Nice to hear from you Martin,
but it seems that you have the same problem with reading »what is to be read«. The same as Philip and Rick. The difference between X and X’…<
HB : You could be if you’d study your fathers’ books.
MT : I think that to become an expert in anything requires more than reading one person’s books, no matter how influential or important that person might be.
HB : Please read it as I write it.I don’t know what’s happening lately. Are letters which I wrote somehow different.
MT : And to follow Bill in what is the most important thing he often said in a variety of ways: “Study PCT, not what I (Bill) say about PCT”.
HB : I agree. Did I say anything else ? I could Martin, but I had enough. On whatever you think it’s Bill’s assumptions you could be wrong, because I assume from our conversations that you don’t know which Bill’s writings are suported with physiological »facts« and which are not.  I don’t want to say that you don’t understand PCT. You do to a very high extent, and I never said that I don’t respect your PCT knowledge. Even without physiological knowledge you manage to integrate knwledge which is by my oppinion near Bill’s.
But there are many questons left about PCT. I remember you mentioned that you were asking him quite many times for answers.
Rick has much more problems.
 And you are right. if you want to understand PCT you simply have to study physics, mathematics. physiology…. Etc. But iisn’t it worth of studying to understand someting in it’s original form ?
Bill P long time ago :
Hello, Boris –
I’ve decided to copy this to some of our MOL experts and to Bruce Abbott, since they all have an interest in this subject. People, this is Boris Harman whose writings you have probably seen, occasionally, on CSGnet.
HB :
As far as I understand reorganization is genetically driven and the output function of reorganizing system is reorganization, keeping intrinsic error near zero.
If I’m right this is very difficult to explain specially when people are not acquanted with physiology and some basic mehanisms in the cell or generally about physiological mechanisms of homeostasis. Your theory contain very complex knowledge and needs quite lot background of knowledge even maybe it doesn’t seem so. That’s maybe one of reason why is so hard to understand PCT. If I only remember how much time I’m learning. Not mentioning others.
The whole message was send :
thu 12.3.2009 16:28 to :
bbabbott@verizon.net; teamcarey@grapevine.com.au; Tim.Carey@canberra.edu.au; warren.mansell@manchester.ac.uk; wmansell@gmail.com; Davidmg@verizon.net; David.Goldstein@dhs.state.nj.us; r.johnson@imperial.ac.uk
HB :
This is from the time when conversation with Bill were very frequent. I felt he was glad when we talked about physiological possibility in PCT. I don’t know if there was anyone esle with whom he shared such an information, But I suppose not.
There’s some short answers in your further text….<
···
From: Martin Taylor [mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net]
Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2015 8:20 PM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: Holy Writ (was Re: Declaration of Independence)
[Martin Taylor 2015.09.30.13.52]
On 2015/09/30 12:29 PM, Boris Hartman wrote:
From: bara0361@gmail.com [mailto:bara0361@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, September 27, 2015 5:19 PM
To: csgnet@lists.illinois.edu
Subject: Re: Declaration of Independence
BP : I’m certainly not the expert, …
HB : You could be if you’d study your fathers’ books.
I think that to become an expert in anything requires more than reading one person’s books, no matter how influential or important that person might be. You have to also study the background against which that person’s work is placed. You can’t understand relativity, no matter how much you read of Einstein’s writings, unless you have at least some background in tensor calculus and non-Euclidean geometry, and understand the difference between a God’s eye view of the Universe (Newtomian) and the view available to an inhabitant of the Universe (which is analogous to the PCT student’s distinction between the Analysts’s view and the controller’s view). You can’t be an expert in PCT unless you understand something of the mathematics and dynamics of feedback loops. Even Bill often said PCT often surprised him when he did a simulation, so how could you expect any one to become an expert solely by reading his writings on the subject?
HB : As I said before, it’s probably just a mistake in »integrating« perception in your levels.
Even if Bill’s work were the only place where one could learn about PCT, I think he would be horrified to think that his work was recommended as an alternative to thinking about and researching the issues. It’s not like a Holy Writ, whose truth can never be independently tested, and therefore has to be taken as absolute literal truth.
HB : Martin your way of understanding things is good. Keep it on.
Bill’s work is a guide, nothing more. But it’s a very good guide, because Bill had a certain genius to see what others had not seen despite having a background that should have enabled them to see it (and I include myself among that number of blind fumblers). If research shows Bill to have been wrong about something, then he was wrong, and given convincing evidence, he would have acknowledged his error. The fact that he has not often been shown to be wrong is no justification for asserting that somebody else must be wrong because what they say is not contained in Bill’s writings, or, god forbid, contradictory to something he wrote.
Much of what is taken to be “PCT” on CSGnet is derived from subjective experience or simple assumption. The concept of a pure hierarchy, for example, is so far as I know unsupported by evidence.
HB : Your assumptions are not right. Just my oppinion. It’s not just the concept of pure hierarchy, at least not at first three levels. And this are showing his incredible geniosity in fundamentals of understanding characteristics of nervous system. That’s one of prior goals of PCT. How organism works, how nervous system really works.
Indeed, I think there is quite a bit of evidence suggesting the existence of lateral within-level connections. And what of the levels themselves? Bill’s intuition told him that intensities must precede transitions, but most sensory systems provide spatial and temporal differential signals rather than pure intensity signals, and Bill himself sometimes modelled velocity below position. Is there a “category level” or is there not?
HB : I proposed a lot of times upgrades to understanidng PCT organism. Nobody organized anything in this direction. I’m not interested any more.
My point is not to highlight points where Bill may or may not have made unwarranted assumptions, but to say that, to misquote another genius (I think) Niels Bohr: “You should take every statement he makes to be a question.” And to follow Bill in what is the most important thing he often said in a variety of ways: “Study PCT, not what I (Bill) say about PCT”.
Best, Boris
Martin