Sociology & Politics
Sociology
Sociology involves understanding how people behave in groups, including how they communicate and interact with one another. PCT provides a way to understand how people’s goals operate when in groups, and we can use computers to model how more than one control system interacts in a group setting. The Crowd Demonstration link illustrates this. Each of the moving circles on the screen is an ‘agent’ who has two control systems – one to be as close as possible to its target, and another to be beyond a certain distance from other ‘agents’. Some of the demo programs online show how changing the numbers and control system settings of the agents can lead to a huge range of different social scenarios – from the classic duckling-following-parent to large scale crowd behaviour.
Clark McPhail, Kent McClelland and several other prominent sociologists have made a convincing case that PCT can be used to understand sociology. Further sociologists, such as David Heise, have incorporated PCT into ‘affect control theory’, which focuses on how people’s behaviour is a means of maintaining affect (e.g. mood) within certain reference values.
Recently, Dan Miller has written a wonderful online essay about the relationship between PCT and symbolic interactionism, as described by Mead & Goffman. Click here to read it. There are also clear parallels between PCT and the radical constructivism of Ernst von Glasersfeld, described here in a short article by Bill Powers.
Law
At present, the application of PCT to Law is at its early stages. Hugh Gibbons is one exception. He has co-authored a biological model of human rights based around the tenets of PCT and he also illustrates a case using PCT in this key manuscript, available online soon.
Politics & Philosophy
PCT takes a strongly scientific approach to human nature. It proposes that people and other living systems are purposeful – and that the systems that are responsible for purposeful action are explainable in mechanistic terms. It takes the paradigm of model-building within physics and engineering and applies it to biology and psychology.
The philosopher Thomas S. Kuhn expressed his praise over Powers (1973) book: "this manuscript is among the most exciting I have read in some time; the achieved synthesis is thoroughly original."
In a new book, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Approaches to a Science of Life, Dag Forssell explains the great importance of PCT as a 'true' science within psychology. Yet the debate continues - see the discussion about PCT having claims that are too bold on the website Lesswrong. A recent student research project documents the obstacles to learning and accepting PCT within university education.
Powers’ approach has major implications for key areas of philosophy and politics:
What is consciousness?
What is ‘will’? Can we model 'volition'?
Mark Olson approaches this issue from a PCT perspective in his Masters thesis. Also, the book 'Volitional Action: Conation and Control' provides a range of articles on the topic.
Can we explain political catastrophes through the drive for power and control?
What is the nature of reality?
How do we best test a scientific theory?
The links on the right provide just some of the essays on these topics that are available.
Rick Marken takes a visionary approach in an online article in which he imagines a future society that embraces PCT.
In March 2011, Steve Hayes met Bill Powers and they compared views on 'functional contextualism' and PCT. This discussion is now available online.