[From Bill Powers (921212.2000)]
Rick Marken (921212) --
Incredible, ain't it? If you write a basic paper on PCT, they'll
say it's irrelevant to psychology. If you try to make it relevant
to psychology, they'll say it isn't basic. Looks like there's no
way to get there from here.
Those reviews you posted brought to my mind the whole dreary
stream of trivial reviews we have all seen over the years. This
really seems to be the best that established science can do, at
least in the journals we have seen (and that includes the major
ones, I think). The awful truth is that these scientists do not
want to learn anything new. They want their own scientific
endeavors and those of their colleagues to be validated. There's
no way to sneak PCT past the guardians of the gates, because they
all recognize that there is something strange about it, something
unfamiliar, and therefore something wrong. The whole system is
organized to protect itself against being upset.
It seems to me that we already have the forum where PCT is
understood and can be developed. Let's forget about the rest of
the scientific world and just do our modeling and talk about the
results here. People who are interested will stick around and
learn and contribute. People who aren't will go their own ways as
usual. Most of the people who subscribe to this List have been
here for over a year, most for almost two years. That says that
something of interest to them is going on. Maybe if we start
treating this list as a place to suggest and report on research,
and to trade methods and ideas for research, the list of
subscribers will become even larger. Maybe if we keep it up, most
of the people who are actually interested in exploring a new idea
will end up on this net, while the rest of the scientific world
reads the journals like comforting bedtime stories.
I think that psychology is old and tired, and ready to be
bypassed.
ยทยทยท
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Best,
Bill P.