From: POWERS_W%FLC@VAXF.COLORADO.EDU (William T. Powers)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.csg-l
Subject: RE:Drivers, cognition, & PCT
Date: 18 Aug 92 17:01:59 GMT
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[Mary Powers 920818]
(Penni Sibun 920816)

>but I don't think your model is sufficient to account for human
>behavior (or the behavior of any creature you didn't build
>yourself).

>I argue, first, that to model [the car and driver story] as a
>single process of controlling for the perception of a single
>variable (or a bunch of them) would be hopelessly baroque and
>probably impossible; second, if you did extract from this a
>common thing we could agree was the essence of "keeping to the
>road", then you're going to have to tell me where you're going
>to put all the rest of the stuff that I've mentioned and can
>produce pretty good evidence for.

Can we first take care of cognitivism by saying that mental
processes that compute outputs will not get you down that twisty
New England road.

Control theory didn't start with building a little creature and
then jumping to behavior in general. It started with the question
of how humans and others can behave at all. The Little Man (or
Arm) simulates the presumed first three levels in a
physiologically plausible way (and that probably takes care of
the control organization of most of the creatures on this
planet).

One thing to remember about control systems is that they are
interactive in the sense that the loop is always closed through
the environment, which is as much a part of the system as
comparators or reference signals. But interactive implies that
the road is out there doing something to the driver, and it
isn't, it's just lying there.

Modelling your drive as a the action of a control system does
seem hopelessly baroque at first glance. All this stuff going on.
But this is where the hierarchical model comes in, to organize
all that confusion. Customs are programs and sequences (signal
for turns, drive on the right, stop at red lights) that satisfy
principles (rules of the road) which are the means for keeping
most drivers alive. Geography is a highly abstract systems
concept derived from perceptions of curves, hills, scenery (no
redwoods in New England), things you've read (New England is a
broken off hunk of Scotland), etc. Weather is another systems
concept - the perception of it's snowing now is part of it, and
so is the radio telling you a cold front from Canada is hitting
warm air from the South Atlantic on a line from Springfield to
Boston. Road construction - as I go I see that everything you
name is either a perception like a bumpy road or snow, or a very
high level abstraction like geography or weather. No wonder you
think that getting from one to the other is beyond the reach of
mere control systems. Take "keeping to the road". Ask yourself
how? By steering. How? By turning the wheel. How? By moving this
arm this way and that arm that way. How? By tensing your muscles.
Start again with keeping to the road. Why? To stay out of the
ditch? Why? (Aside from not wanting to get killed). Because
getting a tow truck etc will make you late for work. Why? You
have a lot to do today. Why? Getting it done brings money,
praise, and satisfaction. Why? You like to feel good about
yourself. Why?

The hows are probably pretty consistent from person to person;
they are the means by which you accomplish the whys, but the whys
will vary from individual to individual, and in the same person
from time to time. The point is not which particular path is
followed from muscle tension to self concept, but that the path
goes from level to level, as what you are controlling for becomes
more and more complex. The higher levels control by setting the
reference signals for control systems at the level below, and
they set the reference signals for syems at the the level below
that, and so on.

Bill suggests eleven levels: intensity, sensation, configuration,
transition, event, relationship, category, sequence, program,
principle, and system. His little creature incorporates the first
three, and the model checks out that far. Several therapists
using this approach focus on the last three, and find that it
very well accounts for human behavior, misbehavior, and
conflicted behavior - the eight (presumed) levels below are the
means by which their clients have screwed up their lives - the
hows.

I get the feeling that you don't like the idea that people are
merely or only control systems. The point is, that is the way
they appear to be organized, and it seems to be an organization
that is capable of generating all the complexity and richness of
human life. Not in one big jump of one great tangle of a control
system, but level by level, each feeding into a system that
controls a slightly more complex set of variables than the ones
below.
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[NOTE FROM BILL]

This is one of those "if everybody did it .. ] cautions. The repro command
sends your file back to you. But if everybody did that, the network
capacity would be halved.
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