Comments below
Nicholas S. Thompson
Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Ethology,
Clark University ([email protected])
http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/
> [Original Message]
> From: John Kennison <[email protected]>
> To: [email protected] <[email protected]>
> Cc: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]>;
> [email protected] <[email protected]>; [email protected]
> <[email protected]>
> Date: 6/20/2009 6:05:58 AM
> Subject: Theories of behavior
>
>
> Russ,
>
> I agree that the question of what it means to say a person "acts as of deeply
> hurt" is not easy to answer. For example, some people would become
> non-communicative while others would communicate aggressively, so how do I
> come up with a third-person description of acting as if deeply hurt?. I would
> have to rely on an elaborate theory that would determine, from a person's
> history of past behavior and a large sample of current behavior that the
> person is, for example, depressed.
nst --> Here is where I argue for a holistic behaviorism. Many of the terms
that we use involve category errors ... they appear to refer to one kind of
thing, rather than to another quite different kind of thing. They display
"misplaced concreteness". "Being angry" is a small piece of a much larger
pattern of emotionality that we have to be in contact with before we can
recognise any of its pieces. To experience the anger of another person you
have to have experienced their other stuff. We often talk as if is possible to
recognise anger in the instant case in oneself and others, but actually
perception of any particular anger-related act or event requires a much larger
history with the person to which the emotion is attributed.
The problem is similar to the problem of recognizing adaptation in nature. We
talk as if a particular creature is adapted to a particular environment, yet
the primary experience that makes that attribution possible is an array of
creatures in relation to an array of environments. That is why evolution was
advanced so rapidly when people started climbing on boats and wandering around
the world collecting stuff.
(I'm not certain if current psychological theory is stated that way.)
>
> This suggests a question for Nick
> Suppose that in analyzing behavior, we found that the rules (or probabilistic
> rules) governing behavior were greatly simplified if we assumed that the
> person could be in various states that resembled what we usually think of as
> psychological states, such as depression, fear, elation, etc. Would this
> count as evidence for inner states?
nst --> This is exactly Dennett's position in the "intentional stance", no???
Perhaps he remains agnostic on your last step. But I am ducking your question.
Theories can have two virtues: likeliness and loveliness. You are saying, if
"inner life" theory could be shown to be likely, would I love it? And the
answer is, No. It also has to be lovely. I.E., it has to be deployed in a
manner that is internally consistent and grammatical.
> ---John
> ________________________________________
> From: Russ Abbott [[email protected]]
> Sent: Friday, June 19, 2009 10:57 AM
> To: John Kennison
> Cc: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group;
> [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Nick and dishonest behavior
>
> As I wrote to Nick directly, I think Nick is gracious and kind and a man of
> great integrity.
>
> But this doesn't make sense to me: "We don't have to believe in inner minds
> to say that a person accused of dishonesty behaves as if deeply hurt." What
> could it possibly mean to say that a person is deeply hurt if there is no
> such thing as first person experience? And if there is no such thing as
> being deeply hurt in a first person way, what could it possibly mean to say
> that someone is behaving as if deeply hurt?
>
> This suggests that it is very dangerous to claim that there is no first
> person experience and that observable behavior is all there is. It would
> encourage "treating people as objects" because that's exactly the position it
> takes. An attitude of this sort would seem to discard millennia of progress
> in our understanding and acceptance of what ethical human-to-human
> interaction consists of.
>
> -- Russ
>
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