[From Bill Powers (980410.1929 MDT)]
Bruce Gregory (980410) --
PCT is a deterministic model of behavior, albeit one with that incorporates
the possibility of a random or pseudo random reorganization. Such models
have an uncomfortable relationship with interpretations that involve "free
will," "choice" or "responsibility." As far as I can see, a living control
system is autonomous to the extent that its reference signals are internal,
but not to the extent that it has ultimately any say about what those
reference signals are. Whatever you attend to may call you forth, but can
you ultimately determine what you attend to? Isaac would argue that the
problem resides in the notion "you". Where is this "you" in an HPCT diagram?
Are we anything more than hierarchies of control systems watched over by
mysterious observers? Is this question even meaningful?
Have you read anything I've said on the subject of "you?" In this area, we
are talking about things that are mysteries, mysteries to layman and
scientist alike. I knew this 40 years ago, and decided to look for
questions I might be able to answer instead of wasting my time on subjects
that nobody has a clue about (however much they like to talk about them). I
said, "Let's account for as much of human behavior as we can using a
mechanistic model, and then, when we have a good one, see what's left
unaccounted for." I said this in BCP and I still feel that this is the only
strategy that has any hope of getting somewhere.
What we have now is a model of a large hierarchy of control systems in
which perceptions and reference levels are dynamically adjusted to make the
total system as error-free as possible. The activities of this whole system
are the "I", the thing that has will and makes choices and is reponsible
for consequences and all that. This model can account for a great deal of
behavior. There are things it can't account for, and now we can see what
those things are much more clearly than we could before we had this model.
One of the things that a mechanistic control-theory-based model seems to do
is to make us think again about terms like free will, choice,
responsibility, and so on. When people use words like these, they really
have little understanding of what they're supposed to mean. In fact, HPCT
brings up some points about free will that make the term seem rather
ridiculous: you may think you have "free" will at one level (You can turn
the steering wheel any way your free will desires), but as soon as you ask
about the consequences of following your free will, you discover that you
also have "freely chosen" goals at a higher level that limit what you can
choose to do at the lower level. If you want to live, you really can't just
turn the steering wheel any way you please.
And what does "choice" mean if you commit yourself to following a rule for
making the best choice? If you adopt the rule, "Buy low, sell high," there
is no further need for choices or decisions; all that's left is to figure
out how to know when "high" or "low" has occurred. Once you know that, your
action is automatic; no decision or choice is needed. To commit yourself to
following any rule, procedure, or algorithm in selecting your actions is to
give up your freedom of choice and your responsibility regarding those
actions. The rule, not you, makes the decisions. The rule, not you, is
responsible for what you do.
In fact, all the old philosophical arguments seem to fall apart when you
start asking practical questions about them in terms of HPCT.
That, of course, would simplify matters greatly, if that is how people
treated the falling-apart. But it is not. People have their own pet agendas
when they come to PCT; they have problems they're been working on for
years, and systems of thought they're pretty proud of and don't want to
give up. They don't seem to notice that all the OTHER people who have come
to PCT with the same attitude have _different_ pet agendas. When I point
out simple consequences of HPCT like the above, most people don't say "Oh,
I've never thought of it that way; now that you mention it, free will
collapses when you think in terms of a hierarchy of perceptions and control
systems." What they do is start arguing with you. They don't WANT that
problem to go away; if it went away, what would they do with all the clever
solutions they've thought up? It's really a rare person who starts to learn
about PCT and HPCT, and who then announces that a whole collection of
interesting problems has been solved by this theory and no longer need to
be considered problems, at least not philosophical problems. What I get
instead is "Oh yeah, well what does PCT have to say about _this_?"
I'm really tired of this reaction to PCT and HPCT. I don't want to play all
those games about this opposing idea or that alternative theory. I've spend
more than half of my life trying to construct a theoretical system that is
rigorous, self-consistent, consistent with observations, and sufficiently
broad to apply to a wide spectrum of behavior and experience. In the
alternatives that are offered for my delectation, I see very little
evidence of any effort to maintain rigor, self-consistency, or consistency
with any theoretical principles. When people ask me what PCT says about
this or that subject, it's usually perfectly clear that they haven't tried
to work it out themselves; at the first sign of difficulty they give up and
ask for the answer.
As I say, I'm really tired of this, and when I say tired I mean physically
and mentally tired, tired of staying up all night trying to deal with some
stupid point I'm not even interested in, tired of sitting in front of the
computer trying to sort out other people's confusions and incompetences,
and tired of dealing with the consequences of the inadequate educations
that people have been getting for the last couple of generations (not that
mine was anything to brag about).
I can't do this any more and I don't want to. Right now I'm supposed to be
working on a control model for balancing an inverted pendulum. It will be
interesting to see how it works out, if I can do it using PCT principles.
But instead I'm sitting here typing yet another response to yet another
post that is mainly about angels on pinheads and basically of no interest
to me. By the time I've finished this post and any others I may write
tonight, I will be too tired to go back to the program, so I'll go to bed,
and wake up in the middle of the night thinking about unfinished answers to
posts, and probably get up for a couple of hours, and end up waking up
tired in the morning. This shit has got to cease.
It's sort of like stopping smoking. I know that what I'm doing is bad for
me, and is destroying whatever abilities I have left to advance PCT. I keep
swearing that I will stop getting involved in these pointless diversions.
And then someone says something and there I am again, unable to resist the
temptation to write a cohererent reply that will be mostly ignored.
Well, this time I'm feeling a little desperate, and maybe I can persuade
some others to form a mutual aid society. I want to work on PCT, not other
people's problems, most of which presuppose a different theory. I want to
use my best working hours to advance the science that some of us are trying
to establish. If we're not going to get help from certain others, we're
not; best to just stop hoping for it and get on with our business.
If what I want to do works out, you'll notice a drastic drop in the
frequency and length of my posts. Starting now.
Best,
Bill P.