[From Ted Cloak (2013.06.28.1100 MST)]
I think we should expect the behavioral output, of either kind, to very
within limits set by the reference standards. For example, Mr. Beaver has
minimum standards for what should be perceived as a satisfactory dam. The
activity of his dam-building system ceases when those standards are met,
whether the observer would call the result a dam or not. Experiments could
be run to ascertain what Mr. Beaver's minimum standards are.
[From Rick Marken (2013.06.28.0915)]
Fred Nickols (2013.06.28.0537 EDT)
FN: Hmm. I think Matti has a point - sort of.
RM: Yes, as I said, Matti was correctly describing the theoretical
explanation of the phenomenon of control.
FN: What you say, Rick, is true
enough: dams are built, migratory birds and other migratory life forms
leave one place and arrive at another, and webs are weaved. And,
consistent with PCT, none of the behaviors involved in that are exactly
identical.
RM: I think your point here is that the word "behavior" is ambiguous; it
refers to both means and ends, acts and results. So the behavior "building
dams" refers to both the consistently produced ends (dams) and the highly
variable means (building) that are used to produce those ends. In my
forward to LCS I I think I was clear that the "behavior" I was talking about
was the results (ends) produced. But maybe I could have been clearer by
noting that these results are produced by highly variable means, another
clue Bill used to understand that behavior is control; the means used to
produce a result _must_ vary to compensate for the disturbances that would
prevent that result from occurring.
FN: But, then, a given dam isn't exactly like another, even if built
by the same beavers; no particular bird starts out leaving exactly the
same place or winds up in exactly the same place; and no two webs are
exactly alike, even if woven by the same spider.
RM: Now we're getting into the observations that lead to the conclusion that
control is hierarchical (another observable fact about
behavior) Yes, the results themselves are somewhat variable because they are
the means of achieving other results; the exact nature of the dam must vary
because the dam is itself a means of stopping the flow of water and this
means must vary due to varying disturbances such as the nature of the
materials available to build the dam, the shape of the part of the river
where the dam is built, etc. All these are observations about "behavior"
that can (and must) be made before one starts developing a model that can
account for these observations. In other words, we can say a lot about the
phenomenon of behavior -- it being a process of control and that this
control is a hierarchical process -- before we say anything about how we
explain what we see - the theory that behavior is the control of perception.
I think one of Bill Powers' greatest contributions to our understanding of
human nature was describing what it is we should be trying to explain.
Before Bill, people thought that behavior was caused output, or the output
that occurs after some central processing of input. What Bill understood was
that behavior IS control -- hierarchical control -- not caused output. This
is a factual, not a theoretical point; you don't need PCT to know that this
is true. Of course, Bill's familiarity with the behavior of artificial
control systems surely helped him make this observation about behavior; and
his understanding of control theory helped him realize that the controlling
that he observed involved the control of perception (which is his
theoretical contribution).
So I think Bill made two really enormous contributions to our understanding
of living systems, one factual and one theoretical. The factual contribution
is that behavior IS control; the theoretical contribution is that control
involves control of input (perception) not output. The only problem with
Matti's suggestion, as far as I'm concerned, is that it conflates these two
contributions by conflating theory and fact. It is a testable theory that
organisms control perceptions; it is an observable fact that they control.
Best
Rick
As for the observer view point, we can and do observe beavers
building, birds and butterflies flying and spiders weaving.
So, from my point of view, there is consistency (not identicality) in
results and there is consistency in the patterned behaviors that
produce them.
So what? Well, I think it goes not to consistency but to variability.
We are able to vary our behavior so as to achieve (and perceive) the
result we're after despite those darned things called "disturbances."
Fred Nickols
From: Richard Marken [mailto:rsmarken@GMAIL.COM]
Sent: Thursday, June 27, 2013 5:28 PM
To: CSGNET@LISTSERV.ILLINOIS.EDU
Subject: Re: Marken's foreword to LCS
[From Rick Marken (2013.06.27.1420)]
> Matti Kolu (2013.06.27.2140 CET)--
>
> p. viii in LCS (I):
> "These disturbances are pervasive but difficult to notice because
> behavior is ordinarily quite consistent. Organisms weave webs,
> migrate to specific destinations, build dams--and they do these
> things over and
over again.
> Powers, looking at behavior through the eyes of a trained physicist
> and engineer, saw that such consistency was quite surprising."
>
> This might have been brought up before. In the first sentence above
> it seems like the consistency should refer to the (perceived)
> outcomes of behavior and not behavior itself.
RM: Actually it was never brought up before. But you make an
interesting point. I think the quoted passage is good as is because I
am talking about behavior from the point of view of an observer. What
an observer sees as behavior is consistently produced results: webs,
migrations, dams, etc.
···
-----Original Message-----
What
an observer of the caliber of Bill Powers understood is that these
consistent
results are being produced in the face of variable (and often
invisible) disturbances. What I am saying here is that Bill realized
that behavior
_is_
control (indeed, LCS III was subtitled "The fact of control" to
emphasize
this
very important point).
PCT is a theory that explains _how_ organisms are able to produce
consistent
results -- to control -- in the face of variable and typically
invisible disturbances. So the theory says what you suggest I should
say in the
first
sentence: that organisms are able to produce consistent results
because they control perceptions of those results.
So the reason I did not say that "perceived outcomes of behavior are
consistent" rather than that "behavior is quite consistent" is
because I
was
talking about a fact (that behavior is control) and not the
explanation of
this
fact (perceptual control theory).
Hope this helps.
Best
Rick
--
Richard S. Marken PhD
rsmarken@gmail.com
www.mindreadings.com
--
Richard S. Marken PhD
rsmarken@gmail.com
www.mindreadings.com