PCT pitch (was Re:... long live William T. Powers)

[MartinT]

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.08.15.00]

[John Kirkland 2017.06.09 1934 Israel]

I’m sure PCTers can help me out here.

        If somebody was to make a PCT-informed pitch to a certain

President about global warning, what could be the gist of
for and against arguments in a (reasonable) debate?

Your question echoes one of my reasons for being dissatisfied with

the psychology I was taught so many years ago: “If psychological
theories are correct, why aren’t psychologist placing themselves in
positions where they can influence the world for good, fix crime,
avoid war, etc. etc.? They surely have the know-how to get
themselves into positions of power where they could put their
theories into practice, don’t they?”

But they don't. Do we who understand PCT? Or does PCT suggest why we

would not or could not do that?

···

On Fri, Jun 9, 2017 at 12:58 AM, Eetu
Pikkarainen eetu.pikkarainen@oulu.fi
wrote:

[Eetu Pikkarainen 2017-06-08]

Â

                Bruce, I largely agree. Some comments

though:

Â

                  [Bruce

Nevin (2017.06.08.07:48 ET)]

                  Begin

with some PCT truisms.

                  All

that we can know of our environment is our
perceptions of it.

Â

                (Not sure about this, but I will turn

to it sometimes later – it depends on definitioons. I
agree that all our knowledge is based on
perceptions.)

Â

                  All

that we can control of our environment is our
perceptions of it.

Â

                That is funny and fuzzy saying, at

least for me: sounds like our perceptions were in
the environment. I would say that we cannot control
anything in the environment but only our perceptions
of it.

Â

                  I

control many perceptions of our environment
without exerting the actions that maintain them
under control. Other people, or other agents,
exert the actions that maintain them under
control.Â

Â

                Or they just happen to be (temporarily)

so that our perceptions of them remain near the
reference.

Â

                  Among

the evidence that I control such perceptions is
the observation that, should control of them
lapse, I act in such a way that other people or
agents resist the disturbance and re-establish
control of them.

                  A

recent example: the street signs for Pinehurst
Avenue and Chase Road were swapped, so that each
designated the other road. My wife called my
attention to it. We contacted the Public Works
Department. They fixed it.

                  What's

the point of this? All that we can know of our
environment is our perceptions of it, and we
presume that our perceptions are the realities
that we perceive. (We presume this even though we
know that our perceptions are selective and omit
infinitely many aspects of the environment, some
of which we know about because we or others have
extended the senses with scientific instruments.)
This presumption is justified by our success
controlling in the environment and by the like
success of all our human and pre-human ancestors
without whose survival we would not be here.

Â

                That is extremely important. Our

success in control of our perceptions is highly
depending on other people and other actors – and
finally on the objects or our perceptions.

Â

                  By

this justified presumption, we project the
universe of our perceptions into the otherwise
unknowable universe of our environment.

Â

                  That

justified presumption extends to the fact that all
that we can control of our environment is our
perceptions of it. We are justified in the
presumption that the controlled variable is in the
environment. Every time two or more of us control
what we perceive to be the same variable in the
environment we obtain further justification of
that presumption. Examples of two or more of us
controlling what we perceive to be the same
variable in the environment are conflict,
collective control, and the Test for the
Controlled Variable.

Â

                Here I disagree. This is a natural

presumption of our everyday life. But I think that
PCT just makes us abandon that presumption at least
in theoretical i.e. scientific context. In everyday
talk and thinking we may say that we control
something in the environment and that something is
possibly controlled also by some other person. But
we should know better that we and those other
persons are controlling only our or their own
perceptions and nothing in environment. That object
or something in the environment OF which our
perception is may be the same OF which the other
persons’ perceptions are. But we do not control that
object or whatever there is in the environment but
just our own perceptions.

Â

                  We

routinely forget that this is a presumption, and
we are justified in doing so.

Â

                No, we are not justified in doing so if

we are scientifically studying “behavior as control
of perception�.

Â

                  It is

impossible to argue whether or not the controlled
variable is in the environment without forgetting
that we make this presumption, and that it is a
presumption. If we accept the justification (which
we must, in order to do things together, including
arguing, and which we routinely do to survive)
then we thereby assert that it is in the
environment. But when we wish to identify things
in a control theory diagram as a tool of analysis,
we remember that this is a presumption, merely the
projection of our perceptions onto the otherwise
unknowable environment, and we must acknowledge
that it is in the perceived environment, the
universe of perception, which we perceive to be
shared between and among us, and really out there,
largely because of the routine successes of
collective control.

Â

Yes that is right, I agree with this.

Â

                  I know

of no way out of the conundrum other than to
acknowledge it. I believe it is foolish to argue
about it.

Â

                The only way out perhaps is staying

strict and careful with our concepts. We must tell
when we use every day “control� and when PCT
“Control�.

Â

Â

–

Eetu Pikkarainen

                PhD (Ed.), Dos., University Lecturer

(in Education)

                Faculty of Education, University of

Oulu, Finland

Â

                Schools in Transition: Linking Past,

Present, and Future in Educational Practice

                Â Â Â  Edited by Pauli Siljander, Kimmo

Kontio and Eetu Pikkarainen

   https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/other-books/schools-in-transition/

Â

Â

Â

                Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â 

/Bruce

Â

Â

                  On Wed, Jun 7, 2017 at 11:33 PM,

Martin Taylor <mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net >
wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.07.22.48]

Â

                  On 2017/06/7 8:25 PM, Alison Powers

wrote:

                  Martin - I am confused because you

say:

Â

                  MT: Rick says the controlled variable

is in the environment, which I say cannot be true,
because in the environment there exists no
independent reference variables nor sources from
which they can be determined independently of
observation of the moment-by-moment values of the
environmental variable itself.

                  But then Rick responded to me in the

PCT Research thread:

Â

                  RM: The controlled variable is not in

the outer environment; rather it is a function of
physical variables that are in the outer
environment; the function is called a perceptual
function.

Â

Â

                  I construed that sentence from Rick

to be a shot in a different long-standing and
apparently irresolvable argument, which I had
intended to ignore. I realize there’s no point in
reiterating the fact that the result of applying a
function to a bunch of variables is itself a
variable, but that’s the nub of the argument in
which that sentence was a shot. Rick disagrees –
it’s mathematics and therefore just an opinion
open to contradiction.

Â

                  However, to me he certainly suggests

in that sentence that the controlled variable is
in the environment, whether it is a function of
other variables in the environment (presumably
controlled ones) or should be treated as the
result of that function. Certainly the function
that defines the CEV is the perceptual function.
We have never had any disagreement about that. The
question is whether the arguments to that function
are in the environment as he explicitly says they
are.

Â

                  But consider instead Rick's recent

statements about “behaviour”, which provide the
context for interpreting the sentence you quote
[From Rick Marken (2017.06.06.1225). I have
highlighted a few phrases and sentences. I don’t
think I need more than this, though I could go
back into the archives and find interactions
between us when Rick has argued against me that
the controlled variable IS in the environment,
quite explicitly. Yesterday’s message should be
enough to make the point:

---

                  RM: Â Saying that "behavior is

control" simply calls attention to the fact what
we call “behaviors” are both actions and results;
in PCT lingo, behaviors are both outputs and the
variables controlled by those outputs –
controlled variables. So the behavior called
“tying shoelaces” points to a control process
where the controlled variable is the state of the
laces, the reference state of this variable is
“tied” and the outputs that produce this result
are the hand movements the get the laces tied.
Moreover, what we see as the output component of a
behavior are typically controlled variables
themselves and what we see as the controlled
variable component of behavior is typically an
output itself. For example, the movements
(outputs) used to produce the reference state of a
controlled variable (tied laces) are themselves a
controlled variable; their speed and direction are
the controlled result of muscle forces. And the
tied laces (the controlled variable) that result
from those outputs (movements) are themselves
outputs that are the means of controlling another
variable, the “onness” of the shoes.

Â

                  RM: So "control" is just a more

precise definition of the informal term
“behavior”. “Control” refers to the observation of
a variable being maintained in a reference state,
protected from disturbance. And this is what we
can see is what is going on with the things we
call “behaviors”. “Tying shoelaces”, for example,
refers to the observation that a variable (the
state of the laces) is maintained in a reference
state (consistently brought to the state “tied”)
protected from disturbance (the different initial
state of the laces, variations in the forces the
affect the laces, etc). When you are able to see
behavior – any named behavior – as being both
output that affects the state of a controlled
variable and a controlled variable itself – you
have learned to see behavior through control
theory glasses. By the way, this is all discussed
in the first 2 chapters of “Controlling People”.

---

Â

                  MT. In all of that is there any

suggestion that a controlled variable might be a
perception? I think not. Everything refers to the
controlled variable being a state of the
environment that can be observed by another
person. In those two paragraphs, the only
reference to perception is in the “P” of “PCT” up
front. If Rick had said, for example, in the
second highlighted clause “the controlled variable
is the [perceived] state of the laces”, I would
have no problem. But he didn’t, and any casual
reader might think he meant (and maybe he did
mean) the actual state of the laces in the
environment.

Â

                  MT. We all know the form of the

control loop, at least in its simplest “canonical”
form. We also know that real organisms have
limitations such as sensory thresholds, which mean
that any particular value of an external variable
gives rise to an uncertain value of the perceptual
variable that is produced by its perceptual
function (actually a hierarchy of perceptual
functions), and we know that neural firings are
actually not a continuous smooth “neural current”.
What we also know is that the reference value for
a perceptual signal is generated from within the
organism, and does not exist in the environment
(contrary to what Rick seems to imply in the
fourth line of each paragraph). Control of a
perception may not even correspond to control of
anything another observer could perceive in the
environment, if the perception includes any
component from imagination.

Â

                  MT. It seems to me that regardless of

what may be in Rick’s mind (and he agreed with me
the other day about Behaviour being the control of
perception), the words he uses can easily lead a
reader to conclude that controlled variables exist
in the environment. I would like to keep clear
that however well the perception corresponds to a
state of the environment, it is not the state of
the environment, though it is the state that is
controlled. To confuse the two
is…confusing.

Â

Martin

Â

[MartinT]

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.23.0037]

  I just noticed that this unfinished message draft had been sent.

I’m not sure how, but I suppose I must have inadvertently touched
the mouse when I was doing something unrelated to the computer,
and the resulting click sent it. Anyway, you can, I suppose,
comment on the little that is there, and I’ll send the complete
message if and when I finish it.

Martin

···

On 2017/06/22 11:31 PM, Martin Taylor
wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.08.15.00]

[John Kirkland 2017.06.09 1934 Israel]

I’m sure PCTers can help me out here.

          If somebody was to make a PCT-informed pitch to a

certain President about global warning, what could be the
gist of for and against arguments in a (reasonable)
debate?

  Your question echoes one of my reasons for being dissatisfied with

the psychology I was taught so many years ago: “If psychological
theories are correct, why aren’t psychologist placing themselves
in positions where they can influence the world for good, fix
crime, avoid war, etc. etc.? They surely have the know-how to get
themselves into positions of power where they could put their
theories into practice, don’t they?”

  But they don't. Do we who understand PCT? Or does PCT suggest why

we would not or could not do that?

  --------------



  Since this is a specific situation, the first thing I would

suggest would not be to produce arguments about global warming. It
would be a search for what variables the subject (who I will call
“T”, to use a random initial) might be controlling and at what
reference values. This is the ideal situation in which to look for
the controlled variable (not only within T though that’s where I
will limit this post). When you know that, you can determine how
to disturb one or more to produce some action. You probably would
have to vary your disturbances to discover how to produce the
action you want. T, however, is not readily available for
application of the Test for the Controlled Variable, so one can
only do a stripped down version of the test based on observation
rather than experiment.

  Let's speculate on possible effects of your suggestions as

disturbances, depending on him controlling some perceptions.

          The entrenched affirmative: "You're been right all

along mate. It’s merely a figment of people’s biased
perceptions, right outside anything they do
intentionally."

          The greenie negative: "Hey look, this is serious. 

There are multiple repeated measurements suggesting the
environment is at risk from human interventions and is
being wrecked even as we speak. It’s up to us all to
something constructive about this, now".

  Let's call the "Denier" D, and the Greenie "G", but before we look

at the possible effects of those arguments, let’s speculate about
possible controlled perceptions that might be important to the
answer. Having no way of actually doing the Test, speculation is
about the best one could do.

  Suppose we start with components of the two self-image vectors of

controlled perceptions (self-as-seen-by-self, which we might call
“introself” and self-as-seen-by-others or “exoself”), which we can
hypothesise to exist. Let’s imagine that one controlled perception
in both exoself and introself is “my power” with a very high
reference value. So we speculate that T wants to perceive himself
as powerful and wants to perceive that others also see him as
powerful.

  What is "Power"? One definition compatible with PCT is the ability

to control perceptions effectively. The more perceptions one can
control, and the more effectively one can control them, the more
power one has. That’s an anal;ytical statement, not a perception
in real time. Perceptions can differ from reality.

  Since most humans are equipped with similar physical means of

interacting with the environment, variations in physical strength
and dexterity make some people intrinsically more powerful than
others, as do variations in sensory-perceptual acuity and mental
agility (non-PCT wording is deliberate here – “mental agility”
refers both to the ability to choose appropriate means of
influencing a perception and the flexibility of reorganizing to
create or discover novel means).

  These variations exist, but they are not enormous. The large

variations in power come with the differential accessibility of
tools. If one does not have much personal power, but has money,
one can buy expensive tools, and can use other people to augment
one’s personal power, because most people control for having more
money than the already have, and they can get more by doing what
the rich person want done. Using other people as tools by paying
them may increase one’s introself perception of power, but does
not demonstrate that power in a way that much influences one’s
exoself perception of being powerful.

  In the case of T, we can observe that he acts toward democratic

allies in ways that seem calculated to antagonise them, suggesting
that he controls for conflicts to occur. A conflict provides an
opportunity to show that he can win, allowing others to perceive
his power. But he does not enter conflicts that he could lose. If
you remember the Presidential race, in one debate he said that he
would recognize the vote as legitimate “If I win”, and in the last
weeks of the campaign he frequently insisted that the vote was
rigged, so that if the vote went against him he would not have
lost, and if he won it would have been against tremendous odds. As
it is, he won the popular vote because the 5 million fraudulent
votes that were cast, all of them for Clinton, should be deducted
from her total.

  So how might D and G try to disturb a perception he controls?

        Yeah, I remain confident potential contributors can see

what I’m driving at here.

Cheers

JohnK

        On Fri, Jun 9, 2017 at 12:58 AM, Eetu

Pikkarainen eetu.pikkarainen@oulu.fi
wrote:

[Eetu Pikkarainen 2017-06-08]

Â

                  Bruce, I largely agree. Some comments

though:

Â

                    [Bruce

Nevin (2017.06.08.07:48 ET)]

                    Begin

with some PCT truisms.

                    All

that we can know of our environment is our
perceptions of it.

Â

                  (Not sure about this, but I will turn

to it sometimes later – it depends on definittions.
I agree that all our knowledge is based on
perceptions.)

Â

                    All

that we can control of our environment is our
perceptions of it.

Â

                  That is funny and fuzzy saying, at

least for me: sounds like our perceptions were in
the environment. I would say that we cannot
control anything in the environment but only our
perceptions of it.

Â

                    I

control many perceptions of our environment
without exerting the actions that maintain them
under control. Other people, or other agents,
exert the actions that maintain them under
control.Â

Â

                  Or they just happen to be

(temporarily) so that our perceptions of them
remain near the reference.

Â

                    Among

the evidence that I control such perceptions is
the observation that, should control of them
lapse, I act in such a way that other people or
agents resist the disturbance and re-establish
control of them.

                    A

recent example: the street signs for Pinehurst
Avenue and Chase Road were swapped, so that each
designated the other road. My wife called my
attention to it. We contacted the Public Works
Department. They fixed it.

                    What's

the point of this? All that we can know of our
environment is our perceptions of it, and we
presume that our perceptions are the realities
that we perceive. (We presume this even though
we know that our perceptions are selective and
omit infinitely many aspects of the environment,
some of which we know about because we or others
have extended the senses with scientific
instruments.) This presumption is justified by
our success controlling in the environment and
by the like success of all our human and
pre-human ancestors without whose survival we
would not be here.

Â

                  That is extremely important. Our

success in control of our perceptions is highly
depending on other people and other actors – and
finally on the objects or our perceptions.

Â

                    By

this justified presumption, we project the
universe of our perceptions into the otherwise
unknowable universe of our environment.

Â

                    That

justified presumption extends to the fact that
all that we can control of our environment is
our perceptions of it. We are justified in the
presumption that the controlled variable is in
the environment. Every time two or more of us
control what we perceive to be the same variable
in the environment we obtain further
justification of that presumption. Examples of
two or more of us controlling what we perceive
to be the same variable in the environment are
conflict, collective control, and the Test for
the Controlled Variable.

Â

                  Here I disagree. This is a natural

presumption of our everyday life. But I think that
PCT just makes us abandon that presumption at
least in theoretical i.e. scientific context. In
everyday talk and thinking we may say that we
control something in the environment and that
something is possibly controlled also by some
other person. But we should know better that we
and those other persons are controlling only our
or their own perceptions and nothing in
environment. That object or something in the
environment OF which our perception is may be the
same OF which the other persons’ perceptions are.
But we do not control that object or whatever
there is in the environment but just our own
perceptions.

Â

                    We

routinely forget that this is a presumption, and
we are justified in doing so.

Â

                  No, we are not justified in doing so

if we are scientifically studying “behavior as
control of perception�.

Â

                    It

is impossible to argue whether or not the
controlled variable is in the environment
without forgetting that we make this
presumption, and that it is a presumption. If we
accept the justification (which we must, in
order to do things together, including arguing,
and which we routinely do to survive) then we
thereby assert that it is in the environment.
But when we wish to identify things in a control
theory diagram as a tool of analysis, we
remember that this is a presumption, merely the
projection of our perceptions onto the otherwise
unknowable environment, and we must acknowledge
that it is in the perceived environment, the
universe of perception, which we perceive to be
shared between and among us, and really out
there, largely because of the routine successes
of collective control.

Â

                Yes that is right, I agree with this.

Â

                    I

know of no way out of the conundrum other than
to acknowledge it. I believe it is foolish to
argue about it.

Â

                  The only way out perhaps is staying

strict and careful with our concepts. We must tell
when we use every day “control� and when PCT
“Control�.

Â

Â

–

Eetu Pikkarainen

                  PhD (Ed.), Dos., University Lecturer

(in Education)

                  Faculty of Education, University of

Oulu, Finland

Â

                  Schools in Transition: Linking Past,

Present, and Future in Educational Practice

                  Â Â Â  Edited by Pauli Siljander, Kimmo

Kontio and Eetu Pikkarainen

   https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/other-books/schools-in-transition/

Â

Â

Â

                  Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â 

/Bruce

Â

Â

                    On Wed, Jun 7, 2017 at 11:33 PM,

Martin Taylor <mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net >
wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.07.22.48]

Â

                    On 2017/06/7 8:25 PM, Alison Powers

wrote:

                    Martin - I am confused because you

say:

Â

                    MT: Rick says the controlled

variable is in the environment, which I say
cannot be true, because in the environment there
exists no independent reference variables nor
sources from which they can be determined
independently of observation of the
moment-by-moment values of the environmental
variable itself.

                    But then Rick responded to me in

the PCT Research thread:

Â

                    RM: The controlled variable is not

in the outer environment; rather it is a
function of physical variables that are in the
outer environment; the function is called a
perceptual function.

Â

Â

                    I construed that sentence from Rick

to be a shot in a different long-standing and
apparently irresolvable argument, which I had
intended to ignore. I realize there’s no point
in reiterating the fact that the result of
applying a function to a bunch of variables is
itself a variable, but that’s the nub of the
argument in which that sentence was a shot. Rick
disagrees – it’s mathematics and therefore just
an opinion open to contradiction.

Â

                    However, to me he certainly

suggests in that sentence that the controlled
variable is in the environment, whether it is a
function of other variables in the environment
(presumably controlled ones) or should be
treated as the result of that function.
Certainly the function that defines the CEV is
the perceptual function. We have never had any
disagreement about that. The question is whether
the arguments to that function are in the
environment as he explicitly says they are.

Â

                    But consider instead Rick's recent

statements about “behaviour”, which provide the
context for interpreting the sentence you quote
[From Rick Marken (2017.06.06.1225). I have
highlighted a few phrases and sentences. I don’t
think I need more than this, though I could go
back into the archives and find interactions
between us when Rick has argued against me that
the controlled variable IS in the environment,
quite explicitly. Yesterday’s message should be
enough to make the point:

---

                    RM: Â Saying that "behavior is

control" simply calls attention to the fact what
we call “behaviors” are both actions and
results; in PCT lingo, behaviors are both
outputs and the variables controlled by those
outputs – controlled variables. So the behavior
called “tying shoelaces” points to a control
process where the controlled variable is the
state of the laces, the reference state of this
variable is “tied” and the outputs that produce
this result are the hand movements the get the
laces tied. Moreover, what we see as the output
component of a behavior are typically controlled
variables themselves and what we see as the
controlled variable component of behavior is
typically an output itself. For example, the
movements (outputs) used to produce the
reference state of a controlled variable (tied
laces) are themselves a controlled variable;
their speed and direction are the controlled
result of muscle forces. And the tied laces (the
controlled variable) that result from those
outputs (movements) are themselves outputs that
are the means of controlling another variable,
the “onness” of the shoes.

Â

                    RM: So "control" is just a more

precise definition of the informal term
“behavior”. “Control” refers to the observation
of a variable being maintained in a reference
state, protected from disturbance. And this is
what we can see is what is going on with the
things we call “behaviors”. “Tying shoelaces”,
for example, refers to the observation that a
variable (the state of the laces) is maintained
in a reference state (consistently brought to
the state “tied”) protected from disturbance
(the different initial state of the laces,
variations in the forces the affect the laces,
etc). When you are able to see behavior – any
named behavior – as being both output that
affects the state of a controlled variable and a
controlled variable itself – you have learned
to see behavior through control theory glasses.
By the way, this is all discussed in the first 2
chapters of “Controlling People”.

---

Â

                    MT. In all of that is there any

suggestion that a controlled variable might be a
perception? I think not. Everything refers to
the controlled variable being a state of the
environment that can be observed by another
person. In those two paragraphs, the only
reference to perception is in the “P” of “PCT”
up front. If Rick had said, for example, in the
second highlighted clause “the controlled
variable is the [perceived] state of the laces”,
I would have no problem. But he didn’t, and any
casual reader might think he meant (and maybe he
did mean) the actual state of the laces in the
environment.

Â

                    MT. We all know the form of the

control loop, at least in its simplest
“canonical” form. We also know that real
organisms have limitations such as sensory
thresholds, which mean that any particular value
of an external variable gives rise to an
uncertain value of the perceptual variable that
is produced by its perceptual function (actually
a hierarchy of perceptual functions), and we
know that neural firings are actually not a
continuous smooth “neural current”. What we also
know is that the reference value for a
perceptual signal is generated from within the
organism, and does not exist in the environment
(contrary to what Rick seems to imply in the
fourth line of each paragraph). Control of a
perception may not even correspond to control of
anything another observer could perceive in the
environment, if the perception includes any
component from imagination.

Â

                    MT. It seems to me that regardless

of what may be in Rick’s mind (and he agreed
with me the other day about Behaviour being the
control of perception), the words he uses can
easily lead a reader to conclude that controlled
variables exist in the environment. I would like
to keep clear that however well the perception
corresponds to a state of the environment, it is
not the state of the environment, though it is
the state that is controlled. To confuse
the two is…confusing.

Â

Martin

Â

[EetuP]

[Eetu Pikkarainen 2017-06-29 2]

Martin,

I have been eagerly waiting the continuation for this message.

All that I can invent at the moment is only a traditional view that T should be challenged to such conflicts he would not win. An old time rebel but perhaps by some new means?

Eetu

···

23.6.2017 7.41 ap. Martin Taylor mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net kirjoitti:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.23.0037]

I just noticed that this unfinished message draft had been sent. I’m not sure how, but I suppose I must have inadvertently touched the mouse when I was doing something unrelated to the computer, and the resulting click sent it. Anyway, you can, I suppose,
comment on the little that is there, and I’ll send the complete message if and when I finish it.

Martin

On 2017/06/22 11:31 PM, Martin Taylor wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.08.15.00]

[John Kirkland 2017.06.09 1934 Israel]

I’m sure PCTers can help me out here.

If somebody was to make a PCT-informed pitch to a certain President about global warning, what could be the gist of for and against arguments in a (reasonable) debate?

Your question echoes one of my reasons for being dissatisfied with the psychology I was taught so many years ago: “If psychological theories are correct, why aren’t psychologist placing themselves in positions where they can influence the world for good, fix
crime, avoid war, etc. etc.? They surely have the know-how to get themselves into positions of power where they could put their theories into practice, don’t they?”

But they don’t. Do we who understand PCT? Or does PCT suggest why we would not or could not do that?

---

Since this is a specific situation, the first thing I would suggest would not be to produce arguments about global warming. It would be a search for what variables the subject (who I will call “T”, to use a random initial) might be controlling and at what reference
values. This is the ideal situation in which to look for the controlled variable (not only within T though that’s where I will limit this post). When you know that, you can determine how to disturb one or more to produce some action. You probably would have
to vary your disturbances to discover how to produce the action you want. T, however, is not readily available for application of the Test for the Controlled Variable, so one can only do a stripped down version of the test based on observation rather than
experiment.

Let’s speculate on possible effects of your suggestions as disturbances, depending on him controlling some perceptions.

The entrenched affirmative: “You’re been right all along mate. It’s merely a figment of people’s biased perceptions, right outside anything they do intentionally.”

The greenie negative: “Hey look, this is serious. There are multiple repeated measurements suggesting the environment is at risk from human interventions and is being wrecked even as we speak. It’s up to us all to something constructive about this, now”.

Let’s call the “Denier” D, and the Greenie “G”, but before we look at the possible effects of those arguments, let’s speculate about possible controlled perceptions that might be important to the answer. Having no way of actually doing the Test, speculation
is about the best one could do.

Suppose we start with components of the two self-image vectors of controlled perceptions (self-as-seen-by-self, which we might call “introself” and self-as-seen-by-others or “exoself”), which we can hypothesise to exist. Let’s imagine that one controlled perception
in both exoself and introself is “my power” with a very high reference value. So we speculate that T wants to perceive himself as powerful and wants to perceive that others also see him as powerful.

What is “Power”? One definition compatible with PCT is the ability to control perceptions effectively. The more perceptions one can control, and the more effectively one can control them, the more power one has. That’s an anal;ytical statement, not a perception
in real time. Perceptions can differ from reality.

Since most humans are equipped with similar physical means of interacting with the environment, variations in physical strength and dexterity make some people intrinsically more powerful than others, as do variations in sensory-perceptual acuity and mental
agility (non-PCT wording is deliberate here – “mental agility” refers both to the ability to choose appropriate means of influencing a perception and the flexibility of reorganizing to create or discover novel means).

These variations exist, but they are not enormous. The large variations in power come with the differential accessibility of tools. If one does not have much personal power, but has money, one can buy expensive tools, and can use other people to augment one’s
personal power, because most people control for having more money than the already have, and they can get more by doing what the rich person want done. Using other people as tools by paying them may increase one’s introself perception of power, but does not
demonstrate that power in a way that much influences one’s exoself perception of being powerful.

In the case of T, we can observe that he acts toward democratic allies in ways that seem calculated to antagonise them, suggesting that he controls for conflicts to occur. A conflict provides an opportunity to show that he can win, allowing others to perceive
his power. But he does not enter conflicts that he could lose. If you remember the Presidential race, in one debate he said that he would recognize the vote as legitimate “If I win”, and in the last weeks of the campaign he frequently insisted that the vote
was rigged, so that if the vote went against him he would not have lost, and if he won it would have been against tremendous odds. As it is, he won the popular vote because the 5 million fraudulent votes that were cast, all of them for Clinton, should be deducted
from her total.

So how might D and G try to disturb a perception he controls?

Yeah, I remain confident potential contributors can see what I’m driving at here.

Cheers

JohnK

On Fri, Jun 9, 2017 at 12:58 AM, Eetu Pikkarainen
eetu.pikkarainen@oulu.fi wrote:

[Eetu Pikkarainen 2017-06-08]

Bruce, I largely agree. Some comments though:

[Bruce Nevin (2017.06.08.07:48 ET)]

Begin with some PCT truisms.

All that we can know of our environment is our perceptions of it.

(Not sure about this, but I will turn to it sometimes later – it depends on definitions. I agreee that all our knowledge is based on perceptions.)

All that we can control of our environment is our perceptions of it.

That is funny and fuzzy saying, at least for me: sounds like our perceptions were in the environment. I would say that we cannot control anything in the environment but only our perceptions of it.

I control many perceptions of our environment without exerting the actions that maintain them under control. Other people, or other agents, exert the actions that maintain them under control.

Or they just happen to be (temporarily) so that our perceptions of them remain near the reference.

Among the evidence that I control such perceptions is the observation that, should control of them lapse, I act in such a way that other people or agents resist the disturbance and re-establish control of them.

A recent example: the street signs for Pinehurst Avenue and Chase Road were swapped, so that each designated the other road. My wife called my attention to it. We contacted the Public Works Department. They fixed it.

What’s the point of this? All that we can know of our environment is our perceptions of it, and we presume that our perceptions are the realities that we perceive. (We presume this even though we know that our perceptions are selective
and omit infinitely many aspects of the environment, some of which we know about because we or others have extended the senses with scientific instruments.) This presumption is justified by our success controlling in the environment and by the like success
of all our human and pre-human ancestors without whose survival we would not be here.

That is extremely important. Our success in control of our perceptions is highly depending on other people and other actors – annd finally on the objects or our perceptions.

By this justified presumption, we project the universe of our perceptions into the otherwise unknowable universe of our environment.

That justified presumption extends to the fact that all that we can control of our environment is our perceptions of it. We are justified in the presumption that the controlled variable is in the environment. Every time two or
more of us control what we perceive to be the same variable in the environment we obtain further justification of that presumption. Examples of two or more of us controlling what we perceive to be the same variable in the environment are conflict, collective
control, and the Test for the Controlled Variable.

Here I disagree. This is a natural presumption of our everyday life. But I think that PCT just makes us abandon that presumption at least in theoretical i.e. scientific context. In everyday talk and thinking we may say that we control something in the environment
and that something is possibly controlled also by some other person. But we should know better that we and those other persons are controlling only our or their own perceptions and nothing in environment. That object or something in the environment OF which
our perception is may be the same OF which the other persons’ perceptions are. But we do not control that object or whatever there is in the environment but just our own perceptions.

We routinely forget that this is a presumption, and we are justified in doing so.

No, we are not justified in doing so if we are scientifically studying “behavior as control of perception�.

It is impossible to argue whether or not the controlled variable is in the environment without forgetting that we make this presumption, and that it is a presumption. If we accept the justification (which we must, in order to do
things together, including arguing, and which we routinely do to survive) then we thereby assert that it is in the environment. But when we wish to identify things in a control theory diagram as a tool of analysis, we remember that this is a presumption, merely
the projection of our perceptions onto the otherwise unknowable environment, and we must acknowledge that it is in the perceived environment, the universe of perception, which we perceive to be shared between and among us, and really out there, largely because
of the routine successes of collective control.

Yes that is right, I agree with this.

I know of no way out of the conundrum other than to acknowledge it. I believe it is foolish to argue about it.

The only way out perhaps is staying strict and careful with our concepts. We must tell when we use every day “control� and when PCT “Control�.

–

Eetu Pikkarainen

PhD (Ed.), Dos., University Lecturer (in Education)

Faculty of Education, University of Oulu, Finland

Schools in Transition: Linking Past, Present, and Future in Educational Practice

Edited by Pauli Siljander, Kimmo Kontio and Eetu Pikkarainen

[

https://www.sensepublishers.com/catalogs/bookseries/other-books/schools-in-transition/](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.sensepublishers.com_catalogs_bookseries_other-2Dbooks_schools-2Din-2Dtransition_&d=DwMGaQ&c=8hUWFZcy2Z-Za5rBPlktOQ&r=-dJBNItYEMOLt6aj_KjGi2LMO_Q8QB-ZzxIZIF8DGyQ&m=0nhfyP3k5-Wr6mhZrUnj5mPm1NDoqG-YillmP7AEVms&s=0r7kgNNHJhKIUPUNRy_M4-6gMGtyCTrV7vOjwub4cW4&e=)

/Bruce

On Wed, Jun 7, 2017 at 11:33 PM, Martin Taylor mailto:mmt-csg@mmtaylor.net wrote:

[Martin Taylor 2017.06.07.22.48]

On 2017/06/7 8:25 PM, Alison Powers wrote:

Martin - I am confused because you say:

MT: Rick says the controlled variable is in the environment, which I say cannot be true, because in the environment there exists no independent reference variables nor sources from which they can be determined independently of observation of the moment-by-moment
values of the environmental variable itself.

But then Rick responded to me in the PCT Research thread:

RM: The controlled variable is not in the outer environment; rather it is a function of physical variables that are in the outer environment; the function is called a perceptual function.

I construed that sentence from Rick to be a shot in a different long-standing and apparently irresolvable argument, which I had intended to ignore. I realize there’s no point in reiterating the fact that the result of applying a function to a bunch of variables
is itself a variable, but that’s the nub of the argument in which that sentence was a shot. Rick disagrees – it’s mathematics and therefore just an opinion open to contradiction.

However, to me he certainly suggests in that sentence that the controlled variable is in the environment, whether it is a function of other variables in the environment (presumably controlled ones) or should be treated as the result of that function. Certainly
the function that defines the CEV is the perceptual function. We have never had any disagreement about that. The question is whether the arguments to that function are in the environment as he explicitly says they are.

But consider instead Rick’s recent statements about “behaviour”, which provide the context for interpreting the sentence you quote [From Rick Marken (2017.06.06.1225). I have highlighted a few phrases and sentences. I don’t think I need more than this, though
I could go back into the archives and find interactions between us when Rick has argued against me that the controlled variable IS in the environment, quite explicitly. Yesterday’s message should be enough to make the point:

---

RM: Saying that “behavior is control” simply calls attention to the fact what we call “behaviors” are both actions and results; in PCT lingo, behaviors are both outputs and the variables controlled by those outputs – controlled variables. So the behavior
called “tying shoelaces” points to a control process where the controlled variable is the state of the laces, the reference state of this variable is “tied” and the outputs that produce this result are the hand movements the get the laces tied. Moreover, what
we see as the output component of a behavior are typically controlled variables themselves and what we see as the controlled variable component of behavior is typically an output itself. For example, the movements (outputs) used to produce the reference state
of a controlled variable (tied laces) are themselves a controlled variable; their speed and direction are the controlled result of muscle forces. And the tied laces (the controlled variable) that result from those outputs (movements) are themselves outputs
that are the means of controlling another variable, the “onness” of the shoes.

RM: So “control” is just a more precise definition of the informal term “behavior”. “Control” refers to the observation of a variable being maintained in a reference state, protected from disturbance. And this is what we can see is what is going on with
the things we call “behaviors”. “Tying shoelaces”, for example, refers to the observation that a variable (the state of the laces) is maintained in a reference state (consistently brought to the state “tied”) protected from disturbance (the different initial
state of the laces, variations in the forces the affect the laces, etc). When you are able to see behavior – any named behavior – as being both output that affects the state of a controlled variable and a controlled variable itself – you have learned to
see behavior through control theory glasses. By the way, this is all discussed in the first 2 chapters of “Controlling People”.

---

MT. In all of that is there any suggestion that a controlled variable might be a perception? I think not. Everything refers to the controlled variable being a state of the environment that can be observed by another person. In those two paragraphs, the only
reference to perception is in the “P” of “PCT” up front. If Rick had said, for example, in the second highlighted clause “the controlled variable is the [perceived] state of the laces”, I would have no problem. But he didn’t, and any casual reader might think
he meant (and maybe he did mean) the actual state of the laces in the environment.

MT. We all know the form of the control loop, at least in its simplest “canonical” form. We also know that real organisms have limitations such as sensory thresholds, which mean that any particular value of an external variable gives rise to an uncertain
value of the perceptual variable that is produced by its perceptual function (actually a hierarchy of perceptual functions), and we know that neural firings are actually not a continuous smooth “neural current”. What we also know is that the reference value
for a perceptual signal is generated from within the organism, and does not exist in the environment (contrary to what Rick seems to imply in the fourth line of each paragraph). Control of a perception may not even correspond to control of anything another
observer could perceive in the environment, if the perception includes any component from imagination.

MT. It seems to me that regardless of what may be in Rick’s mind (and he agreed with me the other day about Behaviour being the control of perception), the words he uses can easily lead a reader to conclude that controlled variables exist in the environment.
I would like to keep clear that however well the perception corresponds to a state of the environment, it is not the state of the environment, though it is the state that is controlled. To confuse the two is…confusing.

Martin