<div dir="ltr">I remember distinctly a meeting in which I mistook a Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel's facial tick for a communicative wink.... I didn't realize the mistake until over a week later, when I saw the tick happening in a context where it was clearly non-communicative ;- )<div><br></div><div>Dave asked: "<span style="font-family:Arial">But the interesting problem is with winks that are winks. How can you tell, absent context and cultural experience, if the wink were 'sincere', 'conspiritorial', 'seductive', 'parody', 'meta-parody', 'meta-anti-wink', etc."</span> </div><div><br></div><div>I don't think there is any implication that you can. Outside of a context, there isn't any meaning to be spoken of, is there? For behaviors that are more tightly bound to by genetic constraints to reliably be deployed under certain circumstances, it seems fair to talk about such issues as if members of a species were mostly interchangeable. But for behaviors that are not so constrained (any behaviors highly mold-able by operant conditioning, for example) we their "meaning" would be determined by development, and being able to "tell" what was meant would also be determined by development. </div><div><br></div><div>That much of that individual development converges on similar outcomes for people who live near each other is most of what we mean by "culture", right? </div><div><br></div><div>Also, given that it is a developmental issue, it is unsurprising that some people are generally better at it than others, and that people are generally better at it in regards to people they know and situations they are familiar with. <br clear="all"><div><div dir="ltr" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><br clear="all">-----------<br><div dir="ltr">Eric P. Charles, Ph.D.<br>Department of Justice - Personnel <span>Psychologist</span></div><div>American University - Adjunct Instructor</div><div></div></div><div dir="ltr"><a href="mailto:echarles@american.edu" target="_blank"></a></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><br></div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Thu, May 21, 2020 at 12:21 PM Steve Smith <<a href="mailto:sasmyth@swcp.com" target="_blank">sasmyth@swcp.com</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<p>and.... <br>
</p>
<p>"Sometimes a w/blink is just a w/blink?"</p>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div style="font-family:Arial">Nick,<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">You said — "I don't think anybody
who was familiar with eye movements would ever take a wink for a
blink." <br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">I can quickly think of hundreds of
examples of this not being true. One, I watched a man lose a lot
of money in a poker game because he misinterpreted a blink (sans
signal content) as if it were a wink (with signal content),
thinking that the spasm of the eyelid was a "tell" a kind of
"winking to one's inner self."<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">But the interesting problem is
with winks that are winks. How can you tell, absent context and
cultural experience, if the wink were 'sincere',
'conspiritorial', 'seductive', 'parody', 'meta-parody',
'meta-anti-wink', etc.<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial">davew<br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div style="font-family:Arial"><br>
</div>
<div>On Sat, May 16, 2020, at 11:29 AM, <a href="mailto:thompnickson2@gmail.com" target="_blank">thompnickson2@gmail.com</a>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" id="gmail-m_5568772386379533091gmail-m_3144042728449577683qt">
<div>
<p>Hi, David,<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>While I have great admiration for
Ryle, and use his notion of levels of action gratefully, I
think he and Geertz are just dead wrong here in their
premise. I don't think anybody who was familiar with eye
movements would ever take a wink for a blink. But the basic
point is still right: a wink implies higher level of
organization that a wink and a fake wink implies a higher
level of organization still. Or, I think, Geertz would call
it "deeper". "A deeper description". <br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Now on to ethology. As usual, I am
going to punish your interest with an article. Here you get
the <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281346463_Ethology_and_the_birth_of_comparative_teleonomy" target="_blank">entire history of ethology</a>, is
capsulated in three laws -- about 10 pages or so. Not a bad
a bargain, eh? In fact, if you just read from section 4.0
on, you will get the examples, which contain most of the
impact. They are very like the turkey/polcat example that
you provide, one I had never heard before! Perfect! <br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Please see larding below.<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Nick<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Nicholas Thompson<br>
</p>
<p>Emeritus Professor of Ethology and
Psychology<br>
</p>
<p>Clark University<br>
</p>
<p><a href="mailto:ThompNickSon2@gmail.com" target="_blank">ThompNickSon2@gmail.com</a><br>
</p>
<p><a href="https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/" target="_blank">https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/</a><br>
</p>
<p><br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<div>-----Original Message-----<br>
</div>
<div>From: Friam <a href="mailto:friam-bounces@redfish.com" target="_blank"><friam-bounces@redfish.com></a> On Behalf
Of Prof David West<br>
</div>
<div>Sent: Saturday, May 16, 2020 10:38 AM<br>
</div>
<div>To: <a href="mailto:friam@redfish.com" target="_blank">friam@redfish.com</a><br>
</div>
<div>Subject: [FRIAM] Behavior??<br>
</div>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Glen made a comment, "humans don't
have intention when they wink sarcastically." This triggered
a memory of Clifford Geertz channeling Gilbert Ryle. Just
before seeing Glen's comment I was reading a book on
Influence and encountered some ethology and together they
prompted a whole series of questions about behavior.<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>First a quote from Geertz/Ryle<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>"Consider two boys rapidly
contracting the eyelids of their right eyes. In one, this is
an involuntary twitch; in the other, a conspiritorial signal
to a friend. The two movements are, as movements, identical;
from an I-am-a-camera, "phenomenalistic" observation of them
alone, one could not tell which was twitch and which was
wink ... Yet the difference, however unphotographical, is
vast. ... the winker is communicating ... 1) deliberately,
2) to someone in particular, 3) to impart a particular
message, 4) according to a socially established code, and 5)
without the cognizance of the rest of the company. That
however is just the beginning. Suppose a third boy winks in
an amateurish, clumsy, and obvious manner — he is parodying
the wink ... not conspiracy, but ridicule is in the air.
Complexities are possible, if not practically without end,
at least logically so."<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Then the ethology material<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>"Turkey mothers are good
mothers—loving, watchful and protective. Virtually all of
this mothering is triggered by one thing: the "cheep-cheep"
sound of young turkey chicks. For a mother turkey the
polecat is a natural enemy whose approach is to be greeted
with squawking, pecking, clawing rage. If a stuffed model of
a polecat is drawn by string to a mother turkey it evokes
the appropriate offensive behavior, but if the same model
has a hidden tape recorder that emits the "cheep-cheep"
sound the mother not only accepts the oncoming polecat, but
gathers it beneath her.<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>This kind of "fixed action pattern"
can involve intricate sequences of behavior, such as entire
courtship or mating rituals. (see attachement). The
interesting aspect of this is how the sequences are
activated — with a "trigger feature;" e.g. a particular
shade of red or blue chest feathers, but not a perfect
replica of a rival bird absent colored chest feathers.<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>Then my questions.<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>1- Is a "behavior" always a
movement plus an X-factor?<br>
</p>
<p> 1A. is the X-factor other
nuances of movement, e.g. rippling eyelashes on the
contracted eyelid?<br>
</p>
<p> 1B. is the X-factor an
intentional signal? or is it "meaning." is intention
required?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>2- Is behavior compositional? e.g.
squawking, pecking, clawing behavioral "atoms" compose to an
anti-polecat behavioral composition? (thinking of some kind
of analog with atom --> molecule --> cell -- organism)<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>3- If meaning | signalling |
intention is a required aspect of behavior, from whence it
cometh?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>4- is "behaviorism" necessarily a
subset of semiology?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>5- If behavior is compositional,
are there rules or regularities of composition?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>6- Can culture be seen as a
collection of allowable patterns of composed behaviors?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>7- Is it necessary to have a well
developed discipline of what is observed outside the black
box before attempting to infer what is within and whatever
that might be, its relation to what is observed outside?<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
<p>davew<br>
</p>
<p> <br>
</p>
</div>
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