# Secret Handshakes, Mathematical Mumbo Jumbo

**URL:** <http://discourse.iapct.org/t/secret-handshakes-mathematical-mumbo-jumbo/10306>\
**Category:** CSG1996\
**Created:** [October 25, 1996, 5:20pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/secret-handshakes-mathematical-mumbo-jumbo/10306 "1996-10-25T17:20:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Richard\_Marken](http://discourse.iapct.org/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/9fc348/32.png) [@Richard\_Marken](http://discourse.iapct.org/u/Richard_Marken)\
**Post date:** [October 25, 1996, 5:20pm UTC](http://discourse.iapct.org/t/secret-handshakes-mathematical-mumbo-jumbo/10306/1 "1996-10-25T17:20:54Z")

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[From Rick Marken (961025.1020)]

Bill Benzon:

> Hmmm...I might be interested in publishing those experiements [on control  
> of sequence and program variables]...The only issue is whether or not the  
> work is appropriate to JSES...

Thanks for thinking of me but, based on my perusal of the Website, I don't  
think JSES is the forum I'm after. I'm interested in publishing for an  
audience that either doesn't already have an agenda or has \_my\_ agenda (the  
understanding and promulgation of PCT). One of the only places where such an  
audience exists is on CSGNet.

> Why wouldn't folks inside PCT be interested in these experiments?

Because very few people who are "inside" PCT are research oriented. Moreover,  
very few of those who get inside PCT want to go "all the way" with it. Some  
folks get into PCT thinking that it supports or explains some conventional  
idea about behavior to which they are already deeply (and often  
unconsciously) committed; these folks are willing to understand PCT only up  
to the point where it starts to conflict with those ideas. Others get into  
PCT because they like some things about it (the emphasis on perception, human  
autonomy, whatever) but, again, not those things that conflict with their  
existing beliefs about behavior; these folks usually think that PCT is pretty  
interesting but that it will never "make it" until it takes into account idea  
X (where X is a theory of, approach to or observation of behavior that these  
folks think is real important but is already known to be either irrelevant  
to or contradicted by PCT).

> Just call metaphysics the upper levels stuff, that'll make it kosher  
> in this crowd.

And how do you feel about making metaphysics kosher in this crowd? 😉

> Though you might have to use the secret handshake next time you sign-on.

PCT shows that many of the things that are taken for granted in the  
behavioral amd life sciences -- starting with the idea that behavior is an  
objective phenomenon -- are simply wrong. So it's not surprising to find that  
people who have not yet learned the basics of PCT -- the secret handshake, so  
to speak -- often find PCT-based discussions of behavior frustrating and  
idiosyncratic. PCT starts with a whole new set of assumptions about the  
nature of behavior itself. If you think that PCT is about behavioral  
phenomena in the same way that conventional behavioral and life sciences  
are about these phenomena, then our discussions of PCT are bound to seem  
pretty strange.

The secret handshake for PCT (really the secret decoder ring) is B:CP. But  
you can learn the "secret code" only if you are willing to reconsider some  
cherished (and usually taken for granted) assumptions about the nature of  
behavior itself.

Me:

> Kent is using control system equations to model interacting control systems;  
> Martin is (or would like to be) using dynamical "attractor" equations to  
> model the behavior that \_results\_ from the interaction of control system  
> equations.

Martin Taylor (961024 18:30) --

> I'm afraid I don't see the distinction.

I \_know\_ you don't see the distinction;-)

> Kent works in a background theoretical system that has a lot of engineering  
> behind it

Yes. Control engineering.

> I'm placing the modelling in the context of a theoretical system that has a  
> lot of mathematical knowledge behind it.

I agree. This is exactly what you are doing. I am wondering why you are doing  
it. It is what you did with information theory; you tried to place the model  
of a simple control system in the context of information theory. The result  
was Bill Powers' demonstration that informational descriptions of control  
system behavior are basically useless and both Bill and my demonstrations  
that the verbal descriptions of the control process based on information  
theory are misleading (there is no information available to the control  
system about disturbing variables \_or\_ the resulting influence of those  
variables on controlled variables).

Instead of just theorizing about reorganization, how about \_doing it\_😉

Best

Rick