[From Fred Nickols (971207.1010 EST)]
Bill Powers (971206.0459 MST)--
When I was in graduate school, we students were told about an experiment in
which a psychologist decided to eliminate all confounding factors and
_prove_ that stimuli really cause responses. He boiled the procedure down
to presenting a light stimulus and measuring some motor response, I forget
which one. To keep the animal from moving around and altering its relation
to the stimulus, he ended up building a narrow box into which the animal
was inserted, on its back, with a clamps to hold its body, head, and three
limbs still. To keep the animal from closing its eyes and thus failing to
receive the stimulus, he surgically removed its eyelids. And still, the
animal failed to respond every time with the same action given the same
stimulus. Conclusion? Behavior is variable.
Whose behavior, Bill? The animal's or the psychologist's? I suppose if you
asked the psychologist what he was doing, he would have replied, "Conducting
research" (all in the name of science, of course). But, quite honestly, I
find that kind of science senseless and disgusting. It makes me glad that I
am not a "professional" in the sense that many use that word. What was the
psychologist's name -- Mengele?
Regards,
Fred Nickols
nickols@worldnet.att.net