Test, Coercion

CSGnet Archive CSG1998
1

[From Bruce Gregory (980801.1950 EDT)]

Rick Marken (980801.1650)

Bruce Gregory (980801.1716 EDT) to Bill Powers:

> How does PCT explain choice then? Why do people agonize
> over decisions if the outcomes seem likely to prove equally
> desirable?

Conflict. I think you really should know this by now. We've
already discussed it several times, haven't we?

Choice is conflict? Sorry to be so dense, but I don't understand. I do
understand conflict but run choice by me one more time.

Me:

> could you please explain what was wrong with the coercion
> discussion and how consideration of higher levels might have
> made this discussion go better?

Bruce Gregory (980801.1825 EDT)

> A bather is thrashing about at the deep end of the pool. A
> life guard leaps into the water and, ignoring the bather's
> attempt to exercise control, drags her to the side of the
> pool. This presumably is no more or no less coercive that
> a life guard who drags a bather from the shallow end to the
> deep end where the bather commences thrashing. Both lifeguards
> are coercive. One gets profuse thanks from the bather for
> ignoring her efforts to control. The other is arrested and
> placed under observation.

At the risk of revealing a lack of religious depth on my part,
I don't see how this parable relates to my question. Could you
try again, this time in regular old scientific language?

Try harder, Rick. It's not that hard to get. Both life guards are coercive
by PCT standards, aren't they? Yet somehow there is a difference, isn't
there? I knew you could get it!

Bruce Gregory

2

[From Rick Marken (980801.1650)]

Bruce Gregory (980801.1716 EDT) to Bill Powers:

How does PCT explain choice then? Why do people agonize
over decisions if the outcomes seem likely to prove equally
desirable?

Conflict. I think you really should know this by now. We've
already discussed it several times, haven't we?

Me:

could you please explain what was wrong with the coercion
discussion and how consideration of higher levels might have
made this discussion go better?

Bruce Gregory (980801.1825 EDT)

A bather is thrashing about at the deep end of the pool. A
life guard leaps into the water and, ignoring the bather's
attempt to exercise control, drags her to the side of the
pool. This presumably is no more or no less coercive that
a life guard who drags a bather from the shallow end to the
deep end where the bather commences thrashing. Both lifeguards
are coercive. One gets profuse thanks from the bather for
ignoring her efforts to control. The other is arrested and
placed under observation.

At the risk of revealing a lack of religious depth on my part,
I don't see how this parable relates to my question. Could you
try again, this time in regular old scientific language?

Thanks

Rick

···

--

Richard S. Marken Phone or Fax: 310 474-0313
Life Learning Associates e-mail: rmarken@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~rmarken/

3

[From Rick Marken (980801.1840)]

Bruce Gregory (980801.1716 EDT) --

How does PCT explain choice then? Why do people agonize
over decisions if the outcomes seem likely to prove equally
desirable?

Me:

Conflict.

Bruce Gregory (980801.1950 EDT)-

Choice is conflict? Sorry to be so dense, but I don't understand.
I do understand conflict but run choice by me one more time.

You answered it in your question; we feel like we are making a
choice when "the outcomes seem likely to prove equally
desireable". Ordinarily, we just produce the outcomes
(perception) we want; we are in control. But when we have
goals for equally desireable perceptual outcomes, all of which
cannot be achieved simultaneously, we are in conflict; we have
the experimence of having to _chooe_. For example, you want
both the ice cream and the cake; but an environmental constraint
(your mom) will not allow you to have both. Conflict (choice) time.

Bruce Gregory (980801.1825 EDT)

A bather is thrashing about at the deep end of the pool. A
life guard leaps into the water and, ignoring the bather's
attempt to exercise control, drags her to the side of the
pool. This presumably is no more or no less coercive that
a life guard who drags a bather from the shallow end to the
deep end where the bather commences thrashing. Both lifeguards
are coercive. One gets profuse thanks from the bather for
ignoring her efforts to control. The other is arrested and
placed under observation.

Me:

At the risk of revealing a lack of religious depth on my part,
I don't see how this parable relates to my question. Could you
try again, this time in regular old scientific language?

Bruce:

Try harder, Rick. It's not that hard to get. Both life guards
are coercive by PCT standards, aren't they?

Yes. As you've described it I would say that both are being
coercive.

Yet somehow there is a difference, isn't there?

Yes. You describe two differences. One difference is that one
of the bathers is rescued; the other is murdered. The other
difference is that one lifeguard is thanked and the other is
arrested. Is your point that some instances of coercion will
be judged as being good while others will be judged as being
bad? If so, we already discussed this; we noted that there
are clearly cases where coercion (like dragging a child out
of the path of a moving vehicle) would be seen as good and
others (like rape) where it would be seen as bad. Do you think
this is a new revelation?

I knew you could get it!

Thanks. But I really don't understand what this has to do with
my question, which was:

could you please explain what was wrong with the coercion
discussion and how consideration of higher levels might have
made this discussion go better?

What does your lifeguard example tell me about what was wrong
with the earlier coercion discussion? What does it tell me
about how consideration of higher levels might have made this
discussion go better?

Best

Rick

···

---
Richard S. Marken Phone or Fax: 310 474-0313
Life Learning Associates e-mail: rmarken@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~rmarken/

4

[From Bruce Gregory (980802.1117 EDT)]

Rick Marken (980801.1840)

You answered it in your question; we feel like we are making a
choice when "the outcomes seem likely to prove equally
desireable". Ordinarily, we just produce the outcomes
(perception) we want; we are in control. But when we have
goals for equally desireable perceptual outcomes, all of which
cannot be achieved simultaneously, we are in conflict; we have
the experimence of having to _choose_. For example, you want
both the ice cream and the cake; but an environmental constraint
(your mom) will not allow you to have both. Conflict (choice) time.

As far as PCT is concerned choice is only possible when outcomes are equally
desireable, eh? How does the hierarchy determine that the outcomes are
equally desireable?

Yes. You describe two differences. One difference is that one
of the bathers is rescued; the other is murdered. The other
difference is that one lifeguard is thanked and the other is
arrested. Is your point that some instances of coercion will
be judged as being good while others will be judged as being
bad? If so, we already discussed this; we noted that there
are clearly cases where coercion (like dragging a child out
of the path of a moving vehicle) would be seen as good and
others (like rape) where it would be seen as bad. Do you think
this is a new revelation?

To those who know everything, there are no new revelations.

What does your lifeguard example tell me about what was wrong
with the earlier coercion discussion? What does it tell me
about how consideration of higher levels might have made this
discussion go better?

I don't know what I could have been thinking. Nothing could have improved on
the earlier coercion discussion. Forgive my impudence.

Bruce Gregory

5

[From Rick Marken (980802.0940)]

Bruce Gregory (980802.1117 EDT) --

As far as PCT is concerned choice is only possible when
outcomes are equally desireable, eh? How does the hierarchy
determine that the outcomes are equally desireable?

I don't know what I could have been thinking. Nothing could
have improved on the earlier coercion discussion. Forgive
my impudence.

This PCT thing hasn't really worked out that well for you,
has it, Bruce?

Best

Rick

···

--
Richard S. Marken Phone or Fax: 310 474-0313
Life Learning Associates e-mail: rmarken@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~rmarken/

6

[From Bill Powers (980802.1400 MDT)]

Bruce Gregory (980802.1117 EDT)--

As far as PCT is concerned choice is only possible when outcomes are equally
desireable, eh? How does the hierarchy determine that the outcomes are
equally desireable?

Choice and decision are not fundamental terms in PCT. The course of action
we take, most of the time, is serving multiple goals simultaneously, as
well as counteracting the effects of multiple disturbances. Most of the
time this is accomplished without conflict, so there are no choices or
decisions to make. I steer the boat across the stream angled against the
current as required and at a speed that will get me to the other side in
time for my passenger to meet the train. I don't have to decide how fast to
row or at what angle to steer; I adjust these variables to maintain my
perceptions in the states I desire. I don't have to decide how to feather
the oars, or how hard to pull on them, or how much to lean forward and
back, or how fast to breathe. All these variables are maintained in the
states that will keep the whole system, at all levels, in equilibrium, with
minimum overall error.

This is a totally different picture of behavior from the old one that
presents everything as a choice between alternatives. We should see
behavior as a choice between alternatives only when we can show that there
is actually a conflict between alternatives, so some higher-level process
has to be used to resolve the conflict -- a process that we call, loosely
and uninformatively, "deciding."

Best,

Bill P.

···

Yes. You describe two differences. One difference is that one
of the bathers is rescued; the other is murdered. The other
difference is that one lifeguard is thanked and the other is
arrested. Is your point that some instances of coercion will
be judged as being good while others will be judged as being
bad? If so, we already discussed this; we noted that there
are clearly cases where coercion (like dragging a child out
of the path of a moving vehicle) would be seen as good and
others (like rape) where it would be seen as bad. Do you think
this is a new revelation?

To those who know everything, there are no new revelations.

What does your lifeguard example tell me about what was wrong
with the earlier coercion discussion? What does it tell me
about how consideration of higher levels might have made this
discussion go better?

I don't know what I could have been thinking. Nothing could have improved on
the earlier coercion discussion. Forgive my impudence.

Bruce Gregory

7

[From Bruce Gregory (980802.1802 EDT)]

Rick Marken (980802.0940)

This PCT thing hasn't really worked out that well for you,
has it, Bruce?

Not PCT, Rick. You. I find you to be an arrogant brown nosing ass hole.

Bruce Gregory

8

[From Bruce Gregory (980802.1904 EDT)]

Rick Marken (980802.1600)]

Brown nosing?!?

Brown nosing.

Bruce Gregory

9

[From Rick Marken (980802.1600)]

Me:

This PCT thing hasn't really worked out that well for you,
has it, Bruce?

Bruce Gregory (980802.1802 EDT)

Not PCT, Rick. You. I find you to be an arrogant brown nosing
ass hole.

Brown nosing?!?

Best

Rick

···

--

Richard S. Marken Phone or Fax: 310 474-0313
Life Learning Associates e-mail: rmarken@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~rmarken/