am searching for" if, that is, I was
in the process of searching . The way you treat values is so inchooherent
that it really isn't worth my thinking about adopting.
Incoherent? That's even more alarming. Could you explain in what way it's
incoherent? I really would like to avoid being incoherent.
>
> There are two ways to consider value.Actually there are lots more ways of thinking about this than you might
suppose.
Did I say there were ONLY two ways? Put your glasses on.
One is to say that something is
> valuable if an organism adjusts its reference level for that thing to a
> high setting. The other is to say something is valuable if it objectivelyNotice the influence of positivism here. What function "objective function"
does the use of "objectively" serve in this sentence?
By "objective" I mean "reliably observable by more than one person." We can
observe fairly reliably that ingesting arsenic is not good for a person, so
if the person puts a high value on ingesting arsenic, he is not likely to
survive much longer. This is opposed to things which are less subject to
public agreement -- for example, setting a high reference level for being
"good". Nobody else can see what you mean by "good," so there is no way to
reach consensus.
These matters are not much influenced by positivism or naive realism. They
are simply statements on which people can reach agreement by public means.
Whether they refer to some "real reality" or only to a collection of
subjective perceptions does not have to be settled (a good thing, since it
can't be settled).
None. The sentence
would functionally mean the same if the word is removed. So, what function
does the word "objectively" serve?
It is a notification that we are using the physics-neurology-chemistry
genre of models, rather than other less well developed models. It means we
are talking about observations on which different people can reliably agree.
It serves an ideological function of
announcing that the discussion is being held in terms of an idealistic
philosophic conception known as "materialism." I can do without
materialism.
OK, do without it. I've never been particularly attached to it, either,
because it ends in "ism."
> promotes the survival of the organism. Obviously, organisms can set high
> reference levels for things that are objectivelyNotice the influence of positivism here. What function "objective function"
does the use of "objectively" serve in this sentence? None. The sentence
would functionally mean the same if the word is removed. So, what function
does the word "objectively" serve? It serves an ideological function of
announcing that the discussion is being held in terms of an idealistic
philosophic conception known as "materialism." I can do without
materialism.
If you can keep repeating yourself, so can I. I do not use "objectively" in
any ideological sense. I merely mean to indicate that more than one person
can observe something, mostly things in the part of experience we agree to
call "outside ourselves." To say that something is objectively bad for an
organism is to say that anyone could observe the evidence, such as the
death of the organism from poisoning. This is in contrast with saying that
something is subjectively bad, meaning that the person who thinks it is bad
may be the only person who does, and nobody else can see why.
> I think the general evolutionary position is the one to use here.
I agree, as long as objectivism, materialism, and physicalism are not
introduced as implicit assumptions.
Fine, I trust that I am not doing so, since I don't know what the official
positions of each point of view would be. Or care.
> We can
> say that those organisms that have survived are those that learned to set
> high reference levels for things that are actually good for them, and low
> reference levels for things that are actually bad for them, where good and
> bad in the sense intended are defined by survival of a species and failure
> to survive. the reference signals specify the values that direct the
> organism's behavior.
>
> This allows us to use reference levels as the operating definition of
> value,We part company here. I would define "value" in terms of consequences. Any
particular reference level may have good or bad consequences. So, I do not
agree with your definition of value.
I also define value in terms of consequences. It is, in fact, the
consequences of acts that are valued, not (most often) the acts themselves.
And of course those are perceptual consequences. Furthermore, a given
perceptual consequence can be given varying values at different times; the
taste of salt is valued highly by a hot thirsty man, but not by a man who
has just eaten a couple of ounces of salt. What PCT does is explain the
process of valuing in terms of comparing a perception with a reference
level: comparing what _is_ being perceived with the amount of that
perception one _wants to be_ perceiving.
Setting a reference level at one level of organization can affect
perceptions at higher levels so as to bring them closer to their reference
levels, or can have the opposite effect. Control systems are organized at
every level to make sure that lower-level reference signals are not set so
as to cause higher-level error -- to the extent possible.
with the understanding that organisms generally set reference levels
> as appropriate for survival.
>
I would agree that typically this is what organisms in fact do. However,
typically, isn't good enough to serve as a foundation definition.
Of course it's good enough, you silly man, you just don't have an adequate
grasp of this subject. (I think I'm beginning to catch on to your mode of
argumentation -- how was that?).
> >Here is point where we part company-- that is "What is it that is going
> >on behind the numbers that are used?" Is there a substance? Or, is
> >there anything that can be said to be "genuinely real" involved. My
> >answer would be that there is no "substance" but there might be a reality.
I don't know whether you consider a neural signal to be a "substance." If
you do, then I plead guilty to whatever you're accusing me of. I use the
neurological model in explaining how it is that we seem to have brains
(that is, other people seem to have them -- I've never seen mine), and why
it is that having a well-functioning brain seems to be so important in
human affairs, and so on. This model is consistent with much of experience
and will probably become more so.
> I think you are reading more philosophical depth into my statement than I
> intended.Perhaps, however, as I percieve it , you are expounding a view that is
lacking in sufficient depth to serve as an adaquate basis for a viable
theory of value.
That's so tantalizing -- to be told it lacks sufficient depth, without any
indication of what might amount to sufficient depth.
When I say there has to be something going on beneath the
> numbers, I mean that the number representing the output of the control
> system model has to stand for some actual process by which (in this case)
> the consumption control system affects the environment so as to maintain
or
> change the current rate of consumption.Where we seem to disagree is in part located in the above in which you say,
"some actual process." I would agree that there being "some actual
process." Where I would disagree is a matter of what and how that "actual
process" is to be specified. There are I believe good reasons to reject a
substance theory of value, and a monistic conception of reality. I will
return this point below when you agrument touches on this point again.
If you refuse to use physical models, I don't know how you manage to say
anything useful about what the rest of us call physical processes, like
controlling.
>The output action of the system
> resulots in executing transactions at a certain rate, entailing spending
> money at a certain rate and receiving goods are the corresponding rate
> (spending rate divided by average price per good). The actual output
> variable can thus be identified as the rate of spending money, which takes
> place in the environment of the control system. This action affects the
> environment so as to cause goods to appear in the consumer's inventory.
>
> So far this has nothing to do with value.You have already introduce the notion of "goods." So, your claim that
nothing so far has anything to do with value would appear to be
contradictory.
No, you've simply misunderstood how I use "goods". I could have said
"items". The process of obtaining items from a store is a mechanical one of
paying money and receiving the items. I can do that without valuing the
"good" at all -- if I'm running an errand for someone else, the process of
obtaining the good works the same way as it would if I were buying it for
myself. We can surely describe that part of the control loop separately
from the rest of the loop.
>The subject of value comes up
> when we ask why this entity is acquiring goods.No, you already introduced value before this point. You can not talk about
goods, not consistently at least, without getting into the value issue.
Of course I can if I am using the word "good" to indicate items in a store,
without saying what value I personally put on them. Let's not confuse that
meaning of "good" with the other meanings.
There is much in what you say above that I am in agreement with. I've been
aware of this for quite some time. I wasn't as you say "searching" for such
a conception. I have been familiar with these conceptions for for a decade
or two and I continue to find them valuable.
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that there was some conception with which you
were not already completely, totally, exhaustively familiar.
There are enough of them that if they are all kept close to particular
values, chances are that the physical organism is working properly in all
important regards."Physical organism" seems redundant to me, and thus seems to me to be
introducing an ideological twist into the discussion.
Perhaps I should have said "physiological" or "somatic" to show I was
thinking of the states of the organ systems and other things at that level,
as opposed to the states of the signal-handling systems of the brain.
>More to the point, any deviations of these basic variables from
> what we may as well call their "intrinsic reference levels" indicates that
> something is going wrong that needs to be fixed.Usually this is the case.
I have not tried to
> propose every possible way in which "intrinsic errors" of this kind might
> be corrected, but have focused on one basic and especially powerful method
> that I call "e. coli reorganization." This process alters the organization
> of the brain at random, and ceases to alter it only when all intrinsic
> variables are once again at their respective intrinsic reference levels.
> Those intrinsic reference levels, of course, are a product of the
evolution
> of the species.
>
Right. And, I think in almost all most all of the above you are making a
useful point.> So I have proposed a mechanism by which the actual, objective
Here, in the use of "objective" it appears to me that you are introducing a
slant into the argument which is unnecessary.
Don't jump out of your skin every time I happen to use a word that's loaded
for you. As I said, I use words like "actual" and "objective" to refer to
things observable, reliably, by more than one person. We all know, of
course, that we are just comparing perceptions (as best we can through
communication), but it gets very tiresome to keep saying that all the time.
Not only that, but continually attaching qualifiers to what we say is
paralyzing; we get into deeper and deeper layers until the original subject
is lost.
I am not an "objectivist."
You could omit "actual" and "objective." Would , or how would, doing so
change the meaning of the sentence?
Since I was talking about the "actual, objective needs of the organism", I
meant to indicate the needs which, as far as we can ascertain and agree,
must be met for the organism to survive or maintain good health. This
doesn't mean that we have some magical way of observing directly what is
really needed by an organism. It is a conclusion drawn from applying
whatever model of the organism is appropriate to what we perceive of the
organism. If it's a good model it will hold up to testing.
There is a sense in which I agree with you about the character and nature of
needs. I think your system provides the best explaination of this that is
availible. I don't think, however, that it is useful to describe this
structure of behavior in terms of "objective needs." Your talk about
"objective needs" is in my view a unnecsessary injection of a materialist
ideology.
Only if you insist, over my objections, on interpreting it that way. Or are
you saying that your interpretation is objectively correct? I am using the
best models I know about in the best way I can. What is ideological about that?
The term "objective" which you use here is a misnomer. The "needs" are not
in fact all needs for objects.
Of course not. A person needs to be in an environment with a temperature
high enough to support life (given the equipment available). Temperature is
not an object, yet I claim that this is an objective observation: your
"reasonable man" would agree that the person needs a high enough
temperature, and that is what I mean by objective. This is opposed to
subjective needs, which are seldom critical for survival when not met.
Some of the needs are for relationships.
Yes, and any of the other 10 levels of perception I have defined. But there
are subjective and objective needs for relationships. I objectively need
you to hold up the other end of the sofa we are moving; I subjectively need
you to be civil about it. Anyone can tell that we must work together in the
right geometric relationship to move the sofa, but there could be
substantial disagreement about the need for civility -- what _I_ call
civility. Since it's _all_ perception, any type of experience can be used
for an example.
One of the reasons that I do not use the caption PCT is that I have been
aware of how you conceive of PCT in physical terms.
Do you have a better version that is still consistent with the models of
the physical sciences and neurology? Or do you reject physics models,
op-amps and all?
There is, of course, a physical aspect to control theory, but this
physical aspect can be thought of without bringing in a monistic,
objectivist, philosophic world view.
I don't know what these technical terms mean, but I strongly suspect that
they don't apply to me.
A reference signal is (if the model is correct) a real physical thing inside
a brain, not an abstract concept.I do not mean to be disrespectful in anyway. However what you are saying
here does not appear to me to be useful. This statement in my view is
precisely what a positivist philosophic stance requires. I simply don't see
any reason for you to place your work in a positivist context.
I mean, of course, that we should model it as a physical neural signal in a
brain, and not as some magical or mystical or disembodied ectoplasm
floating in some vague imaginary space. I am always referring to models,
not to Real Reality. If you could accept that once and for all, I could
speak normally without hedging my sentences about with qualifiers and
explanations and exceptions, which not only lengthen sentences
unnecessarily, but bore everyone who already understands the context in
which I speak.
All concepts including "materialism" are concepts.
Well, some perceptions are of other kinds, but I agree that all we can know
are perceptions.
Furthermore, all concepts are "abstract."
I don't think we need to keep going over this ground. We agree.
>The actions by which we make the environment
> change to move our perceptions closer to their reference levels are not
> abstract, but ordinary physical actionsOrdinary Perhaps. But, there is no need for me to think about this is
positivistic terms.
Which model do you use to refer to what we call actions, if not the models
of physics (with some physiology)?
They consist of such simple processes as getting out
> a wallet and passing money across a counter,Here is where I think your positivism gets you in trouble. "Passing money
across a counter" isn't simple. Thinking that it is simple when it is not,
creates a problem.
No it doesn't. Nit-picking creates the problem. Are you trying to tell me
that there are many higher orders of perception from which you can view the
act of passing money across the counter? Gee whiz, Bill, why didn't I think
of that?
I can agree in part to this. But, my agreement does not extend to the point
where the description takes on a positivistic interpretation.
I think you're hypersentive on this subject, as well as somewhat
hypocritical. There is no such thing as a description taking on a
positivistic interpretation, except to a positivist. That is a positivistic
idea in itself -- the idea that descriptions take on interpretations all by
themselves, in some Real Reality. You are speaking of things you infer from
what you read, using your private logic and private experiences. How can
you object to what you see as hints of positivism when your own opinions
are usually stated as objective facts?
I don't disagree with you that PCT provides a description of behavior in
causal terms or physical terms. What I am arguing is that the category
"value" is not a substance.
All depends on what you mean by substance. If you mean solid, liquid, or
gas, value is not a substance. Wrong model. If you mean that a neural
reference signal is a substance, using the neurological model, then yes, a
value is a substance -- but only _that_ kind of substance. It is still not
a solid, a liquid, or a gas.
Economics is not physics.
No, but it is describable within the same laws of physics that apply
everywhere else, to the extent it entails interactions in the part of
experience we call the physical world. Unless, of course, you have a model
that works better..
If the only world that you recognize is a positivist one ( I am not sure at
this point if you think of yourself as a positivist but it appears likely )
and the only world is a materialistic one then it would appear that you deny
the reality of values.
If you think that, you have not followed my reasoning at all. I think
values are completely real, and I have developed the model that gives them
a real place to exist, and a real mode of functioning that works with all
the other models I know about (that is, the models I believe). But of
course all of that is part of a _model_ of reality.
You seem to be a monist. I think I prefer to be a
pluralist in the sense that it appears useful to me to think in terms of a
world view in which there are different kinds of values.
I think that there are as many different values as there are controlled
perceptions and people to control them. Reference signals, in my model,
establish and define values.
The accusation of "insubstantiality" doesn't frighten me. I don't think of
experience including values within the category of experience, in terms of a
monistic materialism. And, as far as I know all "conceptual spaces" are
immaginary.
Including yours? I agree, all models create an imaginary picture of
reality. That makes it even more astonishing when some models, like physics
and PCT, manage to make predictions of future experiences with detailed
accuracy.
There is, however, no place in your world for values-- not at least I as
think of values.
Maybe that's the issue right there. How _do_ you think of values? In your
conception, do they have some property that is not explained by modeling
them as reference signals (with the associated control system to give them
an effect)? What is missing from the idea or the experience of values that
is not captured in the concept of a reference signal with respect to which
perceptions are evaluated?
I hope we are not talking here about "objectively correct" values.
What you say has an appealing plausiblity. I would agree that "experience"
is connected to a reality or realities.
That is unnecessary in PCT, but of course we like to think that there is
some sort of reality Out There. I decided long ago that even if there is,
we have no way of comparing what we experience with that reality. All we
have is perception. That is why we have to use models as a way of trying to
understand what is likely to be Out There. "If the world were really
structured as this model is structured, then it would have to behave as we
observe it behaving." That is the Holy Grail that the modeler seeks: a
model that predicts exactly the relationships among observations that we do
in fact observe, neither more nor less.
But, experience is not a substance.
True, but "substance" could be an element of a model with which we attempt
to explain experience. Not all models work out equally well, especially
those that use terms as vague as "substance."
What experience is has yet to be worked out with any adaquacy, but I think
control theory can be helpful. Experience has an unavoidably economic
aspect to it. The orthodox conception of the economy has some problems--
such as the persistent problem of the Giffen paradox. And, control theory
provides what think is a good explaination for the behavior that is
considered paradoxical in the orthodox context. One of the things that
attracted me to the paradox-- besides its being a fundamental issue in
economics-- is that the behavior of an economic agent was obviously tied to
the calorie.
Yes,and one reason this is so satisfying is that it forms a link between
models that are otherwise mostly independent -- physiology, physics, and
neurology, as well as models in economics.
> my remarks concerning numbers had merely
"Merely?" Come on, it was a hard sell for stale snake oil. Fess up to
ideological creedo as a monistic materialist.
Nonsense. You are as objectively wrong as you think you are objectively right.
I acknowledge that when modeling it is neccesary to be explicit about what
it is that is being modelled and that I should be more careful in attaching
dimensions to the terms being modelled. However, "Economics is not
Physics." Positivism, objectivism, materialism have not provided an
adaquate basis for economic theory.
Why don't we just forget about those isms and just go on with the modeling?
We're flirting with angels on pinheads, and won't get anywhere with that.
I have found this discussion most informative. Not that I learned anything
new about control theory in the course of it. But, I never would have
suspected that you take a monistic materialism so seriously. I don't think
there is much of any chance of your converting me to your old time religion.
And, I am quite sure that you are not interested in considering switching to
what I view as a more adequate set of preconceptions.
Bill, for crying out loud, do you have to be so persistently superior and
offensive? Lay off. Let's get back to something productive. You don't need
to worry about isms when you focus on constructing a good clear model.
Don't you think you have anything to learn about that, either?
Best,
Bill P.