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CONCEPT ENCYCLOPEDIA
Edited by F Richard Singer III Edition Date 10/2008
www.conceptualstudy.org & mailto:pndp@sbcglobal.net.
Note: This Concept Encyclopedia has not been officially reviewed by SDP (Society for Descriptive Psychology). It presents concepts as understood by the writers of the articles. Those in Section 1 are written by members of SDP for persons not versed in Descriptive Psychology, but who want a more systematic version of the concepts they routinely use for thinking about the behavior of persons. Authors have been encouraged to discuss these concepts with such persons. Anyone who uses concepts or locutions for concepts that differ substantially from those used in these articles is invited to email me at the address above. I also invite communication from anyone wanting more detailed and precise development of concepts either thru interchange or thru references. Some articles contain such references. Papers in the series Advances in Descriptive Psychology are referenced as Advances followed by the volume number and the paper’s title. Papers in the Conceptual Papers section of my website are referenced as CPCS and the paper’s title. The book Persons, Behavior, and the World, by Mary Shideler gives an initial introduction to Descriptive Psychology. This book is referenced as PBW. Books from the collected work of Peter Ossorio are referenced only by their titles. The SDP website is sdp.org. These books are described there and can be ordered from descriptivepsychologypress.com.
By a net, I mean a network of concepts and conceptual relationships. Over a period of many years, Peter Ossorio developed a net called Descriptive Psychology. Since this net has been adopted by a number of persons, I refer to it as PNDP (the Public Net for Descriptive Psychology). Section 1 explains a number of PNDP concepts and related terminology. When I personally use a modified version of a concept, I indicate how I have diverged from or augmented the way it is used in PNDP. Many more concepts need to be included, and I would appreciate help in making these additions. I also welcome corrections or additions to what has been said about the concepts already included. More examples illustrating these concepts would be especially useful.
Articles in Section 2 are written by me. They focus on concepts from my version of conceptual philosophy that are not currently considered as part of Descriptive Psychology. It explains many of the concepts and locutions that I use in conceptual philosophy, other than those taken from PNDP. These concepts are more fully developed in my book A Personal Approach to Conceptual Philosophy on the Conceptual Philosophy section and the papers on the Conceptual Papers section of conceptualstudy.org. I also invite communication in relation to these concepts.
Concepts are organized in relation to the role they play. They will be found in the context of related concepts, rather than in alphabetical order. To locate a concept explanation or to see ways in which a concept is used you can do a search for it using a word or phase with all capital letters. Preceding this with the symbol $ takes you to the heading of an article on that concept or to a major conceptual condition that it satisfies.
Some Notation: P is a variable on the domain of persons. G is a variable on the domain of groups consisting of at least two persons. S is a variable on the domain of situations.
SECTION
1 PNDP CONCEPTS AND TERMINOLOGY
Person Concepts: PNDP concepts are for understanding persons and what they do. Moreover they are refined and more systematic versions of concepts in our ordinary net for understanding persons. Thus PNDP can provide tools anyone can use to enhance their behavior potential (as discussed in CPCS The Potential Impact of Descriptive Psychology). As with our ordinary person concepts, to adequately understand PNDP, a person must already have competence in working with a number of ordinary concepts that people routinely use in day to day activities and how these fit together and make sense. As Ossorio says in The Behavior of Persons, the world makes sense, and so do people. They already make sense to begin with. One of the closest things to a brute fact that we have is that people are not inherently mysterious to people. Altho there is much that we in fact don’t know about a given person or group of persons, still, meeting a stranger on the street is not like coming face to face with a little green man from Mars. Nor is it like chancing upon a complex mobile artifact without having the slightest idea of what might ensue. And having lunch with my Uncle Ben is not like meeting a stranger on the street. That people understand people is surely one of the fundamental things about people.
$PERSONS: Below are features of a paradigm case of a person. This person concept is behavior and involves two main behavior features, namely $DELIBERATE ACTION and a $DRAMATURGICAL PATTERN. Ossorio briefly characterizes deliberate action as action in which the actor knows what he is doing and is doing it on purpose. This concept is further elucidated in relation to the concept of a behavior description. Acting in a dramaturgical pattern means that a person assigns objects and events into positions in a drama of that person’s ongoing life.
A $PERSON has a history in which deliberate action in a dramaturgical pattern is ubiquitous. A person has sufficiently mastered a person concept to distinguish between persons and non-persons, at least most of the time. A person acquired the concept of a person by learning to act as a person in interaction with other persons. Moreover, a person knows how to act as a person in interaction with other persons.
CPCS Person Concepts gives a fuller formulation, with allowable transformations to cover additional cases. For instance, in order to definitely include a newborn child as a person, these features are modified by allowing them to be future expectations. That paper also indicates how to make this behavioral person concept blend with a widely used person concept that is not behavioral.
There are some related $origin concepts that are not currently a part of PNDP, altho I think they belong in PNDP. They seem compatible with concepts in Chapter 12 of The Behavior of Persons. The origin concepts that I use can be found in Section 2 of this encyclopedia.
$Behavior Descriptions (ordinary): A simple ordinary description might say that Ben wanted firewood and so he split 4 large logs obtaining firewood that he intended to use in his wood burning stove. This description indicates the five considerations (indicated in bold face type) that are involved in this description. Ben is identified as the one engaged in the behavior. What he wanted was firewood. His performance involves splitting logs. His main achievement was to obtain firewood. This was significant to him because it provided wood for burning in his stove. The bold face fonts indicate certain general types of considerations often used in describing behavior. An observer might have noticed a number of other things. She might say that Ben knows that 3 of the logs will be easy to split and that altho Ben is good at splitting difficult logs, he likes to get some easy work done and save a challenging task for last. This mentions some other types of consideration we use in describing behavior. He knows which logs will be easy to split. He knows how to split them. His liking to leave a challenge to last is an attitude towards that activity. It is one of Ben’s characteristics that could be mentioned in explaining why Ben split logs in the order he chose. Many other considerations could be mentioned. In getting firewood, Ben was saving money on his heating bill, indicating another significance consideration. Noting this, the observer might remark on another characteristic, namely that Ben has the trait of being thrifty.
The concepts indicated in bold face and other related PNDP concepts are refined systematic versions of what the ordinary connotations of these terms suggest. Clearly, any and all of this can be said without any systematic knowledge of the types of considerations for a behavior description concept. We all know how to describe behavior in terms of a variety of considerations. The statement below could be said about almost any concept use in Descriptive Psychology.
Formulating a behavior description concept encapsulates our understanding of what it means to describe behavior, which we already knew but might not know we knew - and “knowing that we know” makes a significant difference, both in understanding and in giving descriptions.
$CHARACTERISTICS: There are a number of characteristics we use in thinking about behavior, some of which are indicated in the following list.
{traits, attitudes, interests, styles, abilities, knowledge, values, embodiment, capacities}
These characteristic concepts are formulated in relation
to behavior in ways that are compatible with the ordinary usage suggested by
these terms. For instance, to support the claim that Bo has a strong interest in
football, you could indicate the number of games he watches and the
conversations he has about it. Likewise, in claiming that a dog has a friendly
attitude towards strangers, just indicate the number of times he has welcomed
them. To say that Ben has the trait of being thrifty we would note that he not
only saves money on his heating bill, but takes many
other opportunities to save money. Altho there are alternative ways to organize
and specify characteristics, everyone uses some version of characteristics in
thinking about what persons do. In this sense, some version of a characteristic
concept is crucial for any person. A similar remark applies to some version of
a behavior description concept.
$BEHAVIOR
DESCRIPTIONS & $INTENTIONAL ACTION: The paradigm case of a behavior
description uses all of the parameters below to describe a course of action X
by a person called the actor. The
person giving the description is called the observer.
The observer and actor can be the same person. An observer can give a behavior
description in which there is more than one actor. The observer can be a team
working together to give a behavior description. An
observer can give a behavior description in which there is more than one actor.
Furthermore, an actor need not be human. For instance, an actor could be a lion
or a robot. The observer can be a team working together to give a behavior
description. These parameters are taken from things we might ordinarily say in
talking about something an individual did, as was illustrated earlier. Of
course, our ordinary descriptions are likely to be less systematic and indicate
only those features of interest for the purposes at hand.
¨ $IDENTITY (I) specifies the actor A for X.
¨ $WANT (W) indicates what A intends to achieve by X.
¨ $KNOWLEDGE (K) has to do with what A knows and uses in relation to X.
¨ $KNOW-HOW (KH) has to do with the competencies A displays relation to X.
¨ $PERFORMANCE (P) encompasses the processes that A is implementing.
¨ $ACHIEVEMENT (A) is what X accomplishes, what difference it makes.
¨ $CHARACTERISTICS (C) includes some of A’s characteristics being expressed by doing X.
¨ $SIGNIFICANCE (S) includes what else is being done by doing X, what importance X has for A.
Allowable Transformations: In an specific intentional action description, some of these parameters may not be explicitly given, but it always makes sense to ask about those not mentioned and inquire further about those that were mentioned. In fact there are various recognized types of behavior descriptions in which some of the parameters may be omitted or enhanced. These can be found in Advances 1 Notes on Behavior Descriptions and in Chapter 3 of The Behavior of Persons
$DELIBERATE ACTION (revisited): As indicated earlier, Ossorio briefly characterizes deliberate action as intentional action in which the actor knows what he is doing and is doing it on purpose. Knowing what one is doing involves distinguishing it from one or more alternatives. This means that deliberate action is usually behavior in which the K-parameter involves the actor knowing two or more alternatives on which to act and with the W-parameter involving the actor having varying degrees of wants in relation to these actions. This concept also includes having the competence to engage in and to distinguish between the various options.
Note: Wanting to engage in the action may or may not entail wanting to engage in the performance part of the action. For instance when I say that I want to take my insulin shot I am referring to the action as a whole, rather than to the performance parameter of that action.
$Course of Action: The concept of a course of action includes not only a sequence of actions but also what we would usually think of as a single action, such as turning on a light. In fact, the distinction between what we think of as single action and a sequence is a matter of perspective. For instance, we could think about making a bed as a single action or as a sequence of actions. The sequence might include putting the night pillows in the closet, straightening the covers, putting on the bedspread, placing the matching pillows where they belong. Each of these actions could also be considered as a sequence of actions. Putting the night pillows in the closet involves opening the closet door, picking up the pillows, placing them in the closet, etc.
$IDENTITY PARAMETER: When describing the behavior of an actor, this parameter provides a way to specify whose behavior is being considered. Paradigmatically the actor will be a person, and when this is not the case the identity parameter can be used to focus on this fact.
$WANT Parameter: This is the motivational aspect of behavior. It could also be called the goal or the purpose of the behavior. Behavior is in part distinguished by and oriented toward a wanted state of affairs, and the want parameter provides a place to specify this state of affairs. Note that the want parameter is specific and action related. It refers to what the action is primarily intended to achieve. It does not include all the wants that the actor might imagine at the time of the action. For example, the W parameter in batting practicing would normally be to improve hitting ability. It would not include becoming the best hitter ever. If the actor desired this, it could be included in the significance parameter.
$Know Parameter: This is the cognitive aspect of behavior. It can be used to specify any purported knowledge being acted on. This includes the conceptual distinctions the actor understands. It includes information that the actor has. In general it includes anything that the actor takes as relevant and real about the situation in which the action takes place.
$Know How Parameter: This is competence involved in actor’s performance and achievement. It does not include anything that is matter of luck or coincidence. Jill knows how to play Gin Rummy. She wins more often than not. Since some luck is involved, we would not say that she knows how to win. We could say she know how to use tactics that help her win.
$PERFORMANCE PARAMETER: This represents the process involved in the behavior. Process aspects include having a beginning-end and duration. They involve occurring in some specific context of time and place. They start with a state of affairs and end with a different one.
$Achievement Parameter: This would normally include one or more outcomes that relate directly to the want parameter. It may also include anything that could reasonably be considered as a result of X, including some unintended ones. This parameter is value neutral, i.e. some results leave you in a worse place than where you started or where you wanted to be. Altho some results may be quite trivial, a behavior, being historically unique, always makes some kind of difference.
$CHARACTERITICS Parameter: These are organized it into three categories, each of which includes several types of characteristics that will be developed later.
$Dispositions: {$Traits, $Attitudes, $Interests,
$Styles}
$Powers: {$Abilities, $Knowledge,
$Values}
$Derivatives: {$Embodiment, $Capacities, $States}
$Significance and Significance Chains: A description of X can indicate not only the most direct features of X, but also the significance that X has for P. To consider this parameter the observer asks, “In doing X what else is P intentionally doing?” In general, behavior has a multilevel structure. This can sometimes be organized in terms of one or more chains. This means that a link in the chain entails in some fashion also doing the next link. Further links may or may not be more significant than nearer ones. They are just less directly a part of what is intentionally being done.
The Lion Walks In: Imagine that I am seated at the back of a large lecture hall and I am the only person there. All the doors are closed except that at the front end one of the doors is slightly ajar. I am glancing desultorily at some notes and thinking. Suddenly, the door at the front creaks. I look up and see a lion push his way into the room, soughing. In a flash, I am out the back door, slamming it shut behind me. I run into the office across the hall, slamming the door behind me and quickly alert the relevant authorities. You and a friend were in the projection booth and saw everything that happened in the lecture hall. After order is restored, you ask me “Why did you run out of the room?” I reply “Because I was afraid of the lion.” If questioned more I might have answered that I ran out the door because I wanted to get from the lion and that was a way to do it. If questioned further I might say that I was trying to escape danger by getting away from the lion. See The Behavior of Persons (page 314).
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At the lowest level pictured, P is a parameter for B1,
where W1 is wanting to get out of the room, K1 is
knowing where the door is. P is also the performance parameter for the
related behavior B2, where W2 wanting to be away from the lion, |
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Example: Let X be the course of action of Ben taking a morning walk in the woods. One significance chain for X is as follows. In doing X, Ben is getting his allotted aerobic exercise for the day. Doing this will help him keep his blood sugar under control. By keeping his blood sugar under control, he hopes to prevent some serious health problems from arising. He hopes this will enhance the quality of his life in later years. This significance chain is part of the significance parameter for describing X. In doing X, Ben is also learning the territory near his farm. This part of the significance parameter is not in that chain. His primary achievement is that he completed his walk. The extended achievement parameter includes this, along with meeting his exercise quota and locating some cedar trees he can later transplant. His blood sugar level was under 120 the next morning. The broader health and life quality achievements are unknown.
$Behavior: I am unsure of the stance of PNDP on distinguishing between the concept of behavior and the concept of a behavior description. I consider the concept of behavior as a crucial concept whose essence must be understood before any concept of a behavior description could be formulated. This does not mean that the behavior concept is not subject to refinement in various ways, such as by the Maxims in Place. However the most systematic way to bring essential components of behavior into focus would seem to be by a parametric analysis such as that given by the kind of behavior description used in Descriptive Psychology. Below is what I consider the most basic conceptual condition for relating the concepts of behavior and the concept of a behavior description.
A behavior is an event or process that can be at least partially understood by using a faithful behavior description.
The behavior description concept also provides a tool for bringing various aspect of behavior into focus. Which parameters to use and the detail to which they are developed will depend on the observer’s purposes in giving the description.
I think of the behavior description concept is a tool, much as Bloom’s taxonomy of educational objectives is a tool. I was once asked how the behavior description concept explains why persons do what they do. The answer I gave was simple. It doesn’t, because it is a conceptual tool rather than a theory. If the observer wants an explanation, then the observer must decide what counts as an explanation for the purpose at hand. The observer can then use a behavior description to help construct such an explanation. As an analogy, if asked how Ben’s ax and saw cut down a tree, I would say they don’t, and he does not expect them to. Cutting the tree down is what he does, and these tools help him implement this. The way we use a behavior description concept also depends on the purposes at hand. It is a useful tool for various purposes primarily because it has enough parameters to help focus attention more clearly than we could do with a less systematic tool. This also helps us focus on and organize relevant observations. However, as with any tool, results depend on the skill with which it is used. Even a magic wand could be used badly.
$behavior description EXAMPLES: It is Jill’s turn in a game of Gin Rummy. The face up card would improve her hand, but the card on top of the deck might be even more useful. For an illustrative purpose, we give a description in which the parameters are simple. Each could be expanded if we had reasons to give a more elaborate description. The I-parameter in our description is Jill. The W-parameter is her desire to improve her hand. By saying that Jill knows that she can take either card, our description is a deliberate action description. The K-parameter also includes knowing what is in her current hand and which cards that would improve this hand. The KH-parameter includes knowing how to count the points she would be caught with if her opponent goes down or gins. She takes the card from the deck, the P-parameter. Since the card Jill draws is useless, the A-parameter is not the desired achievement of enhancing the hand to the extent the face up card would have done. One value of the S-parameter is that Jill is trying to win the game. One noteworthy instance of the C-parameter is Jill’s risk taking attitude while playing games. To see why this might be used as part of the behavior description, consider a person with the same value for the other parameters, but who usually avoids risks. For such a person taking the card that is face down would involve a different value of the C-parameter. Perhaps that person was in a state of frustration that overcame the aversion to risk taking.
As a more complex Illustration of a behavior description, consider course of action X of Ben cutting down a dead tree one afternoon. Ben is also the observer giving the behavior description. Ben first focuses on partially indicating the primary values he used for the parameters, i.e. those not associated with what else is being done as indicated in the significance parameter.
I-parameter: Ben
W-parameter: wanting the tree down
KF-parameter: knowing that he could safely delay taking this tree down, knowing that it is dead and thus there could be a danger from falling limbs, knowing the relation between notching the tree and where it is likely to fall, knowing that there was an obstacle blocking the fall, etc.
KH-parameter: knowing how to use tools, knowing where to cut with the saw once the tree was notched with the ax, etc.
P-parameter: getting his tools at 2pm, taking them to the tree, looking for obstructions, cutting a notch with the ax and then using the saw on the opposite side to cut slightly above the bottom of the notch. notching the tree, testing to see if it was ready to fall, etc.
A-parameter: the tree coming down where he wanted it to fall
C-parameter: his dislike of chain saws, the value he places on staying physically active, his habit of engaging in physical activity in the afternoon, etc.
S-parameter: enhancing a resources ® making firewood easier to obtain ® potentially saving money on his fuel bill ® potentially having more security, getting exercise, preventing a hazard
The first two items in C-parameter add an important perspective on what Ben did. This attitude and this value account for the fact that he used an ax and a crosscut saw and the timing of X.
??The above significance chain can be described as follows. In doing X, he is obtaining a usable firewood resource. Having this resource will make it easier to obtain more firewood. One reason for wanting this is that it could later save money on his fuel bill. Saving money would provide some extra security. This significance chain is part of the S-parameter for describing X. In doing X, he is also getting exercise and removing a potential road hazard. These parts of the S-parameter are not in that chain. Each value given in the significance parameter indicates what else I was doing in doing X. Thus we can think of the values of this parameter as intentional actions and use one or more of the parameters to bring them into focus. These values are included in the extended parameters for X. Values for the extended identity and performance parameters are the same as the primary ones for X.
Consider action X1 of trying to prevent a road hazard. The values for W1 and A1 should be apparent. KF1 includes knowing that if this tree falls then it likely to fall across the road. C1 includes the value I place on the safety and convenience of others.
Consider action X2 of trying to make firewood easier to obtain. A1 includes achieving this, altho not to the degree I expected because I have not yet processed it and it is beginning to rot. KF2 includes a knowing that once a tree is down it can be converted into firewood in small stages. C2 includes my more positive attitude toward processing firewood than to taking down dead trees.
Consider action X3 of trying to obtain more security. A1 includes the small increase in security due to having a fallen dead tree, but since I did not process it, this increase was not as large as expected. KF3 includes a comprehension of the relationship between financial resources and security. C3 includes my trait of frugality.
$Behavior Roles or AOC: PNDP conceptualize 3 major roles an individual may take on in relation to behavior and various states: Actor, Observer-Describer, Critic-Appraiser. The actor role is to do what he has reasons for doing. In this role, he is spontaneous and creative, responding to and acting on whatever he finds relevant in his world. The observer-describer role is to note what is happening and to note the relevant states. The critic-appraiser role is to decide how things are going and when appropriate to prescribe ways to make it more satisfactory.
$Note: A Person’s World consists of everything a person is willing to treat as real in the sense of taking account of it in relations to that person’s actions.
$Behavior Perspectives: The 4 categories {hedonic, prudential, ethical, aesthetic} are the main behavior perspective concepts. Since PNDP uses {conventional, artistic, intellectual} as subcategories of aesthetic, we have 6 categories {hedonic, prudential, ethical, conventional, artistic, intellectual}. These 6 correspond closely to ordinary usage. I augment these with an orthogonal behavior perspective concept pair {routine, idealistic}. To take an idealistic perspective on some action is to think of it in terms of its effect on some ideal.
$Main Reality Subconcepts: The concept of a state of affairs is inclusive in the sense that the others category or special cases of it, but this category also includes states of affairs that are not of any of those types. For compactness of expression, I have shortened the term ‘state of affairs’ to ‘state’.
Reality Categories$ {Objects, Events, Processes, States}
In order to for these categories to be useful we need another main reality subconcept, namely that of a relationship.
Rule 1. A state is a totality of related states.
Rule 2. A state is a state that is a constituent of some other state.
Rule 3. An object is a state having other related objects as immediate constituents.
Rule 4. A process is a sequential change from one state to another.
Rule 5. A process is a state having other, related processes as immediate constituents. (A process divides into related sequential or parallel smaller processes.)
Rule 6. An event is a direct change from one state to another.
Rule 7. An event is a state having the two states before and after as constituents.
Rule 8. That a given state has a given relationship (e.g., succession, incompatibility, inclusion, common constituents, etc.) to a second state is a state.
Rule 8a. That a given state has a given relationship to another state is a state.
Rule 9. That a given object, process, event, or state is of a given kind is a state.
Rule 10. That an object or process begins is an event and that it ends is a different event.
Rule 10a. That an object or process occurs (begins and ends) is a state having three states ("before,” "during," and "after") as constituents.
Special Case I: The state which includes all other states (i.e. the real world).
Special Case II: A type of object that has no constituents (an ultimate object or a basic building block).
Special Case III: A type of process that has no constituents, hence no beginning that is distinct from its end, hence no beginning that is distinct from its end, hence is the effective equivalent of an event).
Special Case IV: A type of process that is the same thing as a state, but has no process constituents (i.e., is the effective equivalent of an object during a period in which the object undergoes no change- cf. molecular processes at absolute zero temperature).
Special Case V: A type of state that has no state constituents (e.g., Black is different from white. "Black" and "white" are not states, so there can be no decomposition of either into objects, processes, events, or other states.
$
Observable States: On
page 16 of What Actually Happens
Ossorio says that what we observe is the
real world. He also says that to observe something on a given occasion
is to find out something about it without on that occasion having to find out
something else first (observation contrasts with inference). In this sense the
states such as my computer being on are observable.
$Types of States: In order to
organize our thinking I have augmented the PNDP reality concepts by classifying
states into various types. Types can be more or less comprehensive. Objects and events and processes are extremely comprehensive
types of states. The type of state ‘my bicycle’ is a narrow type of object. It
is, included in the broader type bicycle, which is included in the broader type
objects with wheels, etc. I find it useful to classify the types used to think
about states as objects. Thus not only is the bicycle that I ride in
$Community Concepts: A social practice is a pattern of actions engaged in by persons and that can be taught and learned. Social Practices vary in scope and importance, from playing a minor role in the lives of a few people to playing a significant role for most members of some extensive group of people. An institution is an organized set of interrelated social practices.
A community is a set of members who share some set of paradigms and whose members think of themselves as having a place in the community or some part of the community. The set of paradigm for a community (such as the specialized community of billiard players) may contain a single limited paradigm; or it may contain a comprehensive paradigm along with zero or more limited paradigms.
A culture is
a sufficiently self-contained community whose paradigms involve the primary
social practices of its members. To be sufficiently self-contained means that
the culture can provide ways by which its members can at least minimally
satisfy there basic human needs, and these ways will consist of a wide range of
social practices. To be sufficiently self-contained does not mean that a
culture has no external interactions or does not fulfill some of purposes thru
such interactions.
$Community Parameters: A PNDP community description uses some or all of the seven parameters below to characterize a community and differentiate it from other communities.
{members, statuses, concepts, locutions, social practices, choice principles, world}
Below is a simplified account of these parameters. For more see Anthony Putnam, Communities Advances in Descriptive Psychology Vol 1 p 195 or Mary Shideler Persons, Behavior and the World.
$Members: To be a member of a
community normally is to identify oneself as a member and to be recognizable as
such by other members of that community. The distinction between members and
non-members will also normally be recognizable to non-members. Furthermore,
this distinction behaviorally significant, i.e. members will be treated in some
manners differently than outsiders. Membership may be awarded by a formal
ceremony, such as an initiation in which an individual become a member of
sorority. It may be recognized with specific criteria but without ceremony,
such as being a member of the community of
$Statuses: Having a status is to have a certain set of relationships. For any X each of X’s statuses refer to X’s place in some world in the broadest possible senses imaginable. An eligibility for X is being able to play certain role. Statuses determine P’s eligibilities, i.e. P’s potential for behavior. A status may or may not have anything to do with a community. For instance, an adult great white shark has the status of being at the top of a food chain, and this has considerable implications about what it can do. For a community the most basic status is membership, however in number of other statuses will be available in any community. They may be explicitly recognized, such starting point guard for the Boston Celtics. A status may be more casual, such a person you can rely upon in a crunch.
$Concepts: To engage in deliberate action a person must be able to make conceptual distinctions. The concepts of a community are those that are essential for meaningful participation in its practices, and especially in its core practices. These concepts may or may not be recognized by non-members, and when recognized by non-members they may not be understood in the way they are understood by non-members. Members share these concepts in being able to act upon them in a similar manner. For instance, the community of boy scouts uses the concept of an Eagle Scout, and furthermore this concept is understood in terms of its merit badge requirements. An outsider may also be able to use this concept, but many will use it more vaguely and few outsiders to the scouting community will know the requirements.
$Locutions: The locutions of a community may include the language spoken, such as English or French. More important, they include the ways in which it is spoken and the concepts and conceptual distinctions this indicates. This involves the use of jargon and terminology and expressions that are intertwined with the social practices of the community. The distinction between locutions of members of a community and non-members can vary from being minor subtle to being highly pronounced. For pilots and bridge players the term ‘ace’ represents different concepts, but members of each community, as well as outsider to both communities, could probably understand the essence of the difference. Of course an insider would use this term with greater sophistication. The community of mathematicians uses the terms ‘ring’ and ‘field’ in ways that have no apparent relation to their use in ordinary language. In fact the meaning use of these terms would be difficult to even explain to most non-mathematicians. However a mathematician who did not know English could easily acquire full use of these locutions, having similar locution in his own language.
$Social Practices: A community is especially distinguished by the things members do as members of the community and the way in which they do these things. These are the social practice of the community, and the point of being a member is to be eligible to engage in these practices. There are optional social practices, in the sense that a member can be in good standing without engaging in the practice. There are also core social practices, i.e. those that a member must engage in to be considered a member of the community. For instance, using planting wheat might be an optional social practice in a farming community. However planting some crop would be a core social practice, since a person who never planted a crop would not be considered a farmer.
$Choice Principles: The actions of members as they engage in its social practices are guided by choice principle. Choice principles include any of ways a community accepts the justification of the behavior of its members. For instance, a member may appeal to custom or principles. Choice principles are often expressed in the form of value statements, norms, policies, slogans, etc. They are often illustrated in stories or myths.
$Worlds: In describing what we do
and think about, we use elements that we think of as {objects, processes,
events, states of affairs}. A world for a person P is a large interrelated set
of such elements that P is willing to act on. P will have a multitude of such
worlds. For instance, P might have world W of cycling. That P’s bicycle tire
has a nail would be a state of affairs W. P’s tire and tire gage are object in
W. Having the tire go flat is an event in W.
Repairing a flat tire is a process in W.
There are other persons who have similar worlds. A cohesive set of such
individuals sharing a common world forms a community of cyclists. In general,
members of a community share a world. This means they react to this world by
manifesting values and attitudes and interests that are similar in a multitude
of ways, that they make distinctions in a common manner, and that there share
social practice and choice principles.$
$World & World Change: Some
things – for example, the world around us – are inherently stable and not
readily available for change. It takes something truly unusual and powerful to
change our world. The founder of Descriptive Psychology, the late Prof. Peter
G. Ossorio, created an image he called ‘$The Face in the Wall’ to
illustrate how this can happen. This image has been used very effectively to
illuminate the situation of soldiers returning from
Imagine you are sitting in a room conversing with a friend. Behind the friend is a blank wall, visible to you but not to your friend. Without warning, a face, reminiscent of the statues on Easter Island, appears out of the wall, makes a face at you, sticks out its tongue, and dissolves back into the wall. You might say to yourself “I just had the most remarkable hallucination” as a means of denying that your experience was real; but if you don’t, then you are suddenly living in a different world than before.
Many of us have face in the wall experiences in our lives, thanks to accidents, wars, medical diagnoses, and the like. The experience can also be positive, as in a religious conversion. So what next after experiencing a face in the wall? The challenge is to put your world back together, not the way it was before (virtually always impossible), but in a way that maximizes your behavior potential in the world as you now find it.
$BEHAVIOR POTENTIAL CONCEPTS: The main features of these concepts are taken from The Behavior of Persons. Taking a broad perspective, behavior potential depends on reality constraints, i.e. on whatever might account for or systematize the limits on P’s behavior possibilities. In every situation, there are things that a person P can and can’t do, and what can be done can only be done by acting in certain ways and not others. Each behavioral possibility requires something of P’s own current person characteristics and circumstances, and the extent of these current possibilities depends on both. P may have the right R to remain silent, but either may prevent the exercise of R from being a possibility. A relevant characteristic might be lack knowledge of R or insufficient courage to assert R. A relevant circumstance might be police brutality. The concept of circumstances, involves on P’s relationships and statuses. P’s RELATIONSHIPS may involve anything, including other persons. For instance, P may be riding a car. P’s STATUSES are the places P has in P’s worlds. They are not restricted to P’s place in a social world. P’s status in the car might be driver or passenger. P’s behavior potential within a given realm is an expression of P’s statuses in that realm, and thus influence what P can do within that realm. As a driver, P has different behavioral options than P has as a passenger. Relationships and statuses are essentially equivalent. However they provide a different emphasis for thinking about P’s circumstances.
The thin or simplest sense of behavior potential merely includes all of P’s behavioral possibilities, without relating them to P’s values. More relevant to what P does is what Ossorio calls the thick sense of the term. This is to be understood not merely in terms of which or how many behaviors are available, but also the value of each such behavior. For a behavior B, this corresponds to how much better (or worse) a person’s place would be if P could engage in B, including both current payoff and future possibilities. For example, a small portion of my behavior potential right now consists of the possibilities to blink my eyes once, twice, thrice, etc. This unlimited set is of little value in comparison to my potential to complete a single sentence to my satisfaction in what I am currently writing. When it comes to actions, simple numbers are not relevant, as not every possibility carries the same value. Due to the way values are involved, this thick sense of the concept could be called valued behavior potential
Ossorio further developed valued behavior potential in connection with Maxim C2 in Place (pages 49-53). I sketch the essence of this concept as used there. Consider any behavior B that P has the potential to actualize due to P’s circumstances and characteristics at some time T. Actualizing B would bring about a state of affairs that yields both new behavior potential and a current payoff. The value of the payoff may be either positive or negative. The combination of the value that these have for P is the valued behavior potential of actualizing B for P at time T. Of course, the value B actualizing B for P may differ radically at different time, because both P’s circumstances and P’s characteristics may differ at different times. Moreover unless P has a very simple value system, any attempt to quantify the valued behavior potential of B at time T is unlikely to be useful. What normally is useful for P is to judge whether the valued behavior potential of B is positive and to compare this with the value of other behaviors that P could actualize at time T. Consider a situation where P could actualize B1 or B2. If P believes that B1 has less valued behavior potential that B2 then P will not choose B1 over B2. Interpreted this way Maxim C2 below is merely a conceptual relationship between valuing and choosing. It does not say that P must be correct in such beliefs. Nor does it mean that there is no other behavior that would if actualized provide greater value to P. In general, the only behaviors in P’s currently valued behavior potential are those that are real for P. There is an essential personalized component in the concept of valued behavior potential. B may not be in P’s behavior possibilities even if most people consider B as something P could currently do. Merely recommending B to P may not make B real for P. This may involve some WORLD RECONSTRUCTION for P, i.e. some changes in P’s world.
Maxim C2: A person will not choose less behavior potential over more.
$BEHAVIOR POTENTIAL EXAMPLES: The examples below illustrate the
concept of valued behavior potential, as well as one reason to interpret Maxim
C2 in terms of actualizing behavior potential.
Yesterday Ben had the potential B1 to split several logs and stacking the wood in his rack and B2 to relax in the creek. By actualizing B1, his expected a full wood rack that he valued because of his esthetic attitude about the decor of the rack. His current payoff included also included the satisfaction of accomplishment and the pleasure he normally obtained from the type of exercise involved. By contrast, he felt that actualizing B2 would have resulted in slightly more current payoff on that occasion. What seemed more significant was the new behavior potential from actualizing B1, such as being able to easily access wood, freeing time later for other activities, etc. Moreover the value of new potential anticipated from actualizing B2, such being rested so he could later work more efficiently, was small in comparison to the enhanced behavior potential of a full wood rack. Of course, Ben might have been mistaken. Had he lodged a wedge in the wood or broken his ax, he could have a negative payoff and some less valued potential.
In a similar situation the day before, the payoff expected from B2 was greater to Ben than the value he expected from B1. At that time, Ben was tired and so the current payoff from B1 would not have included the pleasure he normally obtained from the exercise involved. Because it was a very warm day, the pleasure expected from relaxing in the creek was even greater than usual. If we only consider behavior potential, relaxing in the creek was a choice that he expected to result in less valued new behavior potential. This extra difference in current payoff from B2 over B1 more than compensated for any difference in anticipated future behavior potential. There are times when a bird in hand is better than two in the bush.
$Emotional Behavior: Fay and Ron walk down the lane from their cabin to the road. He starts to turn right. She stops. Turning right would have taken her past a house with dogs that run loose. Fay is afraid of these dogs, and considers them dangerous. Avoiding them is a much stronger reason for acting than her desire to go the way Ron turned. This example illustrates three main features of the paradigm case of the concept of emotional behavior as used in PNDP, the emotion in this case being fear. This paradigm case applies to competent socialized adult humans. This concept is developed by Raymond Bergner in the article entitled Emotions. It can be found in his book entitled Studies in Psychology and in Volume 3 of Advances in Descriptive Psychology. Also see The Behavior of Persons, by Peter Ossorio for emotional behavior and other emotion concepts.
(1) An emotion is an appraisal by P of a relationship that something bears to P.
(2) This appraisal logically involves a motivational significance for P.
(3) P has a learned tendency to act on this without deliberation.
The concept of something should be taken broadly to include objects, events, situations, etc. An appraisal may or may not be explicitly in focus. In Fay’s case, the appraisal was largely implicit. She merely came to the road, was aware that turning right seemed dangerous, and gave in to her strong impulse to stop. However as soon as Ron asked her about it she easily identified the possibility of dogs attacking her as a threat. Ron said that there would be less traffic the way he wanted to go and assured her that the dogs only bark and that they always back away when confronted. This did nothing to mute the motivational significance of her appraisal. Part of what it means to classify a behavior as emotional is that it carries motivational significance (as the word logically is intended to convey), altho the motivation need not be preemptive as it was with Fay. Finally, not only was Fay motivated to stop without deliberation, this was something she had learned to do in response to this type of situation. In general, Fay avoids going anywhere near strange dogs that are running loose.
The term impulse is used in the ordinary sense, i.e. as an immediate inclination towards some unpremeditated action that a person is aware of at least to the extent that there is enough time between the inclination and the action to counter the inclination. As with any impulse, Fay might have decided to go the way Ron was turning, but the very fact that this would have taken a major effort shows that her appraisal carried strong motivational significance.
Saying that Fay is afraid of dogs and that her response in this case involved this fear does not mean that she is having some specific type of feeling. Moreover she did not have a noteworthy feeling about the dogs as she stopped, but this does not mean that her stopping was not emotional behavior. On other occasions, a similar emotional response of avoiding dogs has been accompanied by strong feelings. It is the three conditions above, rather than the presence or absence or extent of feeling, which characterize the concept of emotional behavior.
The last condition explicitly distinguishes emotional behavior as a form of action that is not deliberate action. However there are types of non-deliberate action that are not emotional. In order to contrast emotional behavior with behavior having only some of these features, consider another example involving Ron. The description about to be given is primarily a performance description, with the other behavior description parameters implicit or ignored. Hopefully you can imagine enough about these other parameters to understand his actions and the interpretation given for them. Ron is moving rocks in the creek. A crawdad shoots out and he tries to catch it. He is distracted as a horsefly lands on his head. He automatically tries to brush it away. This fly is persistent. Ron lies on his back in the creek prominently exposing a bare knee. The fly lands. Ron knows that if he swats too soon the fly will escape. He patiently waits until it begins to bite and then he swats. He casually removes the smashed fly.
His appraisal about the crawdad had the minor relation to him as something for him to catch, and his tendency to catch a crawdad in such a situation was learned and in this particular case was implemented without deliberation. What primarily distinguishes this from an emotional act is that there his appraisal alone did not carry motivational significance. He often sees crawdads and does not consider catching them. Removing the smashed fly also involved an appraisal of his relationship to it and a tendency to act automatically. Altho this act did not involve considering alternative, it act was casual. In Ron’s initial reaction to the horsefly, I doubt that an appraisal was even made, but if so the appraisal was only implicit. The tendency to act was both strong and automatic. However unlike an emotional response, there was no time to counter the inclination, so this tendency to act was reflexive rather than impulsive. Nor was this reaction learned. Ron’s methodical slaying of the fly involves an appraisal of it as an irritant. The motivational significance, while strong can be distinguished from an emotional response because his acting in this fashion was extremely deliberate. Motivational significance is obviously not restricted to emotional behavior.
Trying to catch crawdads when they appear is a habitual response for Ron. Like any other habitual response, altho involving learned tendencies to act, it differs from emotional ones by lacking logical motivational significance. For instance, Fay comes to a corner and turns because this is how she normally drives to work. Altho automatic, there is no impulse and a slight reminder that she was going to the library would have nullified this motivation.
Removing the dead horsefly was an intentional act, but one done without deliberation. It is like the multitude of non-deliberate intentional acts that follow in a course of action initiated by deliberation. After Ron and Fay deliberately turn right their continued walk was intentional, altho very little of it is deliberate and none of it involved strong motivational significance or any impulses. Even when they reached the goat farm and automatically turned around to head back, this was the case. This is just what they would do because they had initially decided to walk 2½ miles. If one of them had suggested walking further then the motivational significance of the appraisal that this is the place to turn around would have been considerably muted.
If the concept of an appraisal is not limited to being cognitive, one could say that a reflex action satisfies most of the conditions given for an emotional one. They both certainly carry a strong tendency to act automatically. However, even if we allow for a broad concept of an appraisal, a reflex action still differs from emotional behavior in two important respects. The tendency to act is mostly unlearned. Nor does it involve an impulse because an impulse is usually an inclination to act that a person can counter.
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$SECTION
2 CONCEPTS FROM $CONCEPTUAL PHILOSOPHY
Origin Concepts: Transcendent action involves a performance that transcends all causal factors that could determine what the actor would do. Also the achievement is to bring about a state that differs from the state that would have emerged had if what had been done was a result of chance or the causal flow. In transcendent action the actor is acting as a center of first causality or as a causal origin. The concept of transcendent action and the origin concepts indicated below are not currently part of PNDP, but is one I suggest as an augmentation. I refer to transcendent acts as origin acts when I want to focus attention more on the person than on the act. An $origin is a person with a noteworthy history of origin activity. Originship is the art or skill involved in being or becoming a more effective origin. An origin quest involves the creation of more supportive environments for persons who are deliberately enhancing their characteristics in ways that enhance their competence and allow them more diverse behavior potential by increasing what William James calls their live options.
$Nets and Closely Related Concepts: A net is a network of concepts and conceptual relationships. A private net for P is a state of affairs within P and is manifest only to P. A public net for G is a more remote state of affairs that each P in G recognizes as similar one of P’s private nets.
My wife’s net for football has some features in common with my football net, but it is clearly a different net. We each have our own private football nets, even though we think of a public net that many people are using. I conceptualize this public net as a state for the group of football fans and my own personal football net as copy that is adequate enough for my purposes.
Note: Wittgenstein said that there are no private languages. In a similar manner we could say that there are no private concepts and hence no private nets. In terms of what he had in mind, I have no essential quarrel, and would even say there is no private property. However I am using term private in a different sense that is not intended to indicate independence from group influence. It is part of our basic reliable knowledge that the private nets for any human are primarily acquired from the social practice involving similar nets used by other humans. However it is conceptually possible that a private net can be independent of all public nets, and this has been illustrated in science fiction. Furthermore, we would expect a traditional theist to believe that there is at least one private net which is totally independent of any public net.
$Realms: The concept of a realm of interest is broad, including anything that any person might be interested in thinking about. Examples of realms include your parents, my bicycle, last nights card game, the perfect number problem, dogs, bicycles, gin rummy, eggs, trigonometry, kinematics, card games, rain, human transportation systems, the Roman empire, empires, war, shadows, mathematics, ghosts, communism, heaven, history, etc.
$Realm of Certainty: There is a
great deal that a person takes for granted. I take it for granted that I have
never been to
$Concepts: Altho I sometimes think of concepts as basic building blocks for a conceptual net, they are more like interwoven strands than blocks. Concepts do not exist as independent entities. They support each other and some net, which also supports them. A concept can be understood only in relation to its place within some net.
$Maxims: The main role of concepts and what they are can be partially understood in terms of a variety of Maxims. Maxims for a net are like mathematical axioms, and while most maxims are not precise enough to be classified as axioms, they provide information on how certain concepts are to be used in the context of some net. Occasionally a sentence will be labeled as a maxim, but usually a sentence with an ‘is’ in it is a maxim.
$Maxim A: (adapted from PNDP maxim 6) All concepts belong to one or more nets and bear some type of relationship to other concepts within the nets to which they belong, and P acquires net and concepts within a net by experience in one or more practices using this net.
$Maxim B: (adapted from PNDP maxim 7) P acquires paraceptual information by using concepts in some net to observe or think about any realm of interest that the net helps P access.
$Maxim C: A concept can be any way of making a cognitive distinction for any set of purposes, and it may have various degrees of utility in this respect.
$Maxim D: A concept neither makes claims nor proposes information and cannot be correct or incorrect in the sense of having a truth or plausibility value.
$Maxim E: Conceptual claims may have truth or plausibility value.
$Maxim F: A private net is a characteristic of the power type, and involving both ability and knowledge.
$Maxim G: Any specialized net contains as a component some part of a person’s net for thinking about a person’s realm of certainty about ordinary matters.
$Maxim H: The concept of a definition applies to linguistic expressions. Concepts cannot be defined; however definitions can be used to help clarify concepts.
$Subconcepts: In a net some concepts may be so basic that they provide a substrate implicitly supporting each other and all the other concepts in the net, altho often only implicitly. Since these are the concepts within a net lie submerged beneath and implicitly support a significant part of the meaning of other concepts used, I refer to such concepts as subconcepts. The distinction between subconcepts and other concepts is not intended to be sharp or precise. Being a subconcept is a matter of degree.
$Vital Concepts and Ordinary Nets: P’s ordinary net is the net containing all of P’s concepts that P uses for dealing with everyday activities. P’s ordinary net contains intimately intertwined conceptual strands which permeate P’s thinking and mediate all of P’s experience. A subconcept is vital for P if P’s ordinary net would not be coherent without it. This does not mean that a vital concept cannot be modified. It only means that without some implicit version of this concept it would be impossible for P to make sense of anything. The ordinary net and a vital concept for a group and is conceptualized in a similar manner.
I often think in terms of me and everything else. The problem with this my vague use of the word me. I think of an immediate-me, a functional subconcept rooted in my most intimate personal awareness of me as being me and doing things. In public discourse I use an extended subconcept of me. This extended-me includes what other persons consider as me. The extended-me includes a slowly evolving complex of characteristics. The immediate-me seems simple in comparison to the extended-me. The vagueness in the way I use the word me gives rise to vagueness in my concept of everything else. This does not provide the fundamental subconcepts I need for thinking about what I am doing. I prefer a partition that uses the subconcepts {my will, my persona, my beyond}. My will is what I experience as the immediate-me. My persona is that part of the extended-me which does not include the immediate-me. In contrast to these, I have a subconcept that includes everything beyond the extended-me, and which I call my beyond. This is a way to organize the core of my ordinary net. It is a conceptual decision rather than a claim about the nature of reality. This partition is by function rather than by substance. I extend this type of partition in thinking about other persons, thinking of a person primarily as a point of identity who is a will to engage in the kind of action PNDP classifies as deliberate. A person (Ð) is an individual with a history of deliberate action. Doing is anything a person is engaged in. P’s experience includes everything P does or which happens to P or which P takes part in. It includes internal and external components. It includes thoughts and feelings. It includes intuitions. It includes vague contacts with P’s social environment. Change is any difference in what happens or what is. A cause is anything that which helps determine a change. Persons try to influence the situations they encounter. They often do this order to obtain or prevent results of various kinds, and to the extent they are effective, what happens is partially a result of personal causation. Personal causation is the phenomena of persons effecting situations they encounter thru intentional action, even when the action is not deliberate. Altho I would not have to have the exact reality and person concepts of PNDP that I now turn to, some version of these concepts is vital.
$
Understanding: This is
one of my most ubiquitous vital subconcepts. It involves knowledge and
relational comprehensions. Knowledge is of 3 basic types: know-that, know-how,
know-with. P’s know-that includes any informational knowledge. It includes any
information that P finds believable and that P is willing to use as a basis for
any type of action. P’s know-how includes the cognitive aspects of P’s action
capabilities. Know-with always includes know-that components, and often
contains know-how components. However it is too fluid to be reduced to these
more discrete types of knowledge. I have difficulty imagining that any one
could think of know-with as an accumulation of facts. I find know-with the
primary way of learning thru experience and know-that something that occurs by
focusing on some very limited feature of know-with. A relational comprehension
is an understanding and an appreciation of a relationship. It is possible to
know that Pope Leo convinced Attila to leave of his invasion and that that
Papacy became a more significant institution thereafter, and to have little or
no appreciation of the relationship between these facts.
$Imagined and Actualized States: A state is actualized to the extent that it is directly involved in what actually happened. The walk I did not take last Monday is an event which was not actualized. It is an imagined event in the sense that its place is in my imagination. My imagination while thinking about this event is a personal state which has been actualized. This personal state is directly connected to the choice I made to take a long walk last Tuesday. When talking about this imagined event to some other person P, I expect P can also imagine such an event, and thus such an event will have a place in P’s imagination. It is convenient to assign a public status to this imagined event, so that I can say we are thinking about the same event.
The highly public imagined physical object called the Starship Enterprise belongs to a realm of interest for a number of persons. The imagined status of states within this realm is not problematic in any significant sense.
Altho types are imagined states, they differ from fictional states in the way they relate to actualized states. The type bicycle is directly related to a multitude of actualized objects in a way that directly involves what happens to those objects. Fictional states are not so related.
$Remote vs Manifest States: A state is manifest to the extent it is related to ordinary experiences. In addition to imagined physical states or types of physical states, which are fairly manifest, there are a multitude of other types of imagined state that are much less manifest. One such type that I find highly interesting includes states that are at least more than one step removed from highly manifest ones. Any two specific apples is an actual manifest object, when thought of as a pair. Two apples is a type of object a little less manifest that a specific pair. The type ‘two objects’ is some what less manifest. The ordinary public concept of 2 is even less manifest. The PNCM concept of 2 is related to a concept of the PNCM concept of the set of all natural numbers, a set far enough removed from manifest states to be classified as a remote state.
$The Personal: The ontic type personal includes anything whose creation involves the deliberate action of a person or of persons. Any such thing may be classified as more or less artificial, depending on the amount of personal involvement in its creation.
$Natural and Paranatural: Natural events are those that it seems to be analyzable or explainable using concepts and models from physics and chemistry or from biology. Paranatural events are any that do not lend itself to such analysis and explanations. Much of what humans do is paranatural.
The physical and biological are subclasses of the natural. I am classified as a physical system when I step on a scale, but as a person when I study concepts. A person is a personal state, while a Homo-Sapien is a biological state. Since a human being is a person who is a Homo-Sapien, the classification of human being is both biological state and a personal state. A state that is both impersonal and supernatural is platonistic, a class I use primarily as a convenience for talking with people who think in terms of such states.
$Conceptual Philosophy: Conceptual Philosophy is the conceptual study of vital subconcepts with a focus on the other concepts these subconcepts most directly support. The term ‘conceptual philosophy’ also refers to the nets that result from such study. Ontics is the branch of conceptual philosophy that focuses on a purely conceptual study of the reality concepts. Its main concern is on the categories that might be useful in thinking about reality. Epistemics is the branch of conceptual philosophy that focuses on a purely conceptual study of understanding.
$Conceptual vs Paraceptual: The fact that a red bishop cannot take any piece on a black square is independent of any state of affairs in the world of chess. This is purely conceptual information within in our conceptual net for thinking about the world of chess. That a red bishop has placed your king in check uses this net to give information about a state of affairs this net is intended to help us understand. Such information is paraceptual in relation to this net. Likewise that first cousins share a pair of grandparents is conceptual information about the relationship between concepts used in our public net for ordinary family relationships, since it is independent of any state in the realm of families. Information such as ‘Bill and Jane are first cousins’ is paraceptual in relation to this net.
¨ Conceptual information is about concepts and relationships between concepts in some net. Such information is known by working within the net.
¨ Paraceptual information presupposes some net, but is about some particular state of affairs that the net is intended to help access. It includes any information that is not purely conceptual.
$Plausibility: Plausibility is a relation between a person P and a statement S, indicating the extent to which P is willing to act as if S was true. A simplistic account of this can be given in terms of betting. Suppose P considers betting that X is true. If P finds X somewhat plausible then P might make the bet with a payoff of at least $100. If P finds X only somewhat implausible then P might make not make the bet with a payoff lower than $250. If P finds X highly implausible then P might not make the bet unless the payoff way much higher. The concept of plausibility, and how it differs from the concept of probability, is developed A Net for Understanding
$Believables: P’s believables include beliefs and assumptions and conjectures, along with anything else that P finds at least minimally plausible.
$Conceptual Study: Study is a type of intentional action in which P wants to enhance P’s understanding of something and in which P’s performance is guided by that want. Conceptual study (CS) is guided by a want to understand some portion of a net, Pure CS involves conceptual study of some realm which is a net.
$Theories and Models: Altho the term theory still occurs in mathematics, it is not used in a paraceptual manner. Outside of mathematics, a theory involves paraceptual claims about some realm. It is intended to explain how some feature of this realm works or what is true within this realm. A model also relates to some paraceptual considerations about realm, but only in a suggestive manner that provides a perspective on what considerations about the realm might be plausible. Altho conceptual claims may be made within the model, none of these is to be to be considered as a paraceptual claim about the intended realm of application for the model. Due to the difference between the intent of a theory and of a model, holding incompatible theories is problematic while using incompatible models may be highly useful.
$The Concept of a Version: When a person P thinks about a state within some realm of interest that is not purely conceptual, a person P will use more than a net for that realm. P will also use paraceptual believables about various matters related to the realm. A version of the realm is the collection of all such believables. A version may focus on some fairly manifest believables about particular states. It will also usually include believables that P assumes work fairly well in describing principles about how things work and what can be or happen in the realm.
A cosmic image is a unified way of looking at the nature of the universe and the way that persons fit into the general scheme of things. A cosmic image utilizes some of the subconcepts that are the deepest most ubiquitous. A cosmic image may be taken as a convenient functional perspective on the concepts used to think about the way things seem to work. A cosmic version is a cosmic image that is taken seriously as a substantive account of the way things really are.
$Paradigms: The concept of a
paradigm is the one given by Thomas Kuhn. He used the concept in relation to
the endeavors a scientific community makes in regards to some realm of
interest. His concept could be extended in an obvious manner to other types of
communities having any other limited realm of interest. This concept could also
be extended the realm that includes the interests of a community that go beyond
any limited realms, in which case the paradigm is a comprehensive paradigm.
$Process Knowledge: Knowing a process means knowing how to do something.
$State Knowledge: Knowing a state means being reasonably familiar with it.
$Evaluation Concepts: Evaluation concepts summarized here are developed in Part 3 Chapter 3 of APATCP. To value a state is to assign a significant worth to it. A value for P is any kind of state that P values. A value is a power to the extent that P has the ability to use it in guiding and mobilizing P’s actions. Furthermore the extent to which P’s action achieves states that P values is a major factor that P uses in appraising the achievement and significance of that action.
An ideal for a person P is a special kind of value that consists of a vision for some state S. S may be some actual state that P would have preserved or S my be some imagined state that P wants to have created. To qualify as an ideal, a value must persist over time, be applicable to numerous situations, be acknowledged as a high priority reason for action. If an ideal is actually given high priority in P’s behavior, this ideal is an operational ideal.
Having the capacity to engage in deliberate action is a complex capacity influenced by all of a person’s powers and dispositions and derivatives. P has functional wellbeing to the extent that P’s characteristics allow and enable P to successfully engage in a wide variety of deliberate acts that P finds significant. P is in a pathological state to the extent that P’s characteristics inhibit or do not allow P to successfully engage in deliberate acts that P finds significant. X is in P’s self-interest to the extent that X helps maintain or enhance P’s functional wellbeing. If P’s functional wellbeing is deteriorating then X is in P’s self-interest to the extent that X helps retards this deterioration.
The concept of self-interest is at the root of one of my main relational concepts of good, namely the concept of being good for a person. X is good for P if the net effect of X on in relation to P’s self-interest in the long term is positive. Since self-interest depends on what a person finds significant and the evaluation criteria used in this regard, this concept of what is good for P has an irreducible personalized component. This personalized concept of P’s self-interest depends not only on P’s needs and desires, but also on P’s goals and values. The concept of being good for P also depends on what is meant by ‘long-term’, which I take to mean as extending over the time of P’s existence. As such it may be difficult to determine what is good for P. However in many cases the major effects of X are in the present and near future, so only fairly short-term self-interest needs to be considered.
$Ethical Concepts: The ethical impact of an action X is the
effect X has on the wellbeing of one or more persons other than the actor. To
the extent that P considers the ethical impact that X might have as
significant, P has an ethical concern
in relation to X. X is an ethically
relevant act for P if it would be an ethical concern for some person.
Any value of P’s that P relates to the good of other is an ethical value for P. An ethical guide for P is any guide that P
uses to consider what to do about acts that are ethically relevant A good ethical guide for P is one which
supports or enhances P’s ethical values and in particular to support P’s most
basic ones. An ethical system is a
system that includes a conceptual net for thinking about ethical concerns, a
set of ethical values, and some ethical guides. An ethics is a broader concept that includes an ethical system
along with paraceptual ethical knowledge about what affect the values of this
system. These and other ethical cocepts are developed
in Chapter 4 of A Net for Doing.