Re: consciousness, was Re: etc.


"J.A. Legris" <jalegris@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1180289726.855963.276150@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

On May 27, 12:38 pm, Wolf <ElLoboVi...@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Daryl McCullough wrote:
In article <1180239271.202141.255...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
J.A. Legris
says...

I was referring to EAB's take on the subject, which would reflexively
reject both the terminology and assumptions of the above program.

Who or what is EAB?

--
Daryl McCullough
Ithaca, NY

Experimental Analysis of Behaviour (or Behavior.)

EAB studies discover functional relationships between identifiable
environmental factors and animal behaviours. "Animal" includes humans,
in case you believe Humans Arte Different.


A.K.A. Radical Behaviourism,



No, it is possible to do behavior analysis without being a radical
behaviorist.



which is Skinner's brand of
methodological behaviorism with the added kludge of calling some
mental (i.e. thinking) and neural activities behaviour,



There are probably some circumstances in which "neural activities" would be
called behavior, but behaviorism does not, in fact, generally do that. But I
imagine what is going on is that you are making a category error - you are
calling "things" that are really behavior "neural activities. It is true
that they view "thinking" as behavior.



while
rejecting the tenets of theory-based science,



You adhere to an extremely simplistic view of what science is. You really
have become a caricature of yourself, Legris. You spout more and more
nonsense all the time.



and all mathematics more
complicated than those Skinner understood.



This is not really true, but I wouldn't describe much of the EAB as
"mathematically sophisticated." But it is a part of biological science and
much the same could be said for much of biology. Indeed, this was a driving
force behind Glass and Mackey's "From clocks to chaos." You are not worth
the effort of tracking down the quote but, should you be interested, you can
find it. I am sympathetic to their position, and there is now a fair amount
of motivation to become "more mathematical" and there are new mathematical
tools that seem to be relevant to systems that can't be described by simple
differential equations. But still, it is not clear how to approach much of
the field mathematically. Why don't you go ahead and solve "the" problem of
schedule-controlled behavior for us, Legris?



The resulting hodge-podge
required so much backwards-bending-over, handwaving and tortured
translation that cognitive psychology was born as an overreaction.
Fortunately the swinging pedulum is now precessing into the the realm
of real science.



How many angels can dance on your head, Legris?


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