Shared references

[Bruce_Gregory5]

[From Bruce Gregory (2004.0710.0644)]

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.09 23:14 EDT)]

However, when you hear someone speaking, the linguistic reality of it -- that which makes it words and sentences and not just sounds or marks -- exists only as perceptions. The word-ness of it, the sentence-ness of it, and so on, is completely in the realm of perceptions. It has no other reality. The perceptions are the reality. Therefore you do have direct access to its real nature in really real reality precisely to the extent that you have access to your own perceptions.

I would think you could make exactly the same claim about music. Or art.

Bruce Gregory

Certainty has more appeal than truth.

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0632 MDT)]

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.09 23:14 EDT)–

For “most practical
purposes”, control of perceptions and ignorance of the imperceptible
is obviously perfectly adequate. The issue that Bill Powers was concerned
with was that we have no access independent of our perceptions to the
reality that we trust our perceptions to represent to us, so there is no
way to be sure of the correspondence of our perceptions to reality. There
is no way to really verify the existence of that pen over there, or
anyway the veridicality of your perceptions of it. The closest we can get
is intersubjective agreement in a context of doing science. The physical
sciences cross-corroborate many perceptions, including many instrumental
extensions of our ordinary sensory capacities. Some of the perceptions
inferred by people doing science contradict our everyday perceptions. But
it’s still all perception.

The actual physical reality of the objects in the room around you is
inaccessible to you, all that you have is your perceptions. So it is with
all matters of the sort that may be investigated by physics and
chemistry.

This is a very clear, even inspired, exposition of the position I have
come to. The only thing I would add to that last sentence would a comma,
followed by “or any other means whatsoever, by one human being alone
or many human beings in concert.”
The remainder of your post is a contradiction of these opening
paragraphs. The fact that language exists entirely in the form of
perceptions makes it more difficult, not less, to verify that my language
is like your language. The entire thesis that you present, including your
homages to Zelig Harris, exists in your mind, your awareness, your brain,
and nobody else’s – not even Zelig Harris’ mind. The agreed fact that
human beings cooperate to establish communication in words does not lend
any more power to language than it does to any other ways in which people
cooperate to check their world views against those of others – in
physics, chemistry, mathematics, sports, business, work, sex, or
gastronomy. Having an elaborate, complex, well-tested, and agreed-upon
theory does not make it any less a theory, even though the subject-matter
is the existence of the same theory in the mind of another person.
“Error-free transmission of language” is an unverifiable wish,
a myth, an ideal, for the verification itself can’t be carried out except
by assuming error-free transmission in the first place.
The best you can hope for by way of certainty is internal consistency.
The meanings of my words to me are, I hope and trust, consistent with my
meanings for the words you use to tell me what my words mean to you. No
matter how many times this cross-checking is carried out, it is always
carried out entirely in terms of my meanings (for me) or your meanings
(for you). There is no way to compare my meanings with your meanings,
because what passes between us is only that which evokes the words that I
hear. The meanings that the words evoke come out of my own experiences,
not yours, out of all the rich, many-leveled, interleaved, parallel,
interacting processes of my life, not your life. There is simply no
plausible likelihood that your meanings are an error-free reproduction of
mine, because your life has not been a reproduction of my life.
Your entire argument, and apparently that of the linguists you cite, is
that error free transmission occurs because error-free transmission
occurs: it is simply an assertion of the same claim in different
paraphrases, offered without proof. It is offered without proof through
no failing of yours, but simply because there can be no proof of that
kind of assertion. You can legitimately say that you choose to assume
that linguistic communication is in some sense error-free, on the basis
of an assumption that the communicants are identically constructed at the
higher levels of organization. But then I would expect you to propose
some test of these assumptions that does not, as does the test of
intersubjective agreement. rely for its validity on their truth. You have
offered no such test. Neither has Harris. Again, I say that that is not a
failing; such a test does not exist, to my knowledge.
I have read, at your instigation, some of Harris’ work. I don’t get from
it what you get from it; what you found convincing I did not find
convincing. But why should this concern you so much? Do you not trust
your own ability to reason unless other people verify it? Or perhaps I
should say that differently, since that sounds egotistical. If you don’t
trust your own ability to reason, how can you claim to know that you
understand someone else’s verification of your reasoning? In the final
analysis, we’re on our own. When we take someone else’s word for their
agreement without acquiring an understanding of why they agree, we have
no reason to be more confident that we are right, because we still don’t
understand why we’re right, even in our own terms. All we have is the
comforting feeling that someone else looks kindly upon us, which is not
to be scorned, but which does not amount to verification.
There may not be any way to settle this question. But there may be a way
that we simply haven’t discovered yet. That’s why I keep picking at it,
because it seems a rather important question that needs an answer one way
or the other, if there is one. However, I have lived without an answer
long enough to have arrived as a modus vivendi, and not just as a
second-best option. On reflection, it seems fascinating and exciting to
think that certainty forever eludes us. That means that there is no end
to discovery even by one person alone, and that there is more yet to be
discovered than any inspection of the world of familiar appearances would
suggest. It also means that I am personally always face-to-face with the
unknown, rather than living comfortably within the known and imagining
that others who are wiser than I have everything under control – and
fearing what might happen if the foundations trembled.

If I had based my thinking on what those around me said they thought, PCT
would not exist – not my version of it.

Best,

Bill P.

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0744 MDT)]

Bruce Gregory (2004.0710.0644) --

Therefore you do have direct access to its real nature in really real
reality precisely to the extent that you have access to your own perceptions.

I would think you could make exactly the same claim about music. Or art.

Or anything else you can experience, right?

The unspoken assumption in Bruce N.'s words is that what I have access to
in my own really real reality is the same thing someone else has access to
in that person's really real reality, which if course is the very
proposition that is under debate. Each of us has direct access to our own
perceptions, we agree. But are my perceptions like your perceptions? That
is the question; let us not beg it. It's too important to merit a trivial
answer.

Best,

Bill P.

[Bruce_Gregory5]

[From Bruce Gregory (2004.0710.1015)]

Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0744 MDT)

The unspoken assumption in Bruce N.'s words is that what I have access to
in my own really real reality is the same thing someone else has access to
in that person's really real reality, which if course is the very
proposition that is under debate. Each of us has direct access to our own
perceptions, we agree. But are my perceptions like your perceptions? That
is the question; let us not beg it. It's too important to merit a trivial
answer.

My point was simply that anything human beings do can be treated as symbolic and therefore having meaning which is strictly "perceptual". (The meaning of natural phenomena is likewise perceptual.) I agree with you that there is simply no way to know how closely my perceptions correspond to yours. As you point out, personal histories differ and these differences affect perceptions. At least that is what the evidence supports.

I am not sure why Bruce Nevin is so taken with this idea, but it clearly is something he is unwilling to part with.

Bruce Gregory

Certainty has more appeal than truth.

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0803 MDT)]

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.09 23:14 EDT)--

Mary reminds me of a unique opportunity to compare perceptions that I had
recently -- and how I was able to communicate it, backward, to someone else.

I now have two new lenses in my eyes, after the second surgery for
cataracts. But a couple of weeks ago only one of them was finished, and I
noticed that seen with the new eye, the walls in our living room (painted
only two years ago) were very white, while with the old eye they were
yellowish, as if exposed to 20 years of smokers. I wanted to know how much
the difference was in terms that would communicate to someone else, so I
wrote a program that presented two rectangles on the screen of my computer,
with mouse control of the color of one of them. After some experimenting, I
found that changing only the blue component was sufficient to obtain a
pretty good color match (using a cardboard barrier so that each eye saw
only the rectangle on its side). In a darkened room, I obtained a match by
reducing the blue component in the rectangle seen by my right eye. The
remaining amount of blue was 35% plus or minus a few of what was needed to
make the color look white to my right eye.

I showed the program to my eye surgeon, who was delighted and got it
immediately, although of course the wrong rectangle looked yellow to him
since it was the one seen by my right eye. He had never before known how
the world looked to a cataract patient, although he does about 18 surgeries
a week.

One point is that since I was looking directly at two of my own
perceptions, I could actually compare them legitimately by experiencing a
total visual field in which one eye provided one rectangle and the other
eye provided the other rectangle. The difference in color was right there
in immediate awareness.

The other point is that before the surgery, if someone had asked me what
color my living-room walls were, I would have answered "White", not "Sort
of a grungy yellow." By every possible test, the meaning of the word
"white" would have been correct for me and for anyone else looking at the
same wall -- yet we would not have been perceiving "the same thing." Even a
comparison of "white" with "slightly yellowish" would have resulted in --
false -- agreement, with the general yellowing of my vision relative to the
other person's going undetected.

Would it be possible for two people to see different colors, but to see the
same contrast between colors? Yes and no. To experience the difference
between "contrast" and "no contrast," yes. But to experience the _same_
contrast, no. The general effect of color filtering is to alter the amount
of contrast between colors, and even the kind, as Land showed with his
demonstrations of two-wavelength full-color vision. A brown square in one
picture was produced by a mix of two wavelengths; in another picture, with
exactly the same mix and intensity of wavelengths, the same square looked
bright yellow (if I recall correctly).

By experimenting with our physical models of reality, we can make a great
deal of sense of experiences of all kinds. But we forget at our peril that
we are comparing models, not realities -- except in the rare case where we
have two nominally identical ways of perceiving the same thing and can
compare them inside our own directly perceived realities.

I have noticed, by the way, that Mary's voice carries farther when my left
ear is toward her rather than the right ear. Something funny about acoustic
refraction phenomena, no doubt.

Best,

Bill P.

[Bill_Williams1]

From[Bill Williams 11 July 2004 2:40 AM CST]

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.07 21:22 EDT)]

Bill Powers (2004.06.29.1447 MDT) --

Snipe<>

Bruce Nevin says,

In both the last two cases (a non-human organism and a program running on a
computer), you know that the observed controller's perceptions are NOT NOT
NOT NOT organized like yours and you know that the observed controller does
NOT NOT NOT NOT perceive the environment as you do. (Trying to adopt your
rhetorical style here.) These two cases flatly contradict your statement
about what the Test tells us. So either that statement is incorrect
(incomplete, imprecise, ...) or the Test cannot tell us about any
controller other than fellow humans whose perceptions we know are organized
like our own, and who we know perceive the environment as we do. Please
recall here the second thought that I asked you to hold, and revert to the
questions raised at that point, and assertions you made earlier such as

Bill Powers (2004.06.29.1447 MDT)--

Everything that we need to know can be seen by an observer external to

the controller who has no knowledge of how the controller is organized
inside, or even whether it is a living system or a mechanical device. The

observer doesn't even have to try to guess about the insides of the

controller.

Knowledge that an organism's perceptions are organized like mine, and that
the organism perceives the environment as I do which (per your
2004.06.29.1447) we require IF IF IF IF the Test is to be meaningful, is
knowledge of the kind that you said (2004.06.29.0934) we DON'T DON'T DON'T
DON'T need. That is the problem that I was pointing out.

I perceive that mirroring is taking place in regard to rhetorical style.

Bruce, however, has the better, bettter, better, better argument.

Bill Williams

···

At 04:11 PM 6/29/2004 -0600, Bill Powers wrote:

[Bill_Williams1]

From[Bill Williams 11 July 2004 3:00 AM CST]

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.08 16:56 EDT)]

Bill Willliams 30 June 2004 2:25 AM CST

However, it seems to me that a comprehension of your argument
might be enhanced if it were expressed in terms of some apt
slogans.

I try to rely on careful language rather than persuasive rhetoric, but you
might be right.

The more I think about it the more I like,
"There is no such thing as an individual."

You are making use of some terms such as "individual" and
"public" in context in which there is massive equivocation.
For you a "public" is not the sum of "individuals."

As I understand the term, individuals are independent. No interdependencies
with other individuals are built into them.

For clarity, perhaps I should refer to an individual in this sense as an
isolated individual.

However, as best I know, there has never been such a thing.

You go on to say,

But while as you say a "public" is not a magical super-organic creature,
neither can individuals be somehow magically isolated from one another. Our
memories and reference perceptions have their origin in an experiential
matrix of interdependent, cooperating and conflicting human beings, with
which our perceptual universe continues to be populated even when we sit
alone in apparent isolation. For example, the next time you feel yourself
most alone and isolated, you may recall this very discussion, and thereby
be (and possibly perceive yourself) in interrelationship with me.

For sure!

If I understand your argument so far, and I would welcome correction:

"Words are symbols that as a part of a public context have an intrumental
function when used in a language for purposes of communication."

Would it be possible for you to generate a concise lexicon of linguistic

terms and definitions-- as you would define them in terms that would be

friendly to using them in a control theory approach to language?

I suppose that's an aspect what I'm trying to do. Let me think on it.

OK

When I attempt to think about it, I begin to wonder. I come up with
questions such as, "If the purpose of language is to communicate, what
is it that language communicates?"

Language is not especially adapted to communication. Communication may be
accomplished by many means, usually in combination, including among them
language. Language enables error-free transmission of information.

When you say "error-free" I have doubts. It seems like an implausible claim
but then perhaps I don' undestand what the sentence means. All that seems
to me to be required is that a language is sufficiently intrumentally usefull
so that a culture can be maintained.

Your discussion below regarding "consistency" "completeness," and
"explicitness" seems to me to resemble the expectation that a computer
language be able to compile itself.

>When and

whether people use it successfully for error-free transmission of

information is another matter. (This last is a response to Bruce Gregory
92004.0702.1454 who in typically helpful fashion quipped "I'm not sure, but
I think you have just eliminated all of information theory with a single
stroke.") In language, form and information are different faces of the same
thing. Harris showed that for any utterance there is a paraphrase in which
each bit of distinctive form (as conventionally determined among speakers
of the language) is a bit of linguistic information. If the utterance is
ambiguous, there is more than one such paraphrase. The set of such
paraphrases constitutes a maximally explicit, informationally complete
sublanguage without paraphrases, in which no sentence is ambiguous, and the

rest of the language comprises various paraphrases of sentences in this
sublanguage.

I would think that what communication

communicates is meanigs. But, I have never been convinced that analytic
philosophy had a theory of valuation that explain what it is that
constitutes a meaning. I have a sense that the theory of valuation has
a connection to the concept of error in control theory, but this, as
far as I know, has never been considered in a sustained exposition on

the CSGnet.

The assumption that Bill has advanced is that meanings are perceptions.
This does not tell us much, since everything is perceptions, including
language.

The claim that "everything is perception" is only a temporary measure.
Pretty soon it is supplemented by talk about "concrete."

The projection of informational structures of language seems to have the

effect of partitioning the universe of perceptions (including language
itself). However, attempts to identify the meaning of each word
analytically and then build up the meanings of sentences and discourses
synthetically has always foundered. We complain that the meanings of words
shift according to context. It seems rather we project onto the universe of
perceptions structures larger than words as well as individual words. The
difficulty with all of this is that we have no way of identifying meanings

except words.

Never-the-less despite the difficulties we manage to more or less carryon,
and carryout what needs to be done.

Consider: not all perceptions are meanings; they are meanings
only in association or correlation with those bits of language of which
they are the meanings. Therefore there is no standpoint outside of language
from which to identify its meanings.

This might be a starting point for some effective sloganeering. "NO langauge,
No argument." Anyone who starts an argument in effect has accepted your
worldview. Individuals obviously don't have languages. BTW: they don't have
economies either.

It is necessary first to identify the
informational structures of language and then to determine with what kinds
of perceptions they may correspond.

I recall linguists describing "the structure of language" in such terms. And,
I wouldn't doubt that the structure of a language could play a role in how
people in a culture organize their perceptions. It seems to me like a very
ambitious task.

Another way to get to an understanding of the problem is from the

recognition that each perception is unique. A perception that recurs on a
second occasion can only be "the same" as the first if the perceptual
inputs are the same. If perceptual inputs differ perceptibly, in the
universe of continuously variable perceptual values, it is not "the same"
perception. However, when an utterance is repeated perceptual inputs
differ. Even though the perceptual inputs differ, it is the same utterance
(no scare quotes) because the listener (or reader) distinguishes it from

all other utterances that are possible in the language.

I think I would qualify this by saying that a viable language does so, but
then not all cultures and languages are viable.

The formal,

conventional structures of the language, known to both the speaker and
hearer (or writer and reader), partition the universe of vocal sounds (or
squiggles on a surface) into a rather small number of discrete
possibilities. (Of course it is the speaker, hearer, reader, and writer who
project their perceptions of the conventional structures of language onto
the continua of perceptual inputs, thereby effecting the partition into

discrete possibilities.

I am not attributing agency to language.

I've never thought your conception of language required you to do so.
However, for the time being it seems neccesary for you to continue to
deny attributing magical causal forces to "language."

For this

to be possible, the formal, conventional structures of the language must be

known to both the speaker and the hearer, or the writer and reader.

That is to say that they must be part of the culture.

Two proposals have been made as to how the members of a speech community

might come to know the conventional structures of their language. One is
Martin's proposal involving only reorganization. The other is my proposal
that people actually perceive what others are doing and what they
themselves are doing and control the relationships between those sets of

perceptions (self and others).

Is there a possiblity that both yours and Martin's descriptions of what is
going on could both be correct?

A part of what I have in mind in this request would be something like, or

a more adequate version, of my "Words are symbols ..." sentence that
would build upon and illustrate where the implications of your position
differs from and is more suitable as a basis for an understanding of

language than Powers' position.

I think I understand the problems involved in defining language in terms
of the average of the sounds made by individuals.

I think I understand why "agreement" and notions about a public, or a

community are neccesary conceptions for a theory of language.

However, when I read Z. Harris I sometimes have the sense that what he
meant might be more easily understood if some of his conceptions were

stated more explicitly.

I think that the problem is not a failure to state things explicitly, but
the unavailability of a standpoint outside of language for describing
language.

This seems worth thinking about.

It may not be applicable, but I keep thinking about my example of a computer
language being subject to the test of "Will it compile itself?"

I have the sense that you think that a
reconstruction of Harris' ideas in control theory terms is a possiblity.

Yes.

Or, am I asking too much for you to carry out over the 4th weekend?

July 4 2006?

I will eagerly look forward to your providing such a marvel. I hope it comes
expressed in an extension of Pascal.

The more I think about, the happier I am having choosen to study economics,
Linguistics seems far too difficult.

Bill Williams

···

At 03:10 AM 6/30/2004 -0500, Williams, William D. wrote:

[Bill_Williams1]

From[Bill Williams 11 July 2004 4:40 AM CST}

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0632 MDT)]

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.09 23:14 EDT)--

In the final analysis, we're on our own.

Rather, in the PCT sophistology you are almost entirely on your own.

There may not be any way to settle this question. But there may be a way that we simply haven't discovered yet. That's why I keep picking at it, >because it seems a rather important question that needs an answer one way or the other, if there is one.

The way out is a recognition that "There is no such thing as an individual."

Bill Williams

[Bruce_Gregory5]

[From Bruce Gregory (2004.0711.0710)]

Bill Williams 11 July 2004 4:40 AM CST

The way out is a recognition that "There is no such thing as an individual."

You have convinced me, but I'm just one individual.

Bruce Gregory

Certainty has more appeal than truth.

[Bill_Williams1]

From[Bill Williams 12 July 2004 1:50 AM CST]

[From Bruce Gregory (2004.0711.0710)]

        >>Bill Williams 11 July 2004 4:40 AM CST

        >>The way out is a recognition that "There is no such thing as an individual."

You have convinced me, but I'm just one individual.

Even so, I regard it as a giant leap in the right direction.

Bill Williams

[Richard_Marken2]

[From Rick Marken (2004.07.12.1010)]

Bruce Gregory (2004.0711.0710)

Bill Williams 11 July 2004 4:40 AM CST

The way out is a recognition that "There is no such thing as an individual."

You have convinced me, but I'm just one individual.

Now _that_ is funny!

Very nice, Bruce.

Best

Rick

···

--
Richard S. Marken
MindReadings.com
Home: 310 474 0313
Cell: 310 729 1400

[bnhpct]

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.13 14:24 EDT)]

Bill Powers (2004.07.07.2140 MDT)--

The Test never proves that the controller perceives and controls the same
CV I perceive being controlled. It provides a reasonable basis for
proposing a model of what is inside the controller. There are always
alternative models that would produce the same observed effects; an
infinity of them. The best we can do is propose the simplest model that
will do the job, and say that whatever is going on inside, it accomplishes
what this model accomplishes.

An assumption for any science, including physics.

what is the basis of this knowledge and expectation? It's the whole
discipline of physics, so to raise doubts about this knowledge you would
have to supply a workable alternative to the world-view of physics. I'm
not talking about hunches and guesses here, but about the application of
the most reliable of human models which fail so seldom that they are held
up as the standard of knowledge, of what it means to know something.

Although in context this referred specifically to perceptions that the
observer controls as disturbances to the CV, I believe that it applies to
every aspect of the experimental setup, the Test, the model, and
simulations according to the model. If you demur, please explain.

We have been talking somewhat at crossed purposes. I am trying to talk
about social phenomena. To "make it clearer with an example" you are
talking about a kind of tracking experiment that supports a simulation
devoid of social content. To oblige, I have talked about how the
experimental setup itself, and the Test for controlled variables, involves
social phenomena. Such observations are not relevant to the simulation of a
tracker, nor are they the most clear examples of what I am trying to get at.

As a fulcrum for this discussion I have been calling attention to equivocal
use of the term CV. Let me review that first.

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.07 21:22 EDT) --

Since we are being
careful here we must avoid equivocation. The CV was first defined as a
perception in the brain of the observer, a perception of an aspect of the
environment. We cannot say that the CV can be sensed by the observed
controller if the CV is a perception in the brain of the observer.

The observer makes a distinction between the experience of the CV in the
environment (which is, whether he knows it or not, a perception in his
brain) and his experience of himself as an observer. He sees the computer
screen and its display over there, and feels himself as viewing it from a
distance.

This is the observer's perception of the environment. You omitted to
mention his perception of the controller, whence his perception that this
is a shared environment. He perceives the controller as being able to
determine the location of the cursor by means of hand movements pressing
against a joystick or mouse. He probably corroborates this perception by
interacting with the controller. The social nature of these perceptions is
not relevant to the task. The meaning of "shared environment" is
problematic, since all we have of it is the respective perceptions of two
separate brains, but we will ignore that for the present too.

To test whether the controller is also experiencing this variable, ...

For the controller to "experience" the CV ("this variable" can hardly be
other than the one you were just talking about), it must be in the
environment. It is all right for the controller to assume that the CV is in
the environment -- perhaps control would be impossible without doing so --
but from the omniscient point of view of theory what warrant do we have to
put the CV in the real environment? Physics, perhaps, as above. But if the
CV is in the environment, then leave it there and speak of the respective
perceptions of observer and controller.

the experimenter must interrupt what he believes to be the path by which
the controller perceives the CV.

If the CV is a perception in the brain of the observer, there is no path by
which the controller can perceive it. So we are also assuming that the path
for the controller to perceive the CV is really present in the environment.
But in the very same sentence, while our attention was on this path, the CV
has become a perception in the brain of the controller. An identity
assumption has passed without notice, which may be expressed in the
following equation:

         CV(observer) == CV(environment) == CV(controller)

Or if you say that what is in the environment is the environmental
variables of which the CV is a perception, the equation is

         CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

This was my understanding, until I saw all this talk of the CV being in the
environment. Another example:

[...]

One must demonstrate that interrupting the [controller's] ability to
perceive the environment where [the] proposed CV is

Now the CV is in the environment again ...

... prevents control of it by that controller. That's part of the Test.

... and now the CV is a perceptual signal again: the phrase "prevents
control of it" can only refer to a perception in the brain of the
controller, since we control perceptions, not the actual environment.

Can you see the equivocation here? The CV is now a perception in the
observer, now a variable in the environment, and now a perception in the
controller, whichever is convenient.

From the observer's point of view, the CV is first the observer's
perception of a variable in the observer's perception of the environment,
and then it is the observer's perception of a perception within the
observer's perception of the controller as part of the observer's
perception of the environment. But you have denied that the observer may
have a perception of the controller's perception.

So what about this equivalence

         CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

At first it is a guess, then hypothesis, and finally the only hypothesis
left standing after exhaustive test.

What the experimenter wants is to be backed into a corner from which the
only escape is to admit that this definition of the CV is the ONLY one
that remains despite all attempts to prove otherwise.
[...]
It is an inescapable demonstration of a fact. As long as grounds for
doubting the demonstration can be found, the Test is not completed.

The observer then designs, builds, tests, and progressively refines a
simulation according to the PCT model. While there may be an infinity of
models that perform as the controller does with respect to the equivalence

         CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

there is not an infinity of simulations in accord with the PCT model. Nor
is there an infinity of relationships between CV(observer), CV(controller),
and EV, there is only one, and that is a relationship of equivalence. The
Test for the Controlled Variable demonstrates the equivalence

         CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

with sufficient certainty for a simulation to be built that demonstrates
the same equivalence under like conditions.

This is a basis for understanding and modeling "theory of mind", that is,
control of perceptions of another's perceptions, a cognitive capacity that
most children develop at about age 4. Is this understood and agreed so far?

         /Bruce

···

At 11:10 PM 7/7/2004 -0600, Bill Powers wrote:

[Martin_Taylor2]

[Martin Taylor 2004.07.13.1524]

Back from the UK (without Shared References whether Misquoting or not).

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.13 14:24 EDT)]

As a fulcrum for this discussion I have been calling attention to equivocal
use of the term CV. Let me review that first.

...

If the CV is a perception in the brain of the observer, there is no path by
which the controller can perceive it. So we are also assuming that the path
for the controller to perceive the CV is really present in the environment.
But in the very same sentence, while our attention was on this path, the CV
has become a perception in the brain of the controller. An identity
assumption has passed without notice, which may be expressed in the
following equation:

        CV(observer) == CV(environment) == CV(controller)

Or if you say that what is in the environment is the environmental
variables of which the CV is a perception, the equation is

        CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

This was my understanding, until I saw all this talk of the CV being in the
environment.

...

I originally introduced the term CEV = "Complex Environmental
Variable" to represent the fact that all a Tester or Observer can see
is a selection of the environmental elements that are the arguments
of the function that generates the controlled variable (a perceptual
signal). To eliminate the "E" opens the way for an ambiguity between
"CV" = "controlled variable" (perception) and "CV" = "Complex
varioable" (an environmental condition or state).

It's unfortunate that I used C for Complex when I introduced the term
CEV so many years ago, since not a few people have taken CEV to stand
for "Controlled Environmental Variable", which is a meaningless
construct in the context of PCT.

When one is talking about The Test, the tester and testee have access
to much the same set of possibilities for the environmental
variables, but neither has any access to what the other does with
those variables to create a perception. (I ignore direct measures of
neural activity here). When the Tester tries to disturb a controlled
perception of the testee, the only way it can be done is to influence
one or more of the components of the CEV. The testee may exercise
control by influencing a different component (in which case we have
an example of counter-control), or by influencing the same component
as was disturbed by the Tester (conflict, but only if the Tester
really is controlling for a perception of the disturbed variable at a
new value).

One also has to remain aware that whatever perception is being
controlled, it is probably being controlled as a means of controlling
some other perception of which it is a component. Hence, the Test
might fail even if the Tester, using the same function as the testee,
influences exactly the CEV that the testee is controlling. The testee
might easily relinquish use of that CEV as a component of the
higher-level perception that was using it, while retaining control of
the higher perception by other means.

So, as the originator of the term CEV, may I suggest its retirement
in favour of "EV" = Environmental variable (complex or simple) and
"CV" = "controlled variable (a perceptual signal). And to add to the
mix, each CV has its "RV" = "Reference variable" whose changing value
is to be tracked by the corresponding CV through influencing the
corresponding EV.

DYLA (= Don't you love acronyms).

Martin

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.13.1604 MDT)]

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.13 14:24 EDT)

This is the observer’s perception
of the environment. You omitted to

mention his perception of the controller, whence his perception that
this

is a shared environment. He perceives the controller as being able
to

determine the location of the cursor by means of hand movements
pressing

against a joystick or mouse. He probably corroborates this perception
by

interacting with the controller. The social nature of these perceptions
is

not relevant to the task. The meaning of “shared environment”
is

problematic, since all we have of it is the respective perceptions of
two

separate brains, but we will ignore that for the present
too.

This is what I am talking about. This is how I think of the observer
doing the test, whether the observer is someone else or me. The observer
does not observe anything inside the controller. There is no direct way
to verify that the observer’s perceptions correspond to anything in
reality. All that is possible is to make models that behave as much as
possible like observations. A hypothetical perception inside the
controller is only hypothetical. The observer is out of the page, looking
at the perceptual field I have called my model of the observer’s direct
perceptions (the title above should contain the word
“direct”).

Can you see the equivocation here?
The CV is now a perception in the

observer, now a variable in the environment, and now a perception in
the

controller, whichever is convenient.

The environment is a perception in the observer, containing the
environment and the CV as gthe controller perceives them. I do not speak
of the real environment; only of models of the environment.

At first it is a guess, then
hypothesis, and finally the only hypothesis

left standing after exhaustive test.

No, your test has not been exhaustive. You have not inserted
transformations into the input and output pathways that make the
observer’s perception different from the controller’s even when they
agree that they are seeing the same thing, and even when the proposed CV
passes the test.

The observer then designs, builds,
tests, and progressively refines a

simulation according to the PCT model. While there may be an infinity
of

models that perform as the controller does with respect to the
equivalence

    CV(observer) == EV ==

CV(controller)

there is not an infinity of simulations in accord with the PCT
model.

So what? It’s only a model, an approximation of something as projected
into human perceptual space.

Nor

is there an infinity of relationships between CV(observer),
CV(controller),

and EV, there is only one, and that is a relationship of
equivalence.

Just saying that doesn’t make it true.

The

Test for the Controlled Variable demonstrates the equivalence

    CV(observer) == EV ==

CV(controller)

with sufficient certainty for a simulation to be built that
demonstrates

the same equivalence under like conditions.

Bruce, you’re trying to cross that last barrier between “It is
possible” and “it is true.” You can’t do it. You reason
with your mind, you perceive with your brain, you sense with your sense
organs, you act with your muscles. Certainty is unreachable. All you can
do is make hypotheses and test them, using the same brain, the same
mind.

This is a basis for understanding
and modeling “theory of mind”, that is,

control of perceptions of another’s perceptions, a cognitive capacity
that

most children develop at about age 4. Is this understood and agreed so
far?

Absolutely not. Children develop the idea that others have minds, and
that those minds might be independent of theirs, but they have no more
notion of what is in those minds than anyone else. It’s only a guess.
They can only deal with what they perceive to be in someone else’s mind,
and it takes a lifetime to develop theories of mind that stand up under
even a casual challenge. And they remain forever theories.

If I see something I call a red square, and you see something you call a
red square, about all we can agree on (given enough cross-checking) is
that we think we are both using the same words. That is no more
error-free than agreeing on meter-readings, or agreeing on the time of
day, or agreeing on anything else involving parallel observations of
well-established and familiar perceptions. As to whether the experience I
give the name “red square” is the same of yours, we just have
to learn to get along without ever knowing that.

I can see that if I were to prevail, you would lose something of great
value that concerns your chosen profession, or the category of social
science to which it belongs: the idea that it stands above all other
scientific endeavors in its ability to determine what is going on in Real
Reality. I do not think you will get much agreement on this except from
other social scientists who would also enjoy thinking that they had a
special place among scientists.

Best,

Bill P.

[BJORN_SIMONSEN]

[From Bjorn
Simonsen (2004.07.14,12:55 EuST)]

[From Bruce
Nevin (2004.07.13 14:24 EDT)]

Bill
Powers (2004.07.07.2140 MDT)–

But if the CV is in the environment, then leave it
there and

speak of the respective perceptions of observer and
controller.

I understand
there is an agreement between B.N., B.P., R.M. B.G., M.T., B.S. and more that
CV is in the environment.

I will refer my
comments to the jpge graph (I hope you see it on your screen).

r = reference signal i
= input function

e = error signal o
= output function

p = perceptual signal f
= feedback function

c = comparator function pe
= physical effect

a = action d
= disturbance

qi = input quantity qo
= output quantity

uv = unaffected variable cv
= controlled variable

pif = perceptual input function of = output
function

iv = incidentally affected variable

inside, all boxes are functions.

Outside, someboxes are important variables.

Arrows are physical effects (pe’s)

Some pe’s have special names

Inside, pe’s are called“signals”

From the observer’s point of view, the CV is first
the observer’s

perception of a variable in the observer’s
perception of the environment,

and then it is the observer’s perception of a perception
within the

observer’s perception of the controller as part of
the observer’s

perception of the environment. But you have denied
that the observer may

have a perception of the controller’s perception.

So what about this equivalence

     >CV(observer) == EV ==

CV(controller)

At first it is a guess, then hypothesis, and
finally the only hypothesis

left standing after exhaustive test.

The CV you mention in your first sentence is input quantities
to the observer’s perception. I think it is just hypothetical that this CV is
equivalent to the controllers CV (look at the graph). When I read your first
sentence I transform it to “From the observer’s point of view, the CV is a
function where something of the EV is included.

The end of this first sentence is too complicated for
me. I back up what Bill P wrote

The
observer makes a distinction between the experience of the CV in

the
environment (which is, whether he knows it or not, a perception in

his
brain) and his experience of himself as an observer. He sees the

computer
screen and its display over there, and feels himself as viewing

it
from a distance.

I would have added that the observer
also imagine what the controller controls. Let me go into details.

The observer/Tester controls his
perceptions influenced by a CV. He also controls the perception “I wish to
observe the controller” (This is another loop influenced of another CV).
Testing is to imagine what the controller controls. It is a process where the
tester makes disturbances to the controller’s CV. If the controller works
against these disturbances, the observer includes in his imagination that this
disturbance is a part of his CV that influence the perceptions the controller
controls. If the controller doesn’t work against these disturbances, the
observer includes in his imagination that this disturbance is *not* a part of his CV that influence the
perceptions the controller controls. The test is a process. The more disturbances
an observer makes use of the more nuanced is his imagination of what the
controller controls.

The observer then designs, builds, tests, and
progressively refines a

simulation according to the PCT model. While there
may be an infinity of

models that perform as the controller does with
respect to the equivalence

CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

there is not an infinity of simulations in accord
with the PCT model. Nor

is there an infinity of relationships between CV(observer),
CV(controller),

and EV, there is only one, and that is a
relationship of equivalence. The

Test for the Controlled Variable demonstrates the
equivalence

CV(observer) == EV == CV(controller)

with sufficient certainty for a simulation to be
built that demonstrates

the same equivalence under like conditions.

I think it is an
overstatement saying that there is only one relationship of equivalence between
CV(observer), CV(controller), and EV. The observer’s imagination of what the controller
wishes to perceive is hypothetical. And this hypothetical imagination changes
as long as the controller is making disturbances. When he stops making
disturbances, he isn’t testing what the controller wish to perceive.

This is a basis for understanding and modeling
“theory of mind”, that is,

control of perceptions of another’s perceptions, a
cognitive capacity that

most children develop at about age 4. Is this
understood and agreed so far?

The PCT ”theory
of mind” is a theory that explains how an observer controls his own perceptions. The Test (being an
observer) puts this theory into a social setting. And the Test doesn’t make a
perception of what another controller is controlling, it makes a hypothetical
perception (an imagination). It is like the“Fishermen’s friends”, it is the
best you have.

Piaget has
theories about the development during infancy, but I don’t think children
develop cognitive capacity at about age 4. I think they develop cognitive
capacity as an embryo. I think a child develop new cognitive capacity when she
starts walking at an age of 1.

I liked to read [Martin
Taylor 2004.07.13.1524] and [From Bill Powers (2004.07.13.1604 MDT)]

bjorn

image0012.wmz (70.3 KB)

oledata6.mso (75.6 KB)

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.14.0735 MDT)]

Bjorn Simonsen (2004.07.14,12:55 EuST)–

You said what I should have said:

The CV you mention in your first
sentence is input quantities to the observer’s perception. I think it is
just hypothetical that this CV is equivalent to the controllers CV (look
at the graph).

Hypothetical, as you say, means imagined, manufactured inside the head.
When we make the distinction perception/imagination, we mean to
distinguish perceptions constructed from sense data and perceptions
constructed from memory or directly from short-circuited reference
signals (if memory does not come into play at all levels of imagination).
A CV, while it is still just an ordinary part of the experienced
environment, is a perception constructed primarily from sense data. When
it takes on the identity of a controlled variable, we are adding imagined
information derived from logical treatment of the results of the Test, so
a CV is partly imagined. When we then conclude that there must be a
perceptual signal in the brain of the controller, we are drawing even
more heavily on imagination, memory, and reason, because those are
deductions from a model far removed from the way the environment and the
controller look to us without the theory. What do you see when you look
at another person’s head? His perceptions? No, you see eyes,nose, ears,
mouth, skin and hair. Your perceptions. And even those call up
names which are added from memory after the initial sensory
experiences.
When you come right down to it, even your own perceptions are
mostly imaginary deductions from a theory. Do you see neural signals in
your brain? No, you experience a world that you see through the frame of
your field of vision, a world that you hear, taste, smell, feel, and so
on. That is the rock-bottom reality against which you judge the validity
of all theories. If a theory says you’re not experiencing what you
experience, it is wrong. If it says you experience more than you
experience, it is wrong. If it says you experience what someone else
experiences, it is wrong. You experience is what you experience,
neither more nor less.

Even higher-level perceptions begin as apparently direct perceptions of a
reality that is outside you as well as, more dimly, inside you. The
distance between two objects is right out there in the space between
them. The sequence in which things happen is in their occurrances out
there in the world. The logic of not having your cake and eating it too
is in the having and the eating, not in your head. “It’s
obvious” we say. “Any fool can see that,” we say. That is
because unless you’re born a theoretician, there is no
“natural” understanding that these are all neural signals in
your brain, constructed by a hierarchy of perceptual input
functions.

One of the serious risks of theorizing is coming to think that your
theories are more real than your experiences, and that if theory
disagrees with experience, it is experience that must be modified. To
avoid delusion, a theorist must remember that experience has the
priority, and if theory disagrees, it is the theory that must be changed.
This is the foundation of science and the antithesis of faith. If you see
a meter with the pointer near 3, and theory says you should see it near
6, science says that you had better believe what you do see, not what
theory says you should see. The reason for the discrepancy might be in
your eyes, but you will never know if you simply substitute an imagined 6
for the observed 3. And of course it is much more likely that the
explanation is to be found in the theory, or in the way it was applied.
The anchor of science is observation, not theories about
observations.

Best,

Bill P.

···

The
end of this first sentence is too complicated for me. I back up what Bill
P wrote

The observer makes a distinction between the experience of the CV
in
the environment (which is, whether he knows it or not, a
perception in
his brain) and his experience of himself as an observer. He sees
the
computer screen and its display over there, and feels himself as
viewing
it from a distance.

I would have added that the observer also imagine what the controller
controls. Let me go into details.
The observer/Tester controls his perceptions influenced by a CV. He also
controls the perception “I wish to observe the controller” (This is
another loop influenced of another CV). Testing is to imagine what the
controller controls. It is a process where the tester makes disturbances
to the controller’s CV. If the controller works against these
disturbances, the observer includes in his imagination that this
disturbance is a part of his CV that influence the perceptions the
controller controls. If the controller doesn’t work against these
disturbances, the observer includes in his imagination that this
disturbance is *not* a part of his CV that influence the
perceptions the controller controls. The test is a process. The more
disturbances an observer makes use of the more nuanced is his imagination
of what the controller controls.

The observer then designs, builds, tests, and progressively refines
a
simulation according to the PCT model. While there may be an infinity
of
models that perform as the controller does with respect to the
equivalence

   CV(observer) == EV ==

CV(controller)

there is not an infinity of simulations in accord with the PCT model.
Nor
is there an infinity of relationships between CV(observer),
CV(controller),
and EV, there is only one, and that is a relationship of equivalence.
The
Test for the Controlled Variable demonstrates the equivalence

    CV(observer) == EV

== CV(controller)

with sufficient certainty for a simulation to be built that
demonstrates
the same equivalence under like conditions.

I think it is an overstatement saying that there is only one relationship
of equivalence between CV(observer), CV(controller), and EV. The
observer’s imagination of what the controller wishes to perceive is
hypothetical. And this hypothetical imagination changes as long as the
controller is making disturbances. When he stops making disturbances, he
isn’t testing what the controller wish to perceive.

This is a basis for understanding and modeling “theory of
mind”, that is,
control of perceptions of another’s perceptions, a cognitive capacity
that
most children develop at about age 4. Is this understood and agreed
so far?

The PCT ”theory of mind” is a theory that explains how an observer
controls his own perceptions. The Test (being an observer) puts
this theory into a social setting. And the Test doesn’t make a perception
of what another controller is controlling, it makes a hypothetical
perception (an imagination). It is like the“Fishermen’s friends”, it is
the best you have.

Piaget has theories about the development during infancy, but I don’t
think children develop cognitive capacity at about age 4. I think they
develop cognitive capacity as an embryo. I think a child develop new
cognitive capacity when she starts walking at an age of 1.

I liked to read [Martin Taylor 2004.07.13.1524] and [From Bill
Powers (2004.07.13.1604 MDT)]

bjorn

[Bill_Powers1]

[From Bill Powers (2004.07.14.1015 MDT)]

Martin Taylor 2004.07.13.1524--

I originally introduced the term CEV = "Complex Environmental
Variable" to represent the fact that all a Tester or Observer can see
is a selection of the environmental elements that are the arguments
of the function that generates the controlled variable (a perceptual
signal). To eliminate the "E" opens the way for an ambiguity between
"CV" = "controlled variable" (perception) and "CV" = "Complex
varioable" (an environmental condition or state).

It's unfortunate that I used C for Complex when I introduced the term
CEV so many years ago, since not a few people have taken CEV to stand
for "Controlled Environmental Variable", which is a meaningless
construct in the context of PCT.

Thanks for a post that is up to your best standards. I wish you were coming
to the CSG meeting next week, because I think you would enjoy some of the
demos I'm bringing. I'll post them on my web site after the meeting. And of
course we would all like to hear what you've been thinking lately.

Maybe next year in Scotland?

Best,

Bill P.

[Richard_Marken2]

[From Rick Marken (2004.07.14.0920)]

Bjorn Simonsen (2004.07.14,12:55 EuST)--

I understand there is an agreement between B.N., B.P., R.M. B.G., M.T., B.S.
and more that CV is in the environment.

I like to think of the CV as what it is: a _function_ of physical
(environmental) variables. A CV is not a physical variable in the
environment. It is a function of such variables. For example, in a tracking
task, the controlled variable is the distance between cursor and target
(c-t). Is this variable in the environment? Not really. It is computed by
the brain based on the sensed values of c and t. The environmental
variables, c and t, may be light years apart, as they are when you try to
keep a star (t) in the cross hairs of a telescope (c). In this case, when
the CV = 0, the actual distance between c and t is billions and billions of
miles.

Both the controller and the observer experience the CV as being in the
environment. But, as Bill Powers notes, whether they know it or not, the CV
exists only as a perception in their brains. So what the observer perceives
as the CV is not necessarily the same as what the controller perceives as
the CV. For example, in my "Test for the Controlled Variable") demo at
http://www.mindreadings.com/ControlDemo/ThreeTrack.html the observer (the
computer in this case) might conclude that the controlled variable is the
x,y position of the small square. In fact, what the controller might be
controlling is the distance of x from the left side of the screen and the
distance of y from the top of the screen. So the actual controlled variable
is l-x,t-r where l and t are constants, rather than x,y.

I think it's best for researchers to always keep in mind that the CV is a
perception -- a function of environmental variables -- controlled by the
controller. It really takes no special effort to do this when the basis of
one's research is modeling. When you build a model of a controller you have
to explicitly have the model compute the controlled variable as a function
of environmental variables. I think questions about whether the CV is
"really" in the environment or not come up only when you deal with control
theory as a philosophy rather than as a model of purposeful behavior.

Best regards

Rick

···

---
Richard S. Marken
MindReadings.com
Home: 310 474 0313
Cell: 310 729 1400

[bnhpct]

[From Bruce Nevin (2004.07.14 15:45 EDT)]

Bruce Gregory (2004.0630.1433)

Bruce Nevin
(2004.06.30 11:39 EDT)

A while back there was no quibble about the existence of social norms and
conventions, and Martin suggested that they could arise by control
systems reorganizing to reduce error in their interactions with one
another. This may be sufficient, TBD. However, it is easy to demonstrate
that people in addition do perceive and control differences in social
norms and conventions. All I am arguing is that this perception and
control of social norms and conventions is involved in the process of
learning them and maintaining them. I do not attribute agency to anything
other than the individuals that are involved. So I’m puzzled why what was
well understood and agreed is now controversial.

Needless to say, I cannot speak for others. I can say that I think I
understand Martin’s proposal and that I have a great deal of trouble
understanding yours. Doubtless one of my many limitations, but I can’t
even imagine how one would go about modeling what you describe. Until
that happens, I won’t pretend to understand the implications of your
claims for quantized states of social actions.

“Quantized states of social actions” I guess are social actions
that are subdivided into small, measurable increments, and I suppose that
you mean by this that they are perceived in digital/categorial terms
rather than as continua. Certainly, this is true of language. By
controlling phonemic contrasts language users partition the continua of
speech into discrete words drawn from a finite vocabulary, and all the
constructs made with words are discrete. While attempts to identify
“phonemes of culture” have always failed, use of language can
have the effect of projecting its discrete character onto the continua of
perception to which we refer.

If, however, you mean the representation of a “social action”
by a quantity understood (in the model) to be a perceptual signal (a rate
of firing), Martin’s proposal and mine alike accept this
assumption.

The difference between Martin’s proposal and mine is two modes of
learning: one is by random reorganization, and the other is by
observation of consistencies in the behavior of others and purposeful
adoption of them. Are you questioning whether learning by emulation
really occurs, or are you simply saying you can’t imagine how to
model it? Your habit of irony makes it hard sometimes to understand just
what you mean.

Bill Williams 11 July 2004 3:00 AM CST–

Two proposals have been made as to how the
members of a speech community

might come to know the conventional structures of their language. One
is

Martin’s proposal involving only reorganization. The other is my
proposal

that people actually perceive what others are doing and what they

themselves are doing and control the relationships between those sets
of

perceptions (self and others).

Is there a possiblity that your and Martin’s descriptions of what
is

going on could both be correct?

Yes, and I think it is likely.

Bruce Gregory (2004.0708.1411)–

Bruce Nevin
(2004.07.08 12:40 EDT

Of course, the builder of a simulation cannot leave physics to the

physicists. The simulation has to include a simulation of the

environment. This means that in the simulation, the environmental

variables are really really present and are really really the
same.

What does that mean?

It means that the simulation asserts something about reality.

Suppose I model an atom as a simple
harmonic

oscillator. Are you saying that as far as simulation is concerned
the

atom is really really a simple harmonic oscillator?

No. Within the model of an atom as a simple harmonic oscillator only the
parts and energy flows of a simple harmonic oscillator are present.

Within a simulation of a control system the parts and signals of the
control system are present, and the variables and values of the simulated
environment are also present. A robot closing its perceptual control
loops through the real environment would be a different matter.

I do not know if your model of an atom as a simple harmonic oscillator
includes a simulation of the atom’s environment. But I do know that such
a model does not model anything that we can know directly. Neither the
innards of an atom nor the atom’s environment are directly accessible to
us. A PCT simulation does model what we can know directly, namely,
perceptions and the control of them. If we model two control systems
controlling the same EV, one conducting the Test to determine what the
other is controlling, the EV is really part of the same simulation as the
perceptions inside the two controllers are. Thus, when the Tester has
succeeded in identifying the CV that the other controller is controlling
and is able to track the value at which it is controlling that CV, the
simulation asserts an equivalence

    CV(observer)

== EV == CV(controller)

When a living Tester has succeeded in identifying the CV that the other
controller is controlling and is able to track the value at which it is
controlling that CV, no such equivalence is demonstrable, because (unlike
in the simulation) we do not have direct access to EV. However, we do
assume that equivalence, that is, we assume that we know the CV of the
observed controller by way of our control loops each being closed through
the same EV (one in control mode, the other in observation mode, or in
control mode with very weak output as a disturbance).

O.K. But that tells

us nothing about whether in the real world the atom is really really
a

SHO.

That’s true. Nor does your model of an atom assert that it is. However,
the PCT simulation does assert the presence in the environment of the
specified environment variable with the specified values. Imagine a PCT
simulation of two control systems in an environment. One is the Tester
and the other is the observed control system, and the Tester succeeds in
identifying the CV. Both simulated control systems are controlling the
same EV in their shared simulated environment. We know this is the case
in the simulation because we have direct access to the EV in the
simulation, it is a program variable just as the CV, references, error
outputs, and so on are all program variables. We cannot know that this is
the case in the environment of two control systems of whose behavior the
simulation is a model because we do not have direct access to the EV in
the environment.

[From Bruce Gregory (2004.0709.0606)]

Bruce Nevin (2004.07.08 17:14 EDT

Is there any serious doubt that the words that you perceive here
are

the words that I typed?

Eats shoots and leaves.

And the horse raced past the barn fell down. Yes, there are ambiguous
sentences that can be decomposed as two or more distinct information
structures. But this is beside the point.

Bill Powers (2004.07.09 MDT)–

I think the lesson of all this is that we
supply meanings to words; words

don’t come into the brain with meanings attached to them.

The forms of language are informational. To this linguistic information
the hearer’s memory and imagination adds other meanings. The former is
determined by institutionalized convention. The latter may include memory
and imagination of social phenomena intermixed with entirely
idiosyncratic experiences of the individual.

Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0632 MDT)–

“Error-free transmission of
language” is an unverifiable wish, a myth, an ideal, for the
verification itself can’t be carried out except by assuming error-free
transmission in the first place.

It is certainly possible to ignore what someone says, and to substitute
different words into it. As with control of any perceptions, disturbances
may come from inside the control system as well as from the
environment.

Bruce Gregory (2004.0710.1015) –

I am not sure why Bruce Nevin is so taken with
this idea, but it clearly is something he is unwilling to part with.

Are you sure that “this idea” in your mind is the idea that I
am trying to communicate, and not instead a different idea that is more
familiar to you? If so, how? If not, why talk as if you are?

Bill Powers (2004.07.10.0803 MDT)–

The other point is that before the surgery, if
someone had asked me what

color my living-room walls were, I would have answered “White”,
not "Sort

of a grungy yellow." By every possible test, the meaning of the
word

“white” would have been correct for me and for anyone else
looking at the

same wall – yet we would not have been perceiving “the same
thing.” Even a

comparison of “white” with “slightly yellowish” would
have resulted in –

false – agreement, with the general yellowing of my vision relative to
the

other person’s going undetected.

Manifestly for all purposes involving coordination with others the
difference has been immaterial. The perception that you both are both
perceiving white walls (and correspondingly objects of other colors) is
sufficient to go on. The actual differences of perception of which you
are now surprisedly aware are of significance only if they disturb
coordinated control of “social” variables. So it is with all of
your concern about perceptions being the same, it is immaterial to the
issue.
/Bruce Nevin
“Irony–that curse, that evasion, that armor, that way of staying
safe while seeming wise.” (Wallace Stegner, All the Little Live
Things)

···

At 02:36 PM 6/30/2004 -0400, Bruce Gregory wrote:
At 02:11 PM 7/8/2004 -0400, Bruce Gregory wrote:
At 06:07 AM 7/9/2004 -0400, Bruce Gregory wrote:
At 12:50 PM 7/9/2004 -0600, Bill Powers wrote:

[BJORN_SIMONSEN]

[From Bjorn Simonsen (2004.07.14,22:15 EuST)]

[From Bill Powers
(2004.07.14.0735 MDT)]

Thank you. I have a great
experience when I read your texts at their best. This was excellent.

You touched on a theme I have
wished to take up many times. I did it two months ago but the only response was
a funny and ironic comment from Bill W.

Let me start with an example. I
stand by a crosswalk, waiting to cross. I look at my left and I look at my
right. Looking to the right, looking to the left is already “history”/past. More extreme; watching a car coming from my
right, then the perceptual signals representing the car 1/10 second ago is “history”/past
1/10 second later.

When someone says: “It is
raining today”, the sounds expressing “raining” is “history”/past when I hear “today”.

Absolutely most of our brain
signals represent remembering or imaging. The only effect sensing signals have
is to compare with past signals or signals representing imagination.

Present doesn’t exist, it is
past before one can tell about it.

If I understand you correct;

          >That is because unless you're born a theoretician,

there is no “natural” understanding that these are

all
neural signals in your brain, constructed by a hierarchy of perceptual input
functions.

There is no “natural”
understanding of our EV, the “natural” variables just tell us something about
our memory (imagination).

Talking about present is an
illusion. It may be practical, but we fool ourselves. So many people say, “Any
fool can see that”. And they believe it;
they think they can see the world.

What do you say?

bjorn