[From Chris Cherpas (951122.1357 PT)]
[re: > Bill Powers (951122.1200 MST)]
[re: >>Chris Cherpas (951122.0935 PT)]
BP:
You underestimate my age and misunderstand my background.
cc:
Misunderstanding and underestimation are the basis of my scientific method.
{
BP:
I didn't learn anything about psychology until
my sophomore year of college, in 1947, and I thought that what they had
to teach about human nature was crap (a Spence-Hull department).
cc:
In other words, you were exposed to psychology AFTER "the mind"
had been exorcized by at least some people. Crap or not, at least
it was only knee-deep. Had you been exposed to psych before
behaviorism, it could have been devils and angels ALL the way.
BP:
Actually, it would have made little difference to me whether the
behaviorist revolution occurred or not. I didn't think much of the
alternatives, either.
cc:
I meant in a broader cultural sense. In any case, I appreciate your
sharing a bit of biography... actually, it would be helpful to learn
more about the details of how you arrived at your formulation.
cc:
The first order of business for scientific psychology was to give
up the ghost, the god/homunculus inside.
BP:
That is where the baby went down the drain with the bathwater. In trying
to get free of mystical and religious concepts, scientific psychologists
decided to ignore the problem of how the system works, and thought they
could reach understanding strictly by manipulating externally visible
phenomena.
cc:
Partly true, but I'd say the exorcism still hasn't been accomplished, so
neither baby nor water went too near the drain. In other words, as
far as I can see we're still strictly pre-paradigmatic in psychology.
Christian psychology is still going strong, among other groups -- like
behaviorists and PCT-ers. It's scientific feudalism.
BP:
Well over half of this century went by before some behavioral
scientists finally wised up and realized that they HAD to make models of
internal processes, and to start wondering about subjective and mental
phenomena that the old guys had dismissed as imaginary -- for example,
imagination.
cc:
I hope you don't mean cognitive scientists (wised up). They put
an academic gloss over folk psychology, and eventually cast it in the
image of the computer. Ulrich Neisser in 1967 still wasn't sure if
there could be ANY theory of action; Chomsky still wonders. Recently,
cognitivists have become "situated" or "contextual" because the homunculus
in the machine still doesn't cut it. Now, if you mean cyberneticists,
that's a different story, since they/you seem to have bitten the bullet
to really go bottom up. I speak metaphorically, of course.
cc:
Evolution, as developed by Darwin, didn't require a model of
something you can't see (except history -- not unlike that "history
of reinforcement" we're always hearing about).
BP:
How about "genes?"
cc:
Like I said before, Darwin didn't need genes. Phenotypes provided plenty
of clues that offspring inherit _something_ from their parents, especially
when animal breeders, "by strictly by manipulating externally visible
phenomena," controlled the process (within certain boundaries) -- especially
since the process is cumulative. The cumulative nature of evolutionary
biology makes it different than the physics generally discussed. How to
do physics is not necessarily how to do everything else -- it wasn't
terribly helpful for Darwin. Operant psychologists did what animal
trainers did with more precision. Nobody thought this would lead to
the only behavioral science we'd ever need; the hope was that when
neurophysiology became more advanced, one could use the results of
operant experiments as specifications for what functional structures
within the system would have to be able to do; Skinner repeatedly made
this claim, right or wrong.
Looking inside isn't new at all -- or useful, per se. It's just one
move that can help in solving a problem; looking outside can help too.
Is this really the critical move that made PCT what it is, considering
the decades/centuries of internally-oriented psychology that's led nowhere?
While it's a necessary condition for PCT to look inside, it sure
isn't sufficient. I don't know what really led you to PCT, however.
Care to retrospectively reconstruct your process a bit more?
I would genuinely appreciate it.
Historical regards,
cc