The Instinctive Buffer Zone

[sunspot]

I was not sure where to put this topic. But since instincts are as much psychological as physical I thought this might be a good place. The idea came to me yesterday when I realized that there is no one size fits all when it comes to our instincts. There appears to be a buffer that allows for variety around an optimum.

 

Let me just start with an example. If we look at the breathing instinct. This is the most important instinct since after about 7min without air, tragic results can occur in most people. Luckily, this instinct is done for us, unconsciously, to assure not too much tampering. Exercise, although beneficial to good breathing is not essential. Many people can live sedate lifestyles and still live to a ripe old age. Such people live in the green zone of the breathing instinct. Exercise is a little better than normal breathing because it can expand the lungs for better air flow and even adding extra lung cells compared to a sedate lifestyle. Exercise is the bright green center of the green zone with respect to the breathing instinct. Normal breathing is the rest of the green zone.

 

Breathing is more than the mechanics of the in-out of air. Air quality can also have an impact on the breathing instinct. The ideal air may be in a remote forest after a rain. The air is not only clean of pollen and dust because of the rain, but also from polution because of remoteness. Also the trees are producing fresh oxygen for us to breath. Fresh new oxygen may not be important but it can't hurt.

 

Very few people have the luxury to live in a remote forest. Most live in cities and suburbs and can still live to a ripe all age. Much of this may also be in the green zone or at the perimeter of the green zone. In very poluted cites we begin to enter the yellow zone. Some people can still exist within this buffer with few ill affects. While others begin to show signs of respiratory problems. With some precautions the yellow zone is still within the buffer zone of the breathing instinct.

 

Beyond the yellow zone is the red zone. This may be jobs like coal mining. Or circumstances that bring us in contact with a lot of smoke from fires. The red zone is an area where the natural instinct begins to get damaged with various degrees of exposure. There may well be an orange zone between the yellow/red, where short term exposure is reversible but beyond a certain amount of time is permenantly damaging. One thing that comes to mind is breathing radioactivity. One is allowed so much per year.

 

Cigarette smoking lies somewhere in the range from the yellow to the red zone. It is definitely not in the green zone. If someone didn't start smoking until they were 21 and only smoked 5-cigs/per day and quit at 40, they would probally never leave the yellow zone, especially if they also exercised. On the other hand, a child who starts smoking at 10 and is up to 2pk/day by 16 may actually stay in the yellow zone until the twenties, because of their young lungs, and then enter the red zone in their thirties as their lungs begin to reach a steady state.

 

What I am trying to show here is that is no one size does fits all when it come to the instincts. This is usually a green zone. But there is also a yelloow buffer zone for each instinct. The buffer zone may not be the optimum green zone of the bright green bulls-eye, but it lies within the range of instinctive adaptation. Maybe culture could benefit by defining the optimum for all the various instincts and then define the buffer that allows for choice within the adaptiverange of that instinct.

 

Maybe other forum members would like to propose what they see as the the green, yellow and red zones of say the hunger instinct. After we set the outline for each instinct we can go back and argue the details. Let us start at the green zone.

[Glider]

Breathing is not an instinct.

[YT2095]

the only thing indirectly instinctual about breathing is shared amongst only a select Few mammals (mankind being one of them), is that of Voluntary Breath control in order to comunicate, beyond that, breathing is 100% "hardwired" into your system!

[sunspot]

The breathing is hardwired for sure, which is good. Communication is a good angle concerning breathing that I didn't really consider. I know some people who can talk a whole breath. They almost appear to be able to talk on the inhale. Breathing is different than eating in that our desire to breath is usually for healthy air. I don't not know anybody who desires to breath junk air or even harmfully poluted air.

 

Most people like to breath sweet smelling air, but this is probably more connected to the instinctive sense of smell than it is to breathing. Smell and breathing may be a good example where two instincts sort of battle each other for dominance. Some people like to burn incense, while others like the smell but don't like to breath the smoke.

[sunspot]

The green zone of the hunger instinct appears to be centered on a varied and balanced diet, as outlined by the food pyramid. Humans are omnivores, which gave primative humans the ability to adapt and survive, even during the last Ice Age. A vegitarian diet is also in the green zone. Many people can live a very healthy life with nothing but veggies. If one adds milk, cheese, eggs, fish, etc., to the veggie diet one is also adding other nuitrients getting closer to the bull's eye, which allows maximum adaptation. The center of the bull's eye may also include the wide variety of cultural specialties, such as unique veggies. The soybean comes to mind and there are many others.

 

Besides what enters the mouth, the green zone of the hunger instinct is also a function of quantity, the frequency of eating, even how one chews of prepares the food. The last point is interesting in that cutting fine or chewing small allows the body to digest better. Bigger prepared chucks or swallowing food in big gulps sends things in the digestive track that can take longer to digest. Cooking meat is definitely in the green zone.

 

Food quantity is often a measure of body size and metabolism with so many calories per day being optimum for most. But size is sort of subjective, since some people can appear a little over or under weight and still live a long life, Quantity is even mmore flexible if one looks at longer terms cycles. Most people will eat much more during the holidays. Many will then diet as a New Years Resolve ,and then drop off the diet and eat moderately over the rest of the year. In a years time, this is probally green zone, but in a smaller time frame, the hunger instinct may fluctuate from the green to yellow to red and back to the green.

 

The hunger instinct green zone is also dependant on the frequency of eating. The three meals a day is probally within the green zone but there may be other combinations that are also in the green zone, such as five smaller meals.

 

The yellow zone is both a short and long term zone. If one only eats certain foods that do not contain a good balance, one can still survive and live long but this may create add edstresses to the body. Short term yellow zone eating probally does little harm in the long term, but it may be worse for one if it become a longer term average.

 

The red zone may include malnutrition, spoiled food, raw meat, the ingestion of wild mushrooms, household cleaning products, lead paint, etc., It can also be extreme behavior that long term exceeds or does not meet the volume and quality requirements of yellow zone eating.

 

The hunger instinct is fairly flexible, over the long term. It allows periods of yellow and even red zone eating. If one's long term eating allows one to average green, short term variety should have no long term affect. The closer to the bulls eyes for longer periods of time one places themselves, the more yellow maybe red zone periods that can be averaged, over the long term, and still allow one to end up in a average lifetime green zone.

 

Maybe knowing the bulls eye allows one a better handle on how much of the good life or bad life is still good for you.

[YT2095]

I don't not know anybody who desires to breath junk air or even harmfully poluted air.

 

funny you should say that, as You Do now

 

I smoke about 20 a day and love the smell of a well running petrol engine (leaded or otherwise).

neither of which are good for me, but I elect (quite voluntarily) to expose myself to both of these.

 

I think in this instance you should steer clear of Absolutes in your statements

[Glider]

The desire to breathe is caused by a reduction in blood pH (i.e. a buldup of carbon dioxide).

 

Hunger is not an instinct either. This is controlled largely by blood glucose levels.

 

I'm not really sure of the purpose of your posts, they seem largely rhetorical and not conducive to discussion (bearing in mind this is a discussion forum), moreover, they are based on flawed assumptions.

[sunspot]

I smoke about 20 a day and love the smell of a well running petrol engine (leaded or otherwise). neither of which are good for me, but I elect (quite voluntarily) to expose myself to both of these.

 

The sense of smell is often combined with breathing yet both are distinct. If you could smell the same smell without harmful air, you could have the best of both worlds. I like to smoke some cigs, about 1/2 pk a day. I try not to smoke during the day only early morning and the evenings. I fugure it is in the buffer zone for me.

 

The desire to breathe is caused by a reduction in blood pH (i.e. a buldup of carbon dioxide).

 

Hunger is not an instinct either. This is controlled largely by blood glucose levels.

 

I'm not really sure of the purpose of your posts, they seem largely rhetorical and not conducive to discussion (bearing in mind this is a discussion forum), moreover, they are based on flawed assumptions.

 

There are two sides to our instincts. There is the purely biochemical as you pointed out. But there is also a psychological side; starts in the head. This is where the biochemical feedback loops comes to life. The psychology that is used to satisfy the biochemical potential is what I am trying to address. For example, the body has specific biochemical needs with respect to food. How we satisfy the needs comes down to our behavior. The body is quite flexible allowing variety. Science is learning what the optimum foods are, but many people's feeding behavior lead them to cake and chips inspite this biochemical optimium. The psychological aspect of the instinct is more flexible than the optimum biochemical. The body still survives indicating that there is probably a biochemical buffer zone that extends beyond the optimum. This makes room for nonoptimized choices.

 

Humans are not delicate flowers that will wilt if they are put in a nonoptimized biochemical environment.

I was hoping, as a discussion we can address the theoretical optimum and the less than optimum that still seems to work

[Glider]

No, hunger is not an instinct. Nor is there any 'buffer zone' (beyond what a person can store). If you don't get what you need, you will suffer. This can be no food at all, or it can be a single element missing from an unbalanced diet (e.g. Iron, Iodine, selenium, boron etc.).

 

The same as flowers, humans will and do 'wilt' if they do not get what they need to survive. Happily, unlike flowers, humans can obtain what they need from a variety of different sources, but that we react badly to being deprived of a single necessary element makes us the same as any other organism.

 

I was hoping, as a discussion we can address the theoretical optimum and the less than optimum that still seems to work

So, is it a discussion on dietary requirements that you want? The optimum is not theoretical and there are many sources that can tell you the prognoses for deficiencies in all the necessary elements and compounds (and their treatments).

 

If you really want a discussion (rather than simply to lecture), then you need to start with a question or some proposition, such as the possible existence of these 'buffer zones'. If you simply post a lecture that is based on the inherent assumption that such buffer zones exist, then, given that nobody else will have heard of them you can't really expect a discussion.

 

You can't expect other people to know the words to your made up song and you can't be disppointed if they don't sing along.

 

By all means post questions or propose topics for discussion, but please stop posting conjectural and rhetorical lectures.

[sunspot]

I am a theoretical speculator and come up with new things. Along the line of this discussion I would like present something for discussion. It has to do with sensory expectation. It is something more associated with the psychology behind instinct than the biochemistry.

 

One often assumes the sensory systems always behave in a cause and affect relationship. Or the sensory system inputs data and we react. With instinctive brain potentials, the sensory affect often comes before the sensory cause. For example, if it is evening and one gets a little hungry for a snack, they may picture a bowl of ice cream in their mind's eye. One might then go to the freezer to find the ice cream so it can satisfy the sensory expectations of taste, smell, cold, sweet, etc..

 

If there is no ice cream, for the craving, one may not be as satisfied with just some cookies and milk, even though they essentially contain the same chemical value. This is because they do not totally forfill the sensory expectations. They will satisfy the hunger but not that something else. A pregnant woman might get her husband to go to the store to get the ice cream because the sensory expectation is more important than simply the sum of the food components needed to satify the biochemical hunger.

[YT2095]

so you`re atempting to differentiate between Want and Need.

is that it?

 

you`ve presented No question again, or opening for Discussion. so I`m left with having to make my Own opening based upon assumption

 

you could at least Throw us a Bone!

[gcol]

If breathing and hunger are not instincts, but are, shall we say biologically programmed responses to stimuli, then what, pray is the difference between an instinct and a biological imperative? I expect you all have opinions, but a scientifically sound answer will be a long time coming.....

[YT2095]

when you touch something Hot, you instictively withdraw away from it, but you can Choose not to, for so long even that it may infact Kill you, the signal that Says it`s Hot is not instinct, the withdrawl is.

 

when you breathe, you may choose to hold your breath, maybe even for a long time, but eventualy, you WILL start breathing again whether you like it or not

 

Hunger, you May choose NOT to eat, fine, but your body will then just eat without your consent, and actualy Comsume the very material that you`re constructed of, again, you lack the choice

[Glider]

I am a theoretical speculator and come up with new things.

Then post them in the Speculations forum. Do not simply make baseless statements.

 

If breathing and hunger are not instincts, but are, shall we say biologically programmed responses to stimuli, then what, pray is the difference between an instinct and a biological imperative? I expect you all have opinions, but a scientifically sound answer will be a long time coming.....

Yeah, a couple of hours at least.

 

An instinctive behaviour is an unlearned yet complex behavioural response to an external stimulus that is automatic and universal to the species. An instinct is the hard-wired mechanism underlying the behavioural drive.

 

Breathing and hunger are not responses to external stimuli. Breathing is a vegatative brainstem function that occurs regardless of stimuli. Changes in blood pH only modulate respiratory rate.

 

Hunger is a sensation resulting from physiological changes (e.g. hypoglycaemia) resulting from alterations in blood chemistry. This triggers a negative affect and the behavioural motivation to seek food.

 

Neither breathing nor hunger are complex behaviours, nor are they responses to external stimuli. Nor are they unique to any species. They are both homeostatic functions common to all animals (that have the mechanisms for respiration and feeding).

 

However, feeding behaviours in many cases are instictive (e.g. hunting, browsing, seeking fruits etc.).

 

Withdrawing your hand from something hot is a reflex. This is neither an instinct nor a conscious behaviour. It relies on a reflex arc (basically an interneuron between the afferent and efferent pathways in the spinal cord). The reflex arc is a functional unit in itself and works at the spinal level requiring no input from higher levels (i.e. the brain).

[gcol]

I almost understood that.....

[sunspot]

I guess my problem is that I don't use the standard definitions, which makes it difficult for others to know where I am coming from. I understand the phenomena but lose something in translation. If we look at what I called sensory expectation, that would be what pops into one's mind when a particular instinct sounds. It is a lead aspect of an instinctive human behavior. For humans it is partially hardwired and partially learned. If we get hungry we gather food. This is hardwired. But before we gather we see in our imagination what we desire to eat.

 

Let me give another example of sensory expectation. If a wild dog begins to get hungry, he may have a hankering for the local rabbit. Even though he can eat nuts and berries, these will not catch his attention unless he is really hungry. The sensory expectation of eating rabbit has a certain expected smell, so he will sniff the ground looking for an overlapping scent stimulus. When he smells rabbit, he will begin tracking in the direction of increasing smell concentration. The final smell that correlates to his sensory expectation is the rabbit in his mouth being chewed.

 

If while he is tracking, he smells a natural enemy, he will respond directly to the sensory stimulus in an instinctive way, trying to minimize the smell concentration by going the other way. In this case the survival instinct might overide the hunger behavior clearing the sensory expectation slate. When he feels safe, he may smell around looking for a food stimulus, with or without the same sensory expectation, and begin food tracking again.

 

The sense of smell is not an instinct, but the sensory expectation, can lead or bias the instinctive behavior. In other words, the neural wiring that is created to due to instinctive experiences combined with the operation of the sensory systems, can add another layer at the top of the instinctive behavior of a species. This can bias the collective instinctive behavior to the experiences of individuial.

[Glider]

Well, if you don't use the standard definitions, how can you expect people to participate in your discussions?

 

However, that's not really the point. The point is that you lecture. For example, from your second paragraph onwards, again you provide a thesis on 'Sensory Expectation', which boils down to a lecture stating "This is how it is". There is no question of 'could it be this way?' or '[/i]Could this hypohtesis explain certain behaviours?[/i]'. It brooks no discussion.

 

If you wish to assert this mechanism as an explanation of a behaviour, then cite your sources. If you are speculating, post in the Speculations forum. If you wish to discuss the possibility that 'Sensory expectaion' may explain caertain behaviours, then ask for discussion. Make it clear that this is your opinion/hypothesis and you are posting it for testing.

 

As it is, your hunting dog example contains flaws. Hunger in predators triggers hunting behaviours. There is no a priori expectation of 'rabbit' or any specific animal/item. Just 'prey', i.e. anything that moves and is small enough to tackle. Specific 'expectations' would be maladaptive as they would increase the chances that any possible prey that was not a rabbit would be overlooked as it would not trigger the attack phase.

 

As it is, a hungry predator (e.g. a fox) will go for anything that triggers the attack phase of the hunting behaviour: rabbits, mice, birds, voles, lizards etc.. Essentially, anything that falls into the category 'potential prey' and presents certain characteristics, i.e. 'Moving', 'smaller than me' and does not trigger an avoidance response (i.e. is not in itself dangerous).

[sunspot]

I might be projecting human traits into animals, but I chose dogs because some are quite ingenious. Scent tracking dogs can be given a scent to smell and will sniff around to find that scent, ignorring other interesting smells along the way that should trigger food tracking. They may go miles before smelling what they are looking for, ignorring instinctive triggers.

 

The sensory systems are usually considered feedforward, like your example of the fox tracking anything that smells good enough to eat. What I call sensory expectation is an instinctive use of the sensors to make reality coordinate with sensory expectation. The architech has an image in his or her mind of a new building. Reality is shaped until the visual reality takes the form of the visual expectation. In this case the sensory systems are used for both feedback and feedforward.

 

I do not mean to be long winded but to continue this analogy. Some architechs may design a building that is much more form than function and it may not be possbile to build this building using the existing principles of engineering and materials. Other building designs may stay within these parameters, but at the perimeter, and may still be limited by possible geology and weather considerations. While other designs can meet all these parameters.

 

The way I look at it, we are architechs of our own sensory expectations. In everyday life we design our instinctive drives using various behaviors. One also designs the sensory expecation of the sensory systems to reinforce our beliefs and desires. If one believed that the world is flat one could find visual data that appears to reinforce this sensory expectation.

 

The green zone of instincts are behavior designs that can meet all the natural parameters associated with our biochemistry. One can also live in the yellow zone at the margin whats physically possible, with unforseen events causing the structures to fall. Others can live in the red zone of behavioral design that exceed the limits of our body's engineering and material properties. The buffer zone map was an attempt to help people understand how various types of behavioral design relate to the body's practical parameters. There is a buffer but there is also a bulls eye.

 

The sensory expectation within some branches of psychology appears to be relative behavior. This is what many people desire to see and some branches of psychology are helping to create this fanatasy world beyond the practical reality of our instincts.

[Glider]

The buffer zone map was an attempt to help people understand how various types of behavioral design relate to the body's practical parameters. There is a buffer but there is also a bulls eye.

This is what I'm talking about. You want to 'help people to understand', but in order to do so you present conjecture and speculation. These two are mutually exclusive.

 

If you say you want to help people to understand a thing, it's generally good practice to demonstrate that you understand what it is you want them to know. I don't think you do.

 

The sensory expectation within some branches of psychology appears to be relative behavior. This is what many people desire to see and some branches of psychology are helping to create this fanatasy world beyond the practical reality of our instincts.

This makes absolutely no sense at all.

 

Do some reading. Get a basic grasp of Psychology and an understanding of instinctive behaviours. At least get a grasp of standard terminology. Then come back and present a case.

[sunspot]

At one time I had a good grasp of psychology. But the modern science equivilent of religion appeared to be suffering from a multiple personality disorder or scientific polytheism. Why are there so many opinions on even simple things like motivation. That is when I decided to go it alone. My standard data base of ideas has atrophied but my understanding is better than it was.

 

What I called sensory expectation is more than the way we act on our instincts. It is also connected to how one percieves reality. One will use their sensors to reinforce this perception of reality. If one is a bigot, they will be able to see examples all around them. But their expectation will cause them to ignor, either consciously or unconsciously data that they do not expect to see (does not satisfy their expectation). Someone with a counter perception will ignor the bigot's data and only see what they perceieve to be reality. Reality is in the middle somewhere. If one takes a middle position to include all the data, very often neither side is able to see it, because their expectation needs one-sided data.

 

Science is not immune. If we look at physics. The universe started as a big bang of the primordial atom, mass transfer from another dimension, matter giesers from black holes/white holes, from a primal energy field, out of the vacuum of space, etc.. These are all mutually exclusive, yet each camp can see data to support their position. Even if one is correct, I gave four other examples of science illusions that are considered reality due to using limted data that reinforces their belief.

 

One would think that psycholgy woulld be advanced enough to step in and say, "hold your horses", your turning science into disney world. But psychology can't because they are doing the same thing. The relativity of behavior bias is the problem. We have all these architechs building sand castles. If one tries to point that out, only that person is out of touch with reality. If I was to guess it is due to psychology trying to replace religion. It took and is taken a polarized position. Religion teaches absolutes so psychology has to take the relative position. Religion taught divine design so psycholgy has to teach random occurance. The truth is probably in the middle.

 

This current state of affairs was predicted by art in the 1950's. This work of art is called relativity. Each point of view appears valid but itself but all together they create many mutually exclusive references.

[Glider]

At one time I had a good grasp of psychology. But the modern science equivilent of religion appeared to be suffering from a multiple personality disorder or scientific polytheism. Why are there so many opinions on even simple things like motivation. That is when I decided to go it alone. My standard data base of ideas has atrophied but my understanding is better than it was.

Opinions? Theories. We call them 'theories'. As it goes, the mechanisms of motivated behaviour are comparatively well understood, as is the role of the thalamus in them. It is the more complex behaviours that are problematic.

 

Whilst there is nothing inherently wrong with 'going it alone', discarding the basics is always a mistake. If you want to present new ideas (which is a good thing), you have to make sure they do not contradict what is already known, or at least that which has a body of evidence in support of it. If you think the accepted view is wrong, you need to present stronger evidence for your view, or evidence that refutes the current view.

 

In any event, what exactly is the problem with 'scientific polytheism'? All it means is that people are approaching the same problems from different perspectives. Or do you consider it a problem that people are not all approaching these problems from the same perspective? If so, which perspective would you like them to use? Yours perhaps?

 

What I called sensory expectation is more than the way we act on our instincts. It is also connected to how one percieves reality. One will use their sensors to reinforce this perception of reality. If one is a bigot, they will be able to see examples all around them. But their expectation will cause them to ignor, either consciously or unconsciously data that they do not expect to see (does not satisfy their expectation). Someone with a counter perception will ignor the bigot's data and only see what they perceieve to be reality. Reality is in the middle somewhere. If one takes a middle position to include all the data, very often neither side is able to see it, because their expectation needs one-sided data.

Here you are confusing instinctive behaviours with stereotype reinforcement. These are separate issues and are not comparable. Bigots have the same instincts as all other members of the species. Stereotype reinforcement is not an instinctive behaviour.

 

By the way, it's 'senses'. Spaceships and androids from Star Trek use sensors. Humans have senses).

 

Science is not immune. If we look at physics. The universe started as a big bang of the primordial atom, mass transfer from another dimension, matter giesers from black holes/white holes, from a primal energy field, out of the vacuum of space, etc.. These are all mutually exclusive, yet each camp can see data to support their position. Even if one is correct, I gave four other examples of science illusions that are considered reality due to using limted data that reinforces their belief.

Again, these are theories, not illusions. Theories are held or disgarded depending on the data. Nobody considers them 'reality' as most scientists realise that theories are merely predictive models used to explain reality. I.e. they are explanations of the processes underlying observable reality, they are not themselves considered reality. They change over time as the body of data changes.

 

One would think that psycholgy woulld be advanced enough to step in and say, "hold your horses", your turning science into disney world. But psychology can't because they are doing the same thing. The relativity of behavior bias is the problem. We have all these architechs building sand castles. If one tries to point that out, only that person is out of touch with reality. If I was to guess it is due to psychology trying to replace religion. It took and is taken a polarized position. Religion teaches absolutes so psychology has to take the relative position. Religion taught divine design so psycholgy has to teach random occurance. The truth is probably in the middle.

Why would Psychology step in a tell physicists that they're deluded? I don't know what you mean by 'relativity of behaviour bias', but Psychologists use the same method as other scientists. They observe a behaviour, formulate a theory to explain it and then try to refute the theory through a process of hypothesis testing. Psychology does not define its methods or position by taking contrary positions to those of any religion. That would be to define Psychology by what religion isn't and defining yourself by what onother isnt is always foolish.

 

Building sand castles is not a bad analogy. If the ones that are built are flawd and do not represent the real castle, then they will fall when the tide comes in. The one that most closely represents reality will stand and be accepted, until it falls and is replaced by a better, more accurate model.

 

What is it exactly that you think scientists are doing wrong? Maybe it's scientific method you have a problem with? Or is it that someone once told you that you are out of touch with reality and you won't let it go?

 

This current state of affairs was predicted by art in the 1950's. This work of art is called relativity. Each point of view appears valid but itself but all together they create many mutually exclusive references.

This is the evidence you present in support of your case? A picture by Escher? This picture is not predictive of any state of affairs. It is not evidence of anything.

 

I'll say it again, if you have a case, present it. Do so clearly and coherently. If your issue is with science or scientific method, present it in general discussion. If your problem is with the way people think or behave in genreal, that should also go in general discussion. If your issue is with Psychology in particular, present it here. In any case, present your argument clearly; state exactly what the problem is and your evidence for it. Try to avoid irrelevancies and try to avoid presenting rambling, conjectural lectures.

[sunspot]

Sorry for going a little overboard. After thinking about it I realize that there are two valid approaches to science; an integral and a differential approach. Sorry for the new terms. The many points of view around a phenomena, like the human mind, is what I will call a differential approach. All these approaches are useful for seeing different angles of the same phenomena. Each by approaching the phenomena at a slightly different angle provides new data and new insight.

 

The integral approach was what I tried to do. My early perception was that each differential approach is expressing truth but noone is expressing the whole truth or there would be no real need for other points of view. The idea for the integral approach was to gather the various theories and try in integrate them into a relationship that could accomodate the truth in all the points of view. An integral approach is not just another differential approach but is treated like it is. It is a lot harder finding compromises than focusing on a single angle.

 

This is where nomenclature gets tough. If I speak of the ego as the center of the conscious personality, there is a tendancy to equate word ego with a Freudian orientation, even though this term is being used in a more comprehensive way for the integration. There are other orientations that look at the conscious center of the personality but none are complele. If I call it the oge (that's ego spelled backwards) to help differentiate a more integrated interpretation nobody knows what I am talking about. It is hard to use standard nomenclature without shifting the center point to a differential point of view.

 

One of the models I presented a little while back was thought dimensional theory, where various types of human thoughts, perceptions, instincts and behavior can all be plotted on one diagram and modelled as thought analogies from 0-D to 4-D. This analogy model could be used by any orientiation to plot its theories and ideas, because it is fully integrated. I came up with this many years ago when everything was fresh in my mind but it was treated as another differential approach. It is hard for 2-D thinkers (cause and affect/differential) to understand the validity of the integral approach.

 

The senses are all the sensory systems. Each of the sensory systems, at its data collection point, I called sensors.