From[Bill Williams 20 June 2004 3:20 PM CST]
[From Bryan Thalhammer (2004.06.20.1000 CDT)]
Bill P. et al.,
[Bill Powers (2004.06.20.0107 MDT)]
...I will recommend that
silence be taken as assent to cutting him off...
...
Sitting in judgement on other people. What a bummer.
I don't like it either.
I am sure many of us are for diverse reasons find this a sad occassion.
I am teaching about PCT, as Gary Cziko taught at the UIUC in classes I
attended. I am summarizing it to a relatively unsophisticated group,
I am confident that this "unsophisicated group" has just the teacher they
need.
And, they might if they were exposed to Bill Powers' argument that going
to Mars wasn't goint to cost anything be very impressed with the science of
PCT economics.
But if I
would let any of them into the CSGNET discussions (!) that Bill W. and
others have whipped up, I am sorry to say that I would be very embarrassed
for inviting them in.
Not to worry. Like I say, just advise them to read selectively. Read Rick for
example-- expecially when he calls Michelle "an ignorant slut." Rick is a
past master of human relations, and the sophistological logic of PCT.
With a firm freedom of speech stance, it should be reasonable to allow any
speech into a forum and accept or ignore it. However, in almost every public
or private interaction, there is an agreement, either explicit or implicit,
to play along. By play along, we mean agree to share a level of tolerance so
that a communication can be accomplished. But we already know that the
classic "freedom of speech" excludes yelling 'fire!' in a theatre.
Typing "lies" and "fraud" isn't likely to cause a panic.
The same
thing goes for a forum with a particular agenda, such as business,
community, religious, special causes, family, and CSGNET. When a contributor
constantly takes the discussion off course, that is, hijacks the discussion,
"Hijacks the discussion." Now here is a good example of PCt sophistology.
it causes disturbance, grief, distrust, fear to contribute, and shame.
Just like those nasty ragged ragheads, cause Rick a sour smomach.
Dang-it, that hijacker, that coyote, that person needs to be corralled, and
finally dismissed.
Why don't you just have Bill Powers bite me? Would that bee sufficient?
That is my view, and I am just as sorry about it as you
are, Bill P. It has to be done for the good of the CSGNET.
Yes, tjhe poor old CSGnet can not stand any more confusion about the cost or
the absence thereof, of going to Mars.
Just as in the
article that Stefan cited about the needs of others vs. the disruption
caused by one:
[Stefan Balke (2004.06.18 CET)] citing:
"Wer den Unterricht stort, oder schlimmer, in der Klasse schreit, muss in
den Trainingsraum. Dort muss ein Plan erstellt werden, der belegen soll, wie
der Storenfried kunftig auf vernunftige Weise am Unterricht teilnehmen
will."
"He who disturbs the lesson, or worse, shouts in the class, must go to the
Training Room. There, a plan must be created that describes, how the
disrupter [~will return to the lesson, taking part in the class]." What does
that resemble here? I, for one, think that we have gone beyond that step on
CSGNET: Now, the disrupters simply have to go. "So it goes." (Vonnegut).
I am sure Kurt would be proud to be quoted by Bryan.
The identity of those who have disrupted in the past here at CSGNET are Bill
Williams, Marc Abrams, Boss Man, and perhaps a few others. Maybe me. I will
go if it means that they go.
I guess Bryan wants to become a PCT hero too.
But the deal is that no one would have to go if
these guys would just mind their behavior.
Like bend over when Bill Powers wants to bite us?
But sadly, this has not happened.
Yes, and not it is time to say, "I see you have choosen.... "
And here is where I have gone off track, as Rick *properly* accuses me, by
being distracted by these guys. My bad, equally. So we have to fix it. Have
to.
Bryan, there is no reason for you to feel bad. There are other slow learners
in the regular classroom too.
Each of us is individually controlling his/her perception of CSGNET by
posting/replying to CSGNET or by replying off-line, in order to arrive at a
CSGNET inbox perception that is least discrepant with our (_each person's_)
reference for how it should appear. Do I have that right? CSGNET control
also includes discussing PCT and its applications, describing basic research
(modeling, etc.), doing applied research (test of the self as a control
system), and even how to express PCT in a common understanding of perceptual
control (MSOB).
And, when it gets boring telling fibs about how it isn't going to cost anything
to go to Mars.
You know, I once innocently used the word *evangelize* (knowing full well
another meaning, religious evangelization, exists. I trusted that the
generic meaning would be the one taken instead), but the subject headings
that Williams used mocked my good intentions.
I guess "mocking" is a non-PCT correct mode of expression on the CSGnet.
However, telling Michelle that she is "an ignorant slut" well that is an
different matter.
Frankly, that sophomoric behavior of his sickens me.
I don't have time today to explain to you that it is your reference level for
a certain kind of speach rather than my speech that "sickens" you.
Now, before I push with true equal force back against his disturbance, let
me merely explain what Bill W. and others have been doing to this group.
(I am not going to take time to pick the exact terminology, but heck, those
who would improperly pick at it, Bill W., Boss Man, and Marc, still get deleted
from my CSGNET inbox, so I won't see their replies!)
More slamming doors, or as the guy said, "Shut up, he explained."
First, they land a bombshell of some sort, on the basis of a person's
isplaced word/phrase, inexactly used terminology, or just, as Bill W. had
said before I cut him off, "for the fun of it."
And, what is wrong with having fun anyway?
They use course [sic coarse?] [or unacceptable language in this forum as
a weapon.
But, it perfectly OK if Bill Powers calls poor Ludwig von Mises an asshole.
What each of us does is push back against these twistings of the CSGNET
inbox (on each of our computers), with varying amounts of gain and
completeness.
Then--- the disrupters come out from their hiding place and describe,
post facto, that our subsequent pushing back is the real crime, shifting
focus away from their original bad behavior.
I suppose that if one really took the time they would find that Ludwig von
Mises probably called Bill Powers "dog poop." And, that made Bill Powers
call Ludwig an asshole.
Marc has in the past apologized for acting
badly like this, sure, but Bill W. actually exults in the trick.
Well, I did have a really hard time convincing Ludwig to call Bill Powers
dog poop. Maybe that was my most orginial sin.
So what the heck?
So what the heck indeed. But, not to worry. PCT sophistology will provide
an answer.
Then, in the aftermath, they drop in posts that they reckon may cause
further grief or error (this is the Test of the Controlled Variable), and
then continue to milk the situation for what it's worth.
Speaking of "milking the situation for what it's worth." What about people
like Bill Powers not telling the truth, or at least the whole truth in public,
Then other people are charging money for stuff that isn't the whole truth--
which probably won't be public because the people taking the money don't mind
not telling the truth. And, telling the truth might have an adverse impact on
the business plan. And, then people start worrying about things like who did
I tell the public "truth" to and who has the real inside skinny.
This causes me, Rick, Dick, Bill P. and Mary, Phil, and countless others
severe grief,
What ought to be causing these people and countless others grief, is the fraud
that is being put on. That is a genuine cause for if you want to be dramatic
about it grief.
Bryan likes to call me-- the original offender. For Bryan it
is simply untenable.
That someone would have the gall to question a system that Bill Powers and his
conspirers in a PCT sophistology have built up into a fraud.
For example, when I hear someone examining "I see you have chosen" (you
know, *that* old one!) I see a tentative, qualitatively scientific
examination of how words don't seem to fit the theory, and an attempt to
work through it. That was my original view of that thing. Yet, there were
several coyotes who baited Rick, twisted that attempt, and destroyed what
good was intended.
As a matter of record anyone that wishes to can check and see that Bill Powers
described Rick's motives in terms of, hatred.
When I sincerely try to examine a topic in CSGNET, and get my face ripped
off by one of these coyotes,
The CSGnet is not for the faint hearted.
I feel that again, it was not worth it, and that I am not meet[sic meat]
("I am not worthy!" -Meyers) for these vast intellects who regularly post
here. And then, I come back. Why? Because its about PCT.
See, that is why the coyotes have to go.
If Bryan is feel he needs to be protected from the "coyotes" then I guess the
coyotes have to go. then he may feel say to say, "Great post Bill." and there
won't be any doubt about which Bill feels safe to post scientific opinions--
like how it isn't going to cost anything to go to Mars.
[From Bill Powers (2004.06.20.0107 MDT)]
...
I don't think there's any "if" any more (a word Bill Williams seems
inexplicably unable to grasp). It's no longer a matter of saying he ought
to be booted out if he continues in the present vein.
Well if I stay, I don't plan on forgetting stuff-- like the learned economic
opinions-- like poor ole Ludwig being called an asshole, and it not costing
anything to go to Mars, and Keynes' User cost being a part of tax fraud.
I'm being presumptuous,
Nothing at all new, in Bill Powers being presumtuous.
of course, but if anyone wishes to make a case for letting
him continue, now is the time to do it, right now.
Everybody can step right up and Rick can call you "an ignorant slut."
I will recommend that
silence be taken as assent to cutting him off, so speak up if you want to
make a case the other way. If there is no objection that holds water, I
will recommend ending Williams' access to CSGnet.
I wonder if Bill Powers has ever read, Marc Twain's examination of Mary
Baker Eddie's consitutional charter for the Christian Science Church.
Something that I understand is that Bill W. has a vendetta about some of us
for writing about his area of expertise.
Even I feel inclined to stick up for poor ole Ludwig when Bill Powers calls
him an "asshole." And, calling my fable "Running Naked in the Forest" a
"vendetta" is a bit of a stretch. I was please to hear Bill Powers say that
dealing with the credentialized experts in economics was, I think he said,
difficult. And, I liked it when Rick said economics isn't for the faint-hearted.
But, it really is going to cost, even cost the economy, a lot if we send an
excursion to Mars.
Maybe, but I do not know for sure. What I recommend if this vendetta exists:
Sometimes, it is better to DROP IT.
Bryan, just because you capitalise "DrOP IT" do you really think this is going
to have any effect on me? Why should it when I know that Bill Powers has been
saying one thing in private and another thing in public-- and the two messages
are directly contradictory.
Likewise, when something rubs you the wrong way, drop it.
Uhm, Bryan, may I point out something to you? Like Kant's test for a policy.
What would happen if everybody took your advice and "dropped it." Suppose you
"dropped it." Would you have typed this Post that I am having such a good time
with?
And if you are going to pop in and drop your bombs, and then leave
I like your description of my posts as "bombs." But, I haven't mentioned anything
about "leaving." Bill Powers is threatening to kick me off the CSGnet, but that
is a differnt thing than my leaving.
Bryan takes up the phrase about " taking responsiblity." This is just as rich a
phrase as "I see you have chosen..."
and not take responsibility, just go away.
But, you see I do take responsiblity in the sense that I am ready to defend my
claims,
Rick really shouldn't have called Michelle "an ignorant slut."
Bill Powers didn't, at least shouldn't have needed to call Ludwig an asshole.
Bill Powers was very badly mistaken when he claimed it wouldn't cost anything to
go to Mars. ( I enjoyed it enourmously when Peter described me as having the soul
of an accountant. ) There will be you can be sure a substantial cost if we send
people to Mars.
Mind you, I am not really annoyed here being sensitive, being wimpy, rather I
am just pushing back, attempting to correct the problem.
Of course people telling one story in public and saying something else quite differnt
in private do have a problem. If people want to go on telling lies then they may need
a protected environment in which to tell their lies.
and have more of you reply that Bill W. needs to go, and that
others who sidetrack the PCT discussion be removed, too. Now, see how I try
to push back equally (or at least in my own perception, equally) against the
disturbance(s)? That is according to PCT theory.
PCT sophistology, I will admit is wonderful. I hope everyone knows how to say
"sophistology" and "relativism." These are words to remember.
And then they attack my pushing back. But I am not personally offended, you
know. 
I am professionally offended (oh, what flies this will draw!).
Since people have figured out a business plan that allows them to take money
for dispensing a PCT sophistology, I don't see why Bryan need feel any particular
embarssment.
There seems to be a real problem that Bill W. has with so-called relativism
(changing one's mind, not taking a stand, etc.). I don't claim to know the
fullness of his argument, other than he seems to get annoyed when people
take various points of view at the same time, change one's mind according to
ew information, or reuse terminology by revisiting old information, and so
on.
I can fill Bryan in a bit here. When I see that people are saying one thing in
public and a directly contrary thing in private I think that I am justified in
calling this a fraud. When money is being taken in public for a program that
is being promoted in public for being one thing, while administration of the
program is in private is quite differnt in private then I think this is a fraud.
People can change their mind, but speaking with forked tongue is something quite
different.
Maybe he is a splitter and I am a lumper, and the two strategies are
mutually inconceivable.
I don't see this as the source of the difficulty. The source of the difficulty
as I see it is that people have gone down paths, perhaps innocently at first,
but mistakenly. Without having an adaquate insight as to where these paths
lead they have made some mistakes and then been unwilling to abandon them.
Stuff happens that they never intended, and then what to do? When they think
that they can lie their way out of an awkward spot then things can get nasty.
I thought that knowledge as growth (see H.
Perkinson) was a proper view of scientific thought, that no knowledge is
ever set, nothing is ever true, nothing is ever finished, that there is
always more data, more data, more data... But from some people's points of
view, changing your mind, waffling, or seeing both sides, etc., are less
authoritative, more wimpy, or a chicken-s++t way of debating.
I don't see that what Bryan is talking about here has anything to do with the
problem that has developed.
They say you
have to be strong, you have to take a stand. Taking a stand that way is not
really science, if it means fitting the data to one's preconceived beliefs.
Science is how new data reshapes a current theory.
I don't see that what Bryan is talking about here has anything to do with the
problem that has developed.
So,
Bryan make think that he has present a cogent argument. I don't see that any
argument has been presented.
I am sorry to explictly recommend final moderation of Bill W.,
Is this like a "final solution?"
but yes,
I think it has to happen, moderation is the solution here, because
self-moderation has not seemed to be a successful strategy for Bill W.
I think "a successful strategy for Bill Williams" is to go on pointing out that
despite what Bill Powers says, it really is going to cost something to go to Mars.
That the PCT sophistology eventuates into people being told, you should just
"Drop it." and nod your head. Lies are gettng told. Bryan's solution seems to
be to ignore the direction in which the mistaken PCT sophistology has gone.
PCT has a chance to positively influence how human behavior is thought
of, but in the present format, the CSGNET cannot help that happen.
I would think that a positive influence would be accompanied by fewer lies being
told. Instead PCT is being used to provide a cover for new lies.
I agree that sometimes some of us use phraseology that was downright out of
place,
I think the problem has gone well beyond a matter of an inept use of an unfamilar
nominclature.
but remember this is a text forum, and 1) we have to be more tolerant of those
faux pas's [Michelle], and 2) we have to choose NOT to use them [Rick]
because of the likelihood that some folks are going to run wild with that
faux pas [consider evangelizing PCT], with a certain misplaced glee. BTW, I
let that happen, my bad.
What Bryan call "running wild" could also be desscribed as making an effective use
of retoric to make a point persuasively. How words are used can sometimes make a
great difference in how the argument is percieved. In contemporary terms the
"framing" can make a great difference in how people perceive an argument that is
being made. Most people are not going to be prepared to make a judgment about the
merits of Keynesian economics, however, in the case of the costs of going to Mars,
many people after considering Bill Powers' argument that it isn't going to cost any
thing, and my criticism of Bill Powers' argument may find that there is a measure
of truth in the old adage-- "There is no such thing as a free lunch." I think for
one Dick Robertson may have seen the Mars project differently.
Hmmm, my homily (!) has now gotten almost as big as yours. Well, look, I
think PCT is the best explanation we have so far, but it can't be an
explanation unless it gets heard (hence Oxford and Bath).
Believe me PCT is getting heard. Getting the message out is one thing. But, there
is also the matter of whether when, as Ed Ford says, "The rubber hits the road."
people find the message believable. The thing about human beings is that, if they
have to they can listen to what you say, nod their heads, get on with their lives,
and permit you to tell them what they know are lies. Then you may later wonder
why is my program upside down in a ditch? Well, when no body with any power is
looking, the people without any power, the people who have been lied to and told
to just drop it and shut-up will throw some switches and everything will go smash.
There is a wider
audience, acceptance, or application, IMHO, but the current CSGNET
discussion prevents a new audience from being invited and becoming involved.
You are the arbiter of PCT, but you do so in a way that attracts criticism,
which is good! However at times, the coyotes use critique as a hammer-blow
I hope you are talking about my "Running Naked in the Forest fable."
instead of the precision tool it is meant to be.
I think someone once described satire as a bloodless knife. However, in my hands,
at least in my present stage of mastery, satire is not what you could call a
precison instrument.
You are not at fault therefore.
While Bill Powers may not actually be at fault, if it does turn out that the
Mars project actually does cost something could be send the tab to Bill Powers?
Actually, Bill P., it is not that much of a bummer now, cutting off Bill W.,
because it has already been a burden for you in the past.
No, I think Bill Powers may have reorganized away his former comittments. Or,
maybe this is just a bluff. Not that it makes any differnce, in whether I would
accept moderation that defends a lie.
You have done the work, dealing with this so long, taking so much concern
for both the offenders as well as the victims benefits.
Who are the victims? The people telling lies, or the people seeking to expose
the lies.
You have my respect for that.
How, can you respect a man who is attempting to defend lies?
But Bill W., and anyone else who uses this forum for their own entertainment,
So, I guess you believe that it won't cost anything to go to Mars?
needs to know that they can be bounced, if they continually hijack the
conversation.
"Hijack." I suppose what is worse is that I am a terrorist hijacker rathr than
simply a poor fool who hijacks because it is cheap "entertainment."
Byran concludes by saying,
> We don't want to further wreck the train we are riding.
When "train we are riding" becomes a lie, then the wreckage has already been in
large part done by the people who expect to be listened to by people who will
nod their heads.
[Note, I believe the use of firstname-lastname in discourse can sound rude,
such as "Rick Marken thinks that blah blah blah...", when it is very likely
that Rick would read it. He like anyone else, might expect to be addressed
personally in the vocative case as "Rick" or "you." We have two Bills here
[right now] and so I have used Bill P. and Bill W. as a way to distinguish
them. It's analogous to the him/her/they failure of the English language.
It's not my desire to sound rude, but if that happens, it is not intended
rudeness.]
No offense taken, I find dialog conducted by way of these E-mail posts has its
own peculiar awkwardness. Adjustments I suppose will take place and evenutally
people will learn how to use the new context more effetively. One of the things
that I expect might be learned is that if you lie you ought to expect to be
found out.
Bill Williams
I am