Newsgroups: bit.listserv.csg-l
Date:         Sat, 3 Oct 1992 11:51:00 GMT
From:         Hortideas Publishing <0004972767@MCIMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Sundry subjects

From Greg Williams (921003)

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Gary Cziko: I received log9209c yesterday (from "CSGnet God," no less!) BUT
NOTHING ELSE.

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>Dag Forssell (921001-1)

>In the meantime,
>can you make any suggestions on the arm demo and crowd using my format?

Just that to the extent you can somehow have the audience INTERACT with them,
rather than simply observe them, I think you will see more "aha" actions.

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>Clark McPhail  (921001)

>My
>impression for years was that hypnosis works because the subject focuses
>upon and tells him/herself to do exclusively what he/she is instructed to
>do by the hypnotist.  Then I discovered with work of Theodore X. Barber, a
>psychologist who is now retired but who examined the phenomenon of hypnosis
>across a forty year span of time.  Simply stated, Barber rejects the
>"trance state" theory of hypnosis and has generated a considerable body of
>empirical evidence supporting his critique.  Further, Barber has advanced
>an alternative interpretation which turns the commonsense view of hypnosis
>on its head.  Instead of the subject-as-passive receptacle of the
>hypnotist's suggestions, Barber construes subjects as exercising variable
>degrees of imagination;  that is, they are variably capable of imagining
>the outcome the hypnotist "suggests" and then carrying out the actions
>require to fulfill what they have imagined.

A reference I recently found which (citing Barber extensively, but many other
investigators also) gets into the "active subject" business -- which makes
just as good PCT-sense in hypnosis as in any other kind of situation where one
person is controlling for seeing certain kinds of actions by another person --
is Graham F. Wagstaff, HYPNOSIS, COMPLIANCE AND BELIEF, St. Martin's Press,
New York, 1981. Its chapters include "Hypnosis Past and Present," "Sham
Behaviour and Compliance," "Compliance and Hypnosis," "How Do I Know I'm
'Hypnotised'?" "Some Hypnotic 'Feats'," "Further Characteristics of Hypnotic
Performance," "Differences in Hypnotic Suggestibility," "Hypnosis and Pain,"
"Hypnotherapy," and "The Nature of Hypnosis."

I was once (maybe) hypnotized by shrink/neurophysiologist Jerry Lettvin (at
MIT; best known for the "What the Fly's Eye Tells the Frog's Brain" paper,
which he co-wrote with Warren McCulloch and Humberto Maturana, among others).
Whatever was going on, to me it seemed most akin to deliberate (on my part)
play-acting. I was trying to play the role which Jerry, as "director" wanted
me to play, because, as I recall, I wanted to humor Jerry and thought it
harmless. I never felt as if I weren't "in control."

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>Gary Cziko 921002.0200 GMT]

>Relevant to the recent discussion of purposeful influence and
>reorganization is an excerpt (sans emphases and footnotes) from a chapter
>of my book in preparation.
>...
>I currently feel that it is indeed possible for people (e.g., teachers) to
>influence long-lasting changes in others' (e.g., students') control
>systems.

Ditto. For me, the question isn't whether it is possible at all, but to what
extent, under which conditions.

>We can also easily imagine that the learner in this example would be very
>highly motivated since failure to learn could result in death.  From a
>perceptual-control-theory perspective, motivation simply refers to error
>(that is, a difference between a perception and the reference level for
>that perception) which results in action to eliminate the error (see Figure
>7.1).  From this perspective, motivation is considered to be internal to
>the student since the reference level of the controlled variable is
>determined by the student, not by the environment.

If "motivation" = difference between perception and reference level, then
motivation is NOT SOLELY determined by the student, but jointly by the student
and her environment (since perception is affected by environmental
disturbances independent of the student). Nevertheless, since the comparator
is internal, the error SIGNAL is "internal to the student."

>Models and
>instruction can provide useful information in the form of constraints of
>what not to try, but they cannot provide explicit instructions concerning
>exactly what to do.

Well said. Models and instruction can only influence (or "guide"), not
determine, what the student does.

>In addition to allowing more time for the learning to take place and
>providing constraints in the form of models and verbal instruction, the
>teacher can also provide easier access to the knowledge or skill by
>providing a series of less demanding intermediate goals.  One way is to
>break down the skill into a number of subskills and provide opportunities
>for the subskills be acquired.

Yes, and this could make the "guiding" quite efficient, I claim (contra Bill).

>By breaking down a complex problem into easier subproblems learning is
>facilitated since the probability of finding a solution to each subproblem
>is higher than that of finding a solution to the more complex
>problem--success in learning to make effective arm alone in swimming is
>more likely than success in learning to make both arm and leg movements
>together.

Here I think you need to talk about why the probability of finding a solution
to a subproblem is (usually) easier than finding a solution to the whole
problem in one swell foop. My hypothesis is that the trajectory from control
system state A (initially, before learning) to state B (after subproblem is
solved) is "shorter" in some abstract space sense than the trajectory from
state A to state Z (after the whole problem is solved). This could stand
considerable fleshing-out.

>In other words, the teacher
>arranges the environment so that the student is continually encountering
>error, but error that is not too large so that the student's reorganizing
>efforts are likely to be successful and set the stage for the next
>introduction of error.

Sounds reasonable to me (for whatever that's worth!).

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>Bill Powers (921002.0600)

>Greg Williams (920928) --

>I agree with

>>1. A disturbs particular perceptions being controlled by B so that
>>B compensates for the disturbances with actions which A wants to
>>perceive.

>>2. A arranges B's environment so that when B controls for
>>particular perceptions, A perceives what he/she wants to perceive.

Well, that says a LOT. Should keep some sociologists busy for a while!

>but I have a problem with

>>3. A arranges B's environment so as to trigger learning
>>/reorganization in B's control system resulting in actions which A
>>wants to perceive.

>>4. A applies physical constraints or threatens to apply physical
>>constraints to B so that B's actions are as A wants to perceive.

I would have predicted your having a problem with 3, on which we have
previously agreed to disagree, but not with 4, which (perhaps in confusing
form which threw you off?) is just "controlling another by use of overwhelming
physical force or threat thereof."

>According to my model of what triggers reorganization, these would
>both mean arranging the environment so that B suffers critical error
>(you notice my return to Ashby's term) such as hunger, thirst, pain,
>illness, suffocation, "stimulus deprivation," or whatever you want to
>put on the list.

Note that I have included BOTH "learning" AND "reorganization" in 3. Do you
think we DON'T need to postulate something "less" than reorganization in cases
which Gary has raised, such as learning how to multiply (where it appears that
(1) the learner's control system is altered and (2) there is no critical error
triggering the learning)?

>By definition, reorganization is unsystematic.

Its TRAJECTORY is unpredictable, but its successful endpoint isn't necessarily
unpredictable -- though it might be unpredictable sometimes in practice,
depending on the particulars of the situation. Of course, it might require
infinite time to get to the predicted endpoint.

>This means that you can't
>predict what behavior will be used to correct the error unless you have
>removed all means of correcting it but one, which is within B's capacity to
>learn.

That's basically what I (and Gary, I think) have been contending. To predict
the endpoint requires providing certain constraints so that the problem can
only be solved in a finite number of ways.

>That's easy to do with a lower animal or a child, but hard to do with
>an adult human being.

Not necessarily in any case. Verbal interactions with typical adults could
make "guiding" their learning much easier than guiding the learning of a non-
human organism or a pre-verbal child. But I am sympathetic to the implication
that adults typically have more POSSIBLE trajectories for a learning process.

>You do note that these methods involve conflict, but you
>don't mention that the outcome is largely unpredictable because
>reorganization is involved.

"Largely" is, of course, in the eye of the beholder. I look around and see
people becoming capable of solving many kinds of problems set for them by
others -- with (sets of) actions "largely" predictable by the problem-setters.
(I say "sets of" because, often, the problem-setter doesn't care which EXACT
actions are used to solve a problem; as long as the PARTICULAR actions are
part of the set of all-actions-which-solve-the-problem, that's fine with the
problem-setter -- that's what the problem-setter is controlling for seeing. In
fact, the problem-setter might not know ANY solution to the problem in
advance, or how to solve it himself/herself.)

>In the second section, I don't understand...

I'll address these questions in a later post, when I have more time.

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>Tom Bourbon [921002 -- 10:50 CDT]

>It is not that the model "does good" and fits only
>if people "do good."  Rather, the model does as well or poorly ad
>the person.

A perfect tracking model would exactly replicate what the person does, in
terms of cursor movement. I just meant to say that I believe the high (not
exact) correlation between simple PCT tracking models and what people do is
attributable largely to the fact that, for much of the time in a given run,
control is "good." If a run were made which consisted mainly of sudden "jerky"
disturbances, then, for a high-correlation model would (I hypothesize) require
complications similar to those in the VERY complex tracking models developed by
human factors engineers.

>Now we see some model-person correlations below .99, but they still
>exceed by orders of magnitude the modal and median correlations in
>the behavioral literature.

I encourge you not to give up the PCT goal of 0.99+ correlations. Otherwise, I
believe, you will not be able to decide WHICH PCT model is the correct one.
Fairly low (but higher than typically found in the behavioral sciences)
correlations are convincing (at least to me) that PCT models are correct,
generically, for tracking. But I next want to know WHICH PCT models are better
than others, and this requires comparing various PCT models' correlations with
what people do UNDER CONDITIONS AFFORDING ENOUGH SENSITIVITY TO SHOW
SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCES IN CORRELATIONS. Such conditions, I claim, are "poor"
control conditions.

>I like your emphases that indicate the relativity of "good and bad"
>control and of "high and low" performance.  Your reasoned treatment
>is better informed than that of people who merely assert their beliefs
>and prejudices on these matters.  PCT models control.  When control
>is present, PCT predicts with precision -- even if the control is
>mediocre.  It predicts with great precision if the control is precise.

Yes. Now it's time to begin choosing AMONG models which are based on PCT.

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>Bruce Nevin (Fri 921002 13:14:03)

>If you are interested in giving a talk send email to mdlm@ai.mit.edu.
>The Revolving Seminar has a small budget for reimbursing the travel
>expenses of senior researchers.  If you are interested in a particular
>speaker, please let us know.  We are particularly interested in
>inviting people who espouse views that are not widely represented
>within the lab.

I move and second that we propose Bill Powers as a speaker for MIT's Revolving
Seminar. Maybe we could send a video camera along -- I'd love to see Bill and
R. Brooks interacting (or NOT interacting, as the case might be) face-to-
face!!!

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Off to Cam-nirvana (Cam's my 13-year-old son): the annual Lexington stamp
show. Anybody out there got a Mint Never Hinged Sweden #1710 (spider)?

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Best wishes,

Greg
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