Query: It fails to explain how we can have short-term positive feedback and long-term negative feedback.

Relevant passages:
Operant conditioning <=SEP=> Operant conditioning ( also called `` instrumental conditioning '' ) is a type of learning in which the strength of a behavior is modified by the behavior 's consequences , such as reward or punishment .   Although operant and classical conditioning both involve behaviors controlled by environmental stimuli , they differ in nature . In operant conditioning , stimuli present when a behavior is rewarded or punished come to control that behavior . For example , a child may learn to open a box to get the candy inside , or learn to avoid touching a hot stove ; the box and the stove are discriminative stimuli . However , in classical conditioning , stimuli that signal significant events produce reflexive behavior . For example , the sound of a door slam comes to signal an angry parent , causing a child to tremble .   The study of animal learning in the 20th century was dominated by the analysis of these two sorts of learning , and they are still at the core of behavior analysis .

Tipping points in the climate system <=SEP=> A tipping point in the climate system is a threshold that, when exceeded, can lead to large changes in the state of the system. Potential tipping points have been identified in the physical climate system, in impacted ecosystems, and sometimes in both. For instance, feedback from the global carbon cycle is a driver for the transition between glacial and interglacial periods, with orbital forcing providing the initial trigger. Earth's geologic temperature record includes many more examples of geologically rapid transitions between different climate states.Climate tipping points are of particular interest in reference to concerns about global warming in the modern era. Possible tipping point behaviour has been identified for the global mean surface temperature by studying self-reinforcing feedbacks and the past behavior of Earth's climate system. Self-reinforcing feedbacks in the carbon cycle and planetary reflectivity could trigger a cascading set of tipping points that lead the world into a hothouse climate state.Large-scale components of the Earth system that may pass a tipping point have been referred to as tipping elements. Tipping elements are found in the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, possibly causing tens of meters of sea level rise. These tipping points are not always abrupt. For example, at some level of temperature rise the melt of a large part of the Greenland ice sheet and/or West Antarctic Ice Sheet will become inevitable; but the ice sheet itself may persist for many centuries. Some tipping elements, like the collapse of ecosystems, are irreversible.

Perceptual control theory <=SEP=> Perceptual control theory ( PCT ) is a model of behavior based on the principles of negative feedback , but differing in important respects from engineering control theory . Results of PCT experiments have demonstrated that an organism controls neither its own behavior , nor external environmental variables , but rather its own perceptions of those variables . Actions are not controlled , they are varied so as to cancel the effects that unpredictable environmental disturbances would otherwise have on controlled perceptions . According to the standard catch-phrase of the field , `` behavior is the control of perception . '' PCT demonstrates circular causation in a negative feedback loop closed through the environment . This fundamentally contradicts the classical notion of linear causation of behavior by stimuli , in which environmental stimuli are thought to cause behavioral responses , mediated ( according to cognitive psychology ) by intervening cognitive processes .   Numerous computer simulations of specific behavioral situations demonstrate its efficacy , with extremely high correlations to observational data ( 0.95 or better ) , which are vanishingly rare in the so-called ` soft ' sciences . While the adoption of PCT in the scientific community has not been widespread , it has been applied not only in experimental psychology and neuroscience , but also in sociology , linguistics , and a number of other fields , and has led to a method of psychotherapy called the method of levels .

Ice age <=SEP=> An ice age is a period of long-term reduction in the temperature of Earth 's surface and atmosphere , resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers . Within a long-term ice age , individual pulses of cold climate are termed `` glacial periods '' ( or alternatively `` glacials '' or `` glaciations '' or colloquially as `` ice age '' ) , and intermittent warm periods are called `` interglacials '' . In the terminology of glaciology , ice age implies the presence of extensive ice sheets in both northern and southern hemispheres . By this definition , we are in an interglacial period -- the Holocene -- of the ice age . The ice age began 2.6 million years ago at the start of the Pleistocene epoch , because the Greenland , Arctic , and Antarctic ice sheets still exist .

Complex system <=SEP=> A complex system is a system composed of many components which may interact with each other . In many cases it is useful to represent such a system as a network where the nodes represent the components and the links their interactions . Examples of complex systems are Earth 's global climate , organisms , the human brain , social and economic organizations ( like cities ) , an ecosystem , a living cell , and ultimately the entire universe .