Perception and reality

CSGnet Archive CSG1994
1

[From Rick Marken (940912.0900)]

Bill Leach (940911.09:18 EST) --

1. An organism's perception of the external world IS the external world
   to that organism . . .

Bruce Buchanan (940911.22:30 EDT) --

I still find some ambiguity in the description above, that the external
world is both (#1) the organism's perception and (#2) the physical reality
independent of the organism's awareness.

This is not quite what Bill Leach meant. Let me try to explain what I think
Bill meant.

The external world is whatever it is. We know of this world only as
perceptions. These perceptions ARE the external world from the point of our
view. In fact, it takes a rather sophisticated organism to even consider the
possibility that what it is experiencing (as the external world) is just a
perceptual function of some other reality -- the "real" external reality that
is "behind" our perceptions. This notion -- that there is a reality "behind"
our perception -- is, I believe, the beginning of both science and religion.
Science and religion can be seen as attempts to understand the reality behind
our experience, each using different techniques.

What also is still a problem for me is to understand the status of the
organism that is observing and describing this total situation, i.e. the
PCT perceiver and investigator.

Let me try to diagram the PCT view of the situation. Let R be reality (what,
in previous discussions, was also referred to a "boss reality" to futher
distinguish it from our experience of it); let p1 be a perceptual signal in a
person observing an organism; let p2 be a perceptual signal controlled by the
organism being observed. So the PCT view of the situation is:

p1 <--f() --R -- g() --p2

The functions f() and g() are perceptual processes in the observer and the
behaving organism, respectively. The result of these perceptual processes is
(according to PCT) a continuous perceptual signal. This perceptual signal IS
the perception experienced by the system. The observer experiences one
aspect of reality (R) as p1, the organism experiences another aspect of
reality as p2.

Let's assume that the arguments to the two perceptual functions are exactly
the same aspects of reality (R). Let's also assume that we are a god who can
actually see that R is a rectangle with height h and width w. So the
arguments to f() and g() are h and w. Now imagine that f() computes a
perceptual signal that is proportional to h x w. So p1 is a perception of
area; as h or w vary (in reality) the observer has a perception of change in
area. Also, imagine that g() computes a perceptual signal that is
proportional to h/w. So p2 is a perception of shape; as h and w vary (in
reality) the organism has a perception of changing shape.

So the observer and the organism perceive (and experience) the same reality
(the arguments, h and w, to the perceptual functions) differently. If p1 and
p2 are the only perceptions of this reality available to observer and
organism, respectively, the observer would not be able to tell what the
organism is controlling. For example, suppose the organism wants to keep p2
at "square" -- that is, h/w = 1.0. Assume that the organism can control this
variable because it can vary the size of h. So disturbances to h and w are
resisted, and the organism keeps h/w = 1.0. But the perception of area (p1)
is not controlled. So, from the perspective of the observer, disturbances to
p1 (the observer's only perception of reality) are not resisted; the area
varies even as shape is controlled. The observer would (correctly) conclude
that the organism is not controlling area; but he would be unable to tell
what the organism is controlling because he is unable to perceive reality in
the same way as the behaving organism.

In PCT, we assume that it is possible for an observer to perceive (though
not necessarily experience -- see below) the world in the same way as the
organism being studied. This is the only way to discover what an organism is
actually controlling;it is the basis of The Test for the controlled
variable. We discover controlled variables by applying disturbances to a
perception and seeing if they are resisted by an organism. If we are
perceiving the variable that the organism is controlling, then we will see
that disturbances have little or no effect on this perception.

Of course, we can't really experience the world in the same way as some
organisms; we have to depend on "artificial" perceptions to some extent. For
example, we cannot experience sounds that are a function of a presumed
reality of pressure variations occurring at greater than abour 20,000 Hz. But
we have instrments that can measure variations in this presumed reality so we
can tell that bats are controlling something about perceptions of this kind.
We can see that the "meter reading" representation of this perception is
controlled. So we get the same perception as the organism; we just don't
experience it in the same way.

it is still my belief that, while all experiences are _based_ in neural
representations, these representations cannot _in themselves_ be what we
perceive but can only really be _the means_ or _mediating structures and
functions_ through which perceptual processes inform us of the external
world.

The only problem here is "what's being informed"? What you seem to be saying
is that neural perceptual signals, like p1 and p2, are informing something
else-- "us" -- about something. But what is this "us" that is being informed?
The PCT model works without an extra "us". The neural perceptual signals in
the model ARE the experiences that are controlled.

WE ARE THE NEURAL SIGNALS IN OUR BRAIN. What we experience -- the
intensities, sensations, configurations, movements, relationships, etc -- as
the world is (according to PCT) what a neural signal "looks like" when you
ARE ONE. The idea that a neural signal is a "mediating structure" just moves
the problem of "why it looks this way" back one step; it doesn't seem to
explain anything.

Best

Rick

2

[From Bruce Buchanan 940913.22:00]

Rick Marken (940912.0900) writes:

it takes a rather sophisticated organism to even consider the
possibility that what it is experiencing (as the external world) is just a
perceptual function of some other reality -- the "real" external reality that
is "behind" our perceptions.

As I understand it, a simple organism responds simply on the basis of its
experiences/perceptions. Human beings become aware that their ordinary
perceptions can be mistaken in various ways and may require some thought if
they are to be as reliable as possible.

But some philosophers (e.g. Locke) have held, in effect, that what we
experience are our own perceptions (cf. ? Rick's "what it is experiencing .
. . is just a perceptual function - ?). Historically this has lead to the
inference that there must be another reality behind these. This view, I
think, is incorrect and a source of confusion. It is rather that the
perception _is_ a _function of_ reality. We are not aware of _the
perception itself_. We are aware of reality _through_ (albeit conditioned
by) the perception. (Although some of my language may be a little :wink:
idiosyncratic, I think that it is entirely possible that we agree on the
principle at issue here.)

(Bruce:)

What also is still a problem for me is to understand the status of the
organism that is observing and describing this total situation, i.e. the
PCT perceiver and investigator.

Let me try to diagram the PCT view of the situation. . . .

I appreciate the clarity of the presentation, Rick, and yet I was trying to
get at considerations at a higher systems level, the level of description
and conceptualization that includes the _whole_ subject or organism as
well as including the PCT theorist and his total situation,. (Let me leave
this for now, however, and perhaps return to clarify what there may be
about this that I see as a problem, i.e. why it may be worth discussion.)

(Bruce:)

it is still my belief that, while all experiences are _based_ in neural
representations, these representations cannot _in themselves_ be what we
perceive but can only really be _the means_ or _mediating structures and
functions_ through which perceptual processes inform us of the external
world.

The only problem here is "what's being informed"? What you seem to be saying
is that neural perceptual signals, like p1 and p2, are informing something
else-- "us" -- about something. But what is this "us" that is being informed?
The PCT model works without an extra "us". The neural perceptual signals in
the model ARE the experiences that are controlled.

The "us" that requires the perceptual signals stand for the total organism.
We may take it for granted, but there must be in existence an organism,
which we may conceptualize as a biological system with physiological needs
(oxygen, food, informative stimuli) which support the required
chemical/hormonal milieu interieur and the nervous system with its
perceptual, memory and control mechanisms. The perceptual control system
is, after all, a function within the organism or system or machine.

. . . .The idea that a neural signal is a "mediating structure" just moves
the problem of "why it looks this way" back one step; it doesn't seem to
explain anything.

(Also see above. )

Maybe I'm off on a wrong track (although obviously I do not really think so).
However, time does not permit me to explore this more fully at the moment :wink: .
(Perhaps later.)

Cheers!

Bruce B.

3

[From Bill Powers (940921.1130 MDT)]

Bruce Buchanan (940920.2200) --

... ordinarily we would not want most people to accept anything and
everything within consciousness as experience which is necessarily
real and reliable.

Try thinking the thought "I am not thinking this thought." It's
perfectly easy to do this. Would you say that that thought really
happened? While it's going on, isn't it part of reality? Is it
unreliable, in the sense that you meant to think some other thought, but
this one occurred instead, or in the sense that you can't think it again
if you want to?

You can also create another thought which you use to refer to the first
thought: you can think "That thought was self-contradictory." This
second thought is just as real and reliable as the first one, isn't it?

You can think "I am Bruce Buchanan," and one second later you can think
"I am President Clinton." Both thoughts are undeniably there; both can
be repeated quite faithfully.

What is it about such thoughts that can be unreal or unreliable? I leave
this koan for your consideration.

···

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Best,

Bill P.

4

[From Bruce Abbott (981013.2225 EST)]

Bill Powers (980913.2024 MDT) --

Bruce Abbott (981012.2000 EST)

I don't know about you, but when I move, say, my hand to a certain position,
I want my hand to actually move to that position, I don't want to merely
perceive that it has gone there. All I can know is what I perceive, but I
certainly hope that my perceptions reflect reality.

You may hope that your perception of hand position "reflects reality," but
you will hope in vain, because there is no way to find out whether it does
or does not.

I will hope in vain that my perception reflects reality? On the contrary, I
will only hope in vain for proof that this is true.

That is because being an organism, all you will ever know
about reality is what you perceive and what further perceptions you build
on the basic ones. All you can ever do is "merely" perceive.

Well, call me a hopeless romantic, but I firmly believe that there is a real
reality "out there," on which my perceptions are generally based, and I
really do think that when I jerk the steering wheel of my car to avoid
hitting the kid whom I perceive to have just run into the street into my
path, that I really am avoiding hitting the kid and not just creating some
perceptual illusion of having done so. I know I can't prove that this is
so, but the hypothesis makes sense of a lot of otherwise strange and
unaccountable relationships among my perceptions -- like the fact that
seeing that I am rapidly closing on a rather solid tree trunk is almost
always followed by a strong perception of pain in my body unless I do
something to change the first perception before it is too late.

You, of course, are free to disagree.

Regards,

Bruce

5

[From Bill Powers (981013.2137 MDT)]

Bruce Abbott (981013.2225 EST)--

You may hope that your perception of hand position "reflects reality," but
you will hope in vain, because there is no way to find out whether it does
or does not.

I will hope in vain that my perception reflects reality? On the contrary, I
will only hope in vain for proof that this is true.

What's the difference? What you assume on faith reflects not some reality
outside you, but your own subjective reasons for wanting to say that your
beliefs have some objective meaning. We can deduce that there may be a real
reality, a "boss reality," but that deduction is only as valid as the
premises we set up to support it, and we can't prove the premises to be
right. We act as if our experiences are real and external because it's
convenient to do so, not because it's true.

That is because being an organism, all you will ever know
about reality is what you perceive and what further perceptions you build
on the basic ones. All you can ever do is "merely" perceive.

Well, call me a hopeless romantic, but I firmly believe that there is a real
reality "out there," on which my perceptions are generally based, and I
really do think that when I jerk the steering wheel of my car to avoid
hitting the kid whom I perceive to have just run into the street into my
path, that I really am avoiding hitting the kid and not just creating some
perceptual illusion of having done so. I know I can't prove that this is
so, but the hypothesis makes sense of a lot of otherwise strange and
unaccountable relationships among my perceptions -- like the fact that
seeing that I am rapidly closing on a rather solid tree trunk is almost
always followed by a strong perception of pain in my body unless I do
something to change the first perception before it is too late.

You, of course, are free to disagree.

I don't need your permission for that.

Do you think that appealing to emotionally loaded examples (like hitting a
kid with your car or smashing into a tree) makes the problem of verifying
reality any easier to solve? Why not just refer to simple examples like
holding up one hand and wiggling the fingers? You're not a hopeless
romantic, you're an expert muddier of the waters. The problem is as simple,
yet as deep, as the problem of showing what it is in the external world
that corresponds to the experience of the color brown. You don't need dead
kids to make that problem seem important.

I know I can't prove that this is
so, but the hypothesis makes sense of a lot of otherwise strange and
unaccountable relationships among my perceptions -- like the fact that
seeing that I am rapidly closing on a rather solid tree trunk is almost
always followed by a strong perception of pain in my body unless I do
something to change the first perception before it is too late.

The reality hypothesis makes absolutely no difference in the way you deal
with those perceptions. While you might think, once or twice, "it's all in
my head so it doesn't matter," a few experiences of pain, in your head or
not, will soon convince you that it DOES matter. Unreal pain hurts just as
much as real pain, so the reality of the pain is quite irrelevant. Even if
that experience corresponds to nothing objective outside of you, you will
still learn to avoid it.

What you're missing is that your own reasoning is also among your
experiences and is a perception along with all the others. There's no way
to peek around the edges of your perceptions to see what's really out
there. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you will be able to give up
the idea that "reality" is important. You make assumptions about the world
and build up your understandings and methods on the basis of those
assumptions.

Of course I, too, have a strong feeling that there is a real world out
there. The difference between us is that I do not have the hubris to claim
that it corresponds one-for-one with my experiences.

Best,

Bill P.

6

[From Bruce Abbott (981014.0745 EST)]

Bill Powers (981013.2137 MDT) --

appealing to emotionally loaded examples

Emotionally loaded? No, just an extreme example to make the point clear. Do
you think my purpose was to arouse emotions and thus block rational thought?
If so, did it work?

you're an expert muddier of the waters

Thank you.

What you're missing

On what grounds do you think I'm missing the point? If you will read again
my two posts on the subject, you will see that I began by _granting_ it.

Of course I, too, have a strong feeling that there is a real world out
there. The difference between us is that I do not have the hubris to claim
that it corresponds one-for-one with my experiences.

Hubris, eh? Show me where I made the claim that reality corresponds
one-for-one with my experiences. I double-dog dare you.

Regards,

Bruce

7

[From Bruce Gregory 9981014.1102 ETD]

Bill Powers (981013.2137 MDT)

Of course I, too, have a strong feeling that there is a real world out
there. The difference between us is that I do not have the hubris to claim
that it corresponds one-for-one with my experiences.

Rick thinks it corresponds one-for-one with your models.

Bruce Gregory

8

[From Bill Powers (981014.0743 MDT)]

Bruce Abbott (981014.0745 EST)--

appealing to emotionally loaded examples

Emotionally loaded? No, just an extreme example to make the point clear. Do
you think my purpose was to arouse emotions and thus block rational thought?
If so, did it work?

Not on me, but I think there was some such effect in the author of the
examples.

On what grounds do you think I'm missing the point? If you will read again
my two posts on the subject, you will see that I began by _granting_ it.

It would help if you would cite the passages granting "the point", whatever
the point has become. If you're referring to the dictionary definition, I
didn't notice the use of the term "controlled variable" in it, and the
definition (exercise constraint and domination over, command, etc.) simply
describes an observable consequence of controlling a perception, but
without mentioning how it works or that it is a perception that's controlled.

I think there is a deep misunderstanding here about "open loop and closed
loop control." These two types of "control" involve completely different
arrangements of components and relationships. In open-loop control, a
causal variable acts to produce an effect, and the effect does not reflect
back to alter the causal variable. In closed-loop control, the closed loop
actually exists, and the cause is changed by the effect it is producing.
These are not just equally valid ways of describing the behavior of the
same system. If one of them is correct, the other is wrong. A doorbell
exhibits open-loop causation: pressing the button to close the contacts
causes the bell to ring, but the ringing of the bell has no influence on
whether the contacts close. To claim that this device controls in the PCT
sense would be just as incorrect as it would be to claim that closure of
the contacts in a thermostat controls the room temperature in the open-loop
sense.

The real question is not what to call a given phenomenon: it's what the
phenomenon turns out to be on close inspection. If there are some human
behaviors that are really produced by open-loop systems, then by all means
we must model them that way. But if they are really produced by closed-loop
systems, and we speak about them in terms of open-loop control, then we are
simply wrong.

What is needed here is another Test -- the Test for the Open-Loop
Controlled Variable. How would you go about demonstrating that a given
instance of behavior is really open-loop and not closed-loop control? We
have a way of testing for closed-loop control. What can you provide by way
of a parallel test to demonstrate that an example of control is open-loop?

I attach a Vensim model of a closed-loop control system involving what
could reasonably be called a "ballistic" connection between an action and
its effect. There are lots of variations on this theme, so don't take this
as the only possible example. The controlled variable is affected by the
action after a 10-second delay. This is something like aiming a big
firehose so its high-arching stream lands on a specific spot 300 feet way,
with a steady wind tending to deflect it to one side. The controller is
controlling the spot where the stream is landing, not by open-loop
computation but by watching where the stream is landing and adjusting the
aiming direction to bring that perceived spot to the reference direction.
This is just a one-dimensional closed-loop control system, but it could
obviously be extended to cover more dimensions.

By adjusting the coefficient of the integral output function, we can make
this control system unstable (gain too high) or unnecessarily sluggish
(gain too low). Or we can make the speed of control as fast as is possible,
given the delay, without unwanted overshoot.

Would you say it is optional whether we call this an open-loop or a
closed-loop control system?

Best,

Bill P.

ballistc.mdl (61 Bytes)

9

Bill Powers (981014.0743 MDT) --

Bruce Abbott (981014.0745 EST)

Emotionally loaded? No, just an extreme example to make the point clear. Do
you think my purpose was to arouse emotions and thus block rational thought?
If so, did it work?

Not on me, but I think there was some such effect in the author of the
examples.

You must be out of bullets. That would explain why you've resorted to
slinging mud.

Regards,

Bruce