[From Rick Marken (970314.0830)]
Bill Powers (970313.1654 MST) --
The applications in which people want to use it are always, it
[PCT] seems, a couple of miles ahead of where the theory has
been tested. They seem to have more faith in the theory than I
have myself.
I think it's worth noting that PCT is _both_ a detailed theory (the one you
propose in B:CP) and what Bruce Gregory (970314.0930 EST) calls a "meta-
model" (which you also proposed in B:CP). I'll refer to the theory (a
hierarchy of perceptual neural signals controlled by varying neural
reference signal inputs to lower order control systems, etc) as PCT; I'll
refer to the meta-model (that organisms are controllers) as PCP (for
"perceptual control perspective").
Given these definitions, I would say that applications are, indeed, a couple
miles ahead of where PCT has been tested. But I think they are right abreast
of PCP because they are based on recognition of the _fact_ that organisms
control their own perceptual experience.
I have no doubt that the details of PCT will start changing once the research
starts rolling in. My guess is that the basic structure of the PCT model will
remain intact but that details (such as the nature of the relationships
between hierarchical levels) will be changed based on data. But the research
that tests PCT won't get started until researchers start asking their
questions from the point of view of PCP.
I think this is important for people to understand. We PCT researchers
have not gone very far down the road of testing the details of PCT. But that
doesn't mean that we are _behind_ the conventional behavioral researchers
because _we are on different roads_! PCT researchers are just a few steps
down the PCP road; the road that leads to an understanding organsisms as
living control systems. Conventional behavioral researchers have gone miles
down a _different road_; the dead end road that purports to lead to an
understanding organisms as causal systems. PCT will remain largely untested
until conventional researchers get off the causal dead end and turn onto
the PCP highway.
Best
Rick