Jack, I appreciate the fine distinction you are making when you say
that "attempts to combat actually reinforce". The mechanism is that
to negate, you have to first validate the reference point - which
increases the "depth of its track" (so to speak).
I am completely aligned with the way that you present neural
pathways (acutally I have a refinement based in Varela's work that
I've already stated) but here's my question. If the neural pathways
approach is so strong - and I think it is - then why talk about
"mental models" at all? Why not just talk about neural pathways and
their mechanisms and interactions?
And thanks for sharing the experiment. These are the source of some
of my best and most informative material and I haven't heard of that
one. Do you have reference source for it?
It reminds me of the great Stanley Milgram experiments where people
would do inhuman things because of their perceptions of authority
figures. Many needed counseling after because they couldn't confront
the meaning of their own behaviour. And the faculty (I think it was
Harvard) insisted that they wouldn't act the same way - but they
did. So they cancelled the experiments.
-- Michael McMaster Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk