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Date:         Mon, 7 Sep 1992 22:51:12 -0600
From:         "William T. Powers" <POWERS_W%FLC@VAXF.COLORADO.EDU>
Subject:      Influence; Ed's advice; e. coli apology

[From Bill Powers (920907.2030)]

Greg Williams (920907-2)

We seem to have a technical disagreement.

Here is a diagram of you controlling your perception of my action
while I control my perception of the environmental variable you are
disturbing:

                               v* my ref for my perc of env variable
                               |
                v= my perc -->(C)-->
               of env var |         |
                         (I)       (O)
                          |         |
Independent dist--> env var <-----  my action
                          |         |
         your action =    d         |   my action approx = -d
         disturbance of   |         |
         env variable    (O)       (I)
                          |         |
                           <--(C)<-- a= your perc of my action
                               |
                               a* your ref for percep of my action

This is a non-conflict situation. The two control systems can act
independently. You can make your perception _a_ equal your reference
signal a* quite independently of my making my perception v equal my
perception v*. I added the independent disturbance later -- we can
still both control our perceptions independently even with an
independent disturbance acting on the environmental variable.

However, I  MAY NOT have a second control system that prefers any
particular value of my action. My action must depend, in amount and
direction, strictly on the error, v* - v. If some other system in me
wants a particular value of the same action, then I will be in
internal conflict.

>>You can have a reference level a* for a.

>I can? By PCT, I can ONLY control for MY PERCEPTIONS. (I could say
HOW MANY >TIMES DO I HAVE TO SHOUT THIS?, but I won't.) Now, I could
have a >reference level corresponding to my perception that you are
performing >action a* -- and my perception could be flatly wrong, for
some reason >or another; or I might have a reference signal for some
other >perception which is (possibly complexly) RELATED to your action
which I >am manipulating.

You're talking about perceiving THAT I'm performing an action _a*_,
which is very different from what the above diagram shows. The above
diagram applies only when you're perceiving an action that I am using
to control a perception, and when you're using a disturbing variable
to affect the variable I'm controlling. You can't have any systematic
effect on your own perception if you've guessed wrong about either the
variable I'm controlling or the action I'm using to control it. You
don't have to be EXACTLY right, but you have to be reasonable close.
If you're far off, then your action will have only a statistical
effect on my action as you perceive it, or something related; then
you'll have classical S-R theory in its full glory, statistics and
all.

And of course you can't pick a reference level for the amount and
direction of my action until you're perceiving the correct action.

You can have reliable control over my action only when your perception
of it covaries closely with the state of my output effects, and when
your action directly disturbs my perception. Also, this reliable
control depends entirely on my success in keeping the environmental
variable, or my perception of it, in a close match to v*. If I lose
control, you do too.

>>I can't have any preference for a particular state of my action if
you >>are to be able to control it without conflict with me.

>No. You can prefer to do it; you cannot prefer to not do it (if I am
>able to control your action without conflict).

The amount and direction of my action must be totally determined by my
error signal. I can't also prefer that it be in any particular state.
So I cannot prefer to produce a large amount of the effort, or no
effort, or an effort in the opposite direction. Since that is the
range of your choices for my action (if you're perceiving the right
one), I can neither hinder nor help you. That's what I mean by saying
that you can control my action only if I have no goal for it: only if
its state has no importance to me.

If you try to preserve your argument by going up a level, the same
problem will arise. If my action consists of selecting from a range of
(lower-level) actions, then your perception will be which action in
that range I am using. A disturbance of my controlled variable would
then require shifting from one KIND of action to another. Now the
control system must be free to select any action within the range of
kinds, depending on the disturbance. There cannot simultaneously be
another system that prefers for a given action to be used, or not to
be used -- if inner conflict is to be avoided. Again, you cannot
control for my using a particular kind of action unless I have no
preference at all, for or against any of the actions. That's because
_I_ can't control if I have such a preference. Your success at
controlling my action (now with regard to kind) depends on my success
in varying the kind of action to control my controlled variable,
whatever it is. And my success depends on leaving the choice of kind
of action completely free.

If it's important to you that I somehow prefer the action that you
create by disturbing me, then you're going to have to reconsider
whatever deductions you have made from this assumption. Whatever
phenomena you're trying to explain in this way will have to be
explained in a different way.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
I'll come back to "importance" later. I don't think you have yet seen
the impact of this subject on the general argument.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
>P.S. Shouldn't you tell Hans B. about how E. coli actually controls,
>based on Koshland's work? He seems to think it is conjectural, not
>empirically based.

I thought I did -- didn't I send that post? When you eliminate
_objective_ importance, you're back to one control system interacting
with another one. When you talk about objective importances, you've
taken off your theoretician's hat and are just one control system
among many, trying to work things out.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Ed Ford (920907) --

Those were good, solid, well-directed answers to Rick's queries. I
think you have the proper alternative to manipulation -- to "making"
people do things, whether for their own good or not. You express the
basic idea that I'm trying to get across: that all impetus for change
has to come from within the person. And you show how to get in contact
with that inner desire to change.

Each person's continuing problem is how to set up an inner structure
of goals that will work in the physical and social environment that
exists. The actual setting up has to be done from inside. Even if you
know EXACTLY what the person needs to do to get along better (however
unlikely that is), you still have to get the idea across to the other,
who has to understand it and translate it into the private terms in
which all behavior is carried out -- and put it into effect. The limit
of your influence on the other person is reached when you present your
case.

When you write your next book, Ed, get that post into it somewhere.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
-
Hans Blom (920906) --

I got your program to compile and run with no trouble. I see that it's
not just a random-walk generator. The perceptual function is hidden in
the condition for choosing long or short steps, so that the steps get
longer as the distance from the circle increases. In effect, you've
given the bacterium the ability to sense distance (which could be done
in a fixed gradient by sensing concentration), and you've given it a
reference level for sensed distance -- the radius of the inner circle.
So I apologize for jumping to the conclusion that this isn't a control
system just from reading the code without running it.

From the way the model behaves, there seems to be some positive
feedback in it -- the bigger the error, the larger the steps. So when
the error gets above some amount, there's a runaway effect. I don't
see what's causing it.

Did you see my post in which I described Koshland's findings about how
e. coli is actually organized?
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Best to all,


Bill P.
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU