Language Enlightenment

Thursday, March 10, 2016

April 9, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

In certain environments miracles seem to be possible, while in others, one feels deprived and stuck. Stimuli controlling these different behaviors, according to B.F. Skinner, are not only outside, but also inside our skin. However, few people are capable of recognizing and accurately describing these matters. Although the majority of us is inclined to blame others, who are our environment, for our behavior, this assessment, based on our own experience, is thrown out of the window due to the prevailing belief that we ourselves are responsible for our behavior. What most us know is pushed out because our MINDS are believed to be causing our behaviors.

The fact that we tell this to ourselves and each other and that we even have laws to remind us that our actions are NOT caused by our environment, that is, by our interaction with other human beings, but by our lack of responsibility, despicable criminal motivations or by our innate devious self-nature - which, as religions would want us to believe, paradoxically, can only be overcome by total submission to an external, all-powerful God, who is ultimately responsible and taking the blame for our actions and doing for us what we are unable of doing for ourselves - is problematic.

There is no way for us to influence our own behavior, as long as we don’t realize that we DON’T cause, yes, CAN’T cause, our own actions. Our belief in our ability to cause our own actions is more troublesome than any other pre-scientific belief. The only way in which mankind is going to be able to let go of all its superstitions is by addressing this fundamental flaw in our thinking that something inside of us makes us do what we do. This utterly absurd notion lays the foundation for everything that is wrong in this world. The only real consolation that we have for all our trouble is behavioral science, which teaches us: WE DON'T CAUSE OUR OWN BEHAVIOR.

By accepting our failure to be responsible for our own actions, we can become aware of the environmental stimuli (other people) that cause, shape and maintain our behavior. Environments have determined man’s evolution and understanding this, we stop blaming ourselves and each other for this undeniable biological fact. Unless we say it out loud to ourselves, we we are NOT going to be able to say it to each other. We have NOT been able to say this to each other, because we were NOT saying this to ourselves. Why? Nobody ever told us to say this out loud to ourselves.

In Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) we come to terms with our evolutionary history. Selection by consequences pertains not only to our biology, but, of course, also to all our behavior. Our emphasis on biology is misplaced. It was the selection of our behavior which led to the selection of the whole human, biological organism. It was, and it still is, our behavior, or rather, our interaction with our environment, which either has good or bad consequences. Good, in evolutionary terms means survival. Good in behavioral terms means reinforcement and increase of our behavior.

Unless we acknowledge that we are NOT individually responsible for our own actions, we are going to destroy ourselves and each other. To the extent that we have been made responsible and feel responsible, we are deeply troubled and involved in suicidal behaviors. Our destructive tendencies are only amendable by the way in which we speak. In spite of what we believe, of all behaviors, we know the least about our talking. Because interaction is so complex and because we have been so unsuccessful in it, we have avoided looking into how our spoken communication actually works.

In SVB, we find out what went wrong with how we communicated. In SVB, we recognize that we are each other’s environment and that our communication only makes sense if we do that. When we don’t acknowledge that we are each other’s environment, our communication breaks down. We behave verbally, but, under circumstances in which we are alienated from each other, that is, from our environment, we produce Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB).

In SVB, we recognize stimuli outside and inside of our skin, which cause NVB. Moreover, in SVB we realize there is no difference between inside or outside, in terms of how our behavior is determined. In other words, we can finally become objective about that part of the world to which only we have subjective access. This can be achieved through verbal instructions such as this writing. Discriminative learning is possible by having communicators listen to themselves while they speak. Stimuli inside of our skin that cause NVB are different from the stimuli outside our skin that cause NVB. Stimuli inside of our skin separate us from our environment outside of our skin. Stimuli inside of our skin that cause NVB, take precedence over stimuli that are outside of our skin that cause NVB. Unless stimuli inside of our skin that cause NVB are communicated with greater awareness, communication about stimuli outside of our skin is not going to make any sense. What makes sense is that part of the world, our body, in which our senses are located. Communication of stimuli outside our skin only makes sense if they are linked, while we speak, to stimuli inside our skin.

Another way of explaining this is to bring our private, covert speech into our public overt speech. We can do this when we are talking with others, but we can also do this by talking with ourselves. It is helpful to do this by ourselves, because it is easier to identify the stimuli within our skin and outside our skin, when we are not disturbed by others, who would focus our attention more on stimuli that are outside of our skin. When we are by ourselves, we can easily focus on the stimuli inside our skin. As we describe them, we notice the great difference between when we talk about them or not. This difference is the difference between public and private speech. We find, to our own amazement, that we can only come to know about our private speech through our public speech. In other words, we can only find out about our private stimuli when public stimuli are not demanding our attention away from our private stimuli. Even though we are by ourselves, it is only when we express ourselves out loud, by ourselves, in public speech, that we realize what we have been saying, covertly, silently, and, unconsciously, to ourselves. Once we have experimented, privately, how to gain access to our private speech, we can bring private speech into public speech. Public speech - by ourselves - is possible and effective, because it allows us to gain access to our private stimuli.

In our communication with others, the expression of our private stimuli only makes sense to the extent that others express their private stimuli as well. If only one of the communicators is expressing private stimuli, but the other is not, and is only expressing public stimuli, we are likely to misunderstand each other, because we are talking about very different things. In SVB, we find, while we speak, what we used to perceive as our own private stimuli, are in fact public stimuli. However, only when we have the opportunity to express our private stimuli will we be able to come to this conclusion. We haven’t been able to come to this conclusion because we haven’t had the opportunity to express what we considered to be our private stimuli. In NVB we cannot achieve this opportunity.

In SVB, because we listen to ourselves while we speak, we realize that our conversation is different from NVB, which we have accepted as our normal way of talking. Moreover, in SVB, we find it is possible to say things we normally can’t say. In SVB the circumstances have been created that make this possible. Public speech is only as good as it accurately represents private speech. When it does that, private speech stops being private.

April 8, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) is a way of talking which can only be experienced if we take time for our conversation. We keep experiencing Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) because we try to keep our dialogues as short as possible. We don’t generally talk in order to explore what our conversation is going to be about. Since we already know beforehand what we are going to say, we say the same things over and over again, which is NVB. To have SVB, it is important to slow down, but once we have got it, there is no reason at all to go slow and nothing stops us from going very fast. However, we don’t want to be slowed down because this makes us aware of what we are doing. When we slow down we notice we repeat what we have already said.

The pace of our conversation is of great importance. In NVB we cannot relax, but in SVB we can be calm and focused. In SVB we are at ease, but in NVB we can never feel at ease. Experiences of safety, security, relaxation, friendliness, playfulness, exploration and creativity, are central to survival. How can there be any enjoyable conversation or a happy relationship without those experiences? It is as simple as this: as long as we are afraid, anxious, agitated and stressed, we are unable to have positive conversation and harmonious relationships. These are respondent processes based on involuntary reflexes of our nervous system. Our spoken communication is a voluntary, that is, an operant behavior, made possible by the absence of any aversive, threatening stimulation. In SVB we have time to talk and we don’t rush like we do in NVB. In SVB we experience positive relationship because the ingredients needed to make it happen are present. Indeed, NVB brings in ingredients that undermine our relationship and destroy and prevent interaction.

The letter type used to write this text is called “consolas.” This author chose this letter type because he wants to write about consolation. SVB is consoling because it allows us to accept the situation we find ourselves in. In NVB there is no acceptance. In NVB we are always struggling to get out of a situation, but in SVB we like the situation that we are in because it reinforces us. Since we speaker and listener are both benefitted by the situation in SVB, they want the situation to continue. Thus, in SVB our conversation can be about the continuation of the situation, but in NVB we are coercing a change in the situation with our conversation.

Although in SVB we understand and accept the situation as it is, this doesn’t mean that the situation isn’t changing. In SVB the situation changes in ways that it can’t in NVB. In NVB the change is forced, but in SVB, the change happens by itself. In SVB the conversation can become complex because its premise is simple, but in NVB the conversation cannot become more complex because the simplicity to make it happen is missing.

When we console each other, we tell each other that we are going to be all right. Consolation is based on trust in our abilities. Those who need to be consoled are taught by those who console them. They learn the skill by the way in which those who console them talk. Because they are comforted they learn to comfort themselves. Those who console, talk with, not at others. SVB is the language of consolation. We need to be consoled, because we have suffered a lot, but few people know how to console. NVB, our common way of communicating, is unforgiving. We have lost our ability to console, because we have been stuck in the same situation for so long that we no longer believe that we can get out of it. SVB consoles us because it takes us out of the situation that have been in. In SVB we finally accept the reality of the human condition, but in NVB, we keep pretending that we are not vulnerable.

April 6, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

We had friends over for dinner yesterday night and I got drunk. We had a pretty good time, but I was talking too much and now I am feeling a little embarrassed. Although they are good people, they are not into Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB). I spoke about my recent developments, but I might as well have spoken about the weather. Rather than sharing my enthusiasm, my friend warned me that someone may be stealing my work and get all the credit. I tried to explain that this was not going to be the case, but it also turned me off, although I didn’t say that. My friend's behavior reminded me of my father, who also always warned me for whatever could go wrong.

People who think they help others by telling them what can go wrong do so because they themselves didn’t succeed. Their lack of success causes them to focus on the possible failure of others. They cover up their own lack of success with a sense of concern for others. They don’t know this, but they want others to fail so that they can then supposedly help them. I have failed many times because of people like that and I still have to be careful with these naysayers. Like I did with my father, I tend to try to convince them that I will succeed, but instead of falling into the trap of justifying myself, I should avoid them. For me success is not determined by trying to prove myself. My friend may mean well, but his effect on me is definitely not good. I had not felt this tendency to prove myself for quite a while, but it was still there. Also, of course, because I was drunk, I talked too much.

I haven’t thought about my father for a long time, but my friend's demeanor made me think of him again. My friend triggered the problematic behavioral pattern I have repeated so many times throughout my life. It is quite useful to revisit this pattern and to look at it. It has been such a problem for me because I didn’t know how it worked. What has changed is that I don’t get angry anymore. Due to my success, I don’t need anyone's approval. However, it feels awkward, to be successful without my father and to know he will never be part of what I have discovered and had wanted to share with him.

SVB, like language, doesn’t belong to anyone and cannot be possessed. It cannot be stolen because it is a shared phenomenon. Stealing the idea of SVB doesn’t even arise, because SVB is not an idea, but a natural process. All ideas are verbal behaviors, which are made possible due to contingencies of reinforcement. Those who believe SVB is an idea which can be stolen, don’t understand what it is. Their view characterizes Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). SVB cannot be given to anyone, nor can it be taken away, just like Mandarin cannot be given to anyone or taken away. It is only possible to learn Mandarin by being exposed to the members of the Mandarin verbal community or to educational books, videos or texts. Likewise, NVB, the verbal behavior which contains all our problems and misconceptions, is also taught and learned. We acquire all our problems in the same way that we acquire our language. It is pragmatic to treat our problems as a way of talking. We don’t know how to solve our problems because we don’t speak Mandarin.

SVB is a new language and NVB is our old way of talking. We can have SVB and NVB while we are speaking Mandarin or any other language, because SVB or NVB are based on positive or negative emotions respectively. We have never treated communication of positive or negative emotions as two different languages. When we do, it becomes very clear that expertise in one often involves a deficit in the other. Those who know SVB, the language of positive emotions, of course, they don’t want to speak NVB, the language of negative emotions. They can speak it, but they don’t want to. However, those who know NVB, the language of negative emotions, can’t speak SVB, even if they had wanted to. They try, but fail. Although it shouldn’t be considered their failure, they only know NVB. We don’t say that English speaking people fail to speak Mandarin, they simply don’t know it. They may only speak a few words, but that is all they know. The only way for an English person to learn Mandarin is to take classes and to communicate with members from this verbal community, such as a teacher. Likewise, the only way to learn SVB is to be introduced to someone from this verbal community. In the same way one’s first language facilitates one’s second language, NVB facilitates SVB. One must have a first language to learn a second language. In behaviorism different languages are called equivalence classes. Just as different languages were learned in different environments, so too do SVB and NVB have their origins in different environments. By moving away from the environment of negative emotions in which one was raised one is stimulated to learn a new language, which over time extinguishes one’s old language.

April 4, 2014

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Behaviorist

Dear Reader,

What is written and what is said can be considered from an operant perspective as a function of one of four processes. It can be 1) positively reinforcing, 2) negatively reinforcing, 3) positively punishing or 4) negatively punishing the writer or the speaker. If what is written or what is said is positively reinforcing the writer or the speaker, then writing or speaking is more likely to occur in the future because of its enhancing consequences. Depending on what kind of writing and what kind of speaking is positively reinforcing the writer or the speaker, the writer will produce a particular kind of writing and the speaker will produce a particular kind of speaking. This refinement of writing and speaking is determined by environmental stimuli which set the stage for this behavior to gain momentum. The writer or speaker who acquires this specialization has a unique effect on the reader and the listener. This effect is unique in that it satisfies the taste of the reader and the listener. The writer or the speaker who is positively reinforced cultivates with his or her writing or speaking the taste and appetite of the reader and the listener.

A completely different process takes place, if the writer or the speaker is negatively reinforced for what he or she is writing or saying. In this case, it is the removal of a negative stimulus which makes a particular kind of writing or speaking more likely to occur in the future. Writing and speaking which is based on avoidance of negative consequences is negatively reinforced. If the writer or the speaker is feeling misunderstood or rejected, his or her writing or speaking is a way of forgetting about these negative experiences. To the extent that writing or speaking makes feelings of being misunderstood or rejected disappear, the writer or speaker is inclined to produce the specific kind of writing and speaking which produce a sense of relief from these negative experiences. Readers and listeners, who read and listen to writers and speakers, who are negatively reinforced, are similarly negatively reinforced for their reading and listening. They recognize and praise this writer or speaker, who writes or says what they experience. However, the subsidence of negative stimuli, which are avoided due to negative reinforcement, only occurs as long the writer is writing, the speaker is speaking, the reader is reading and the listener is listening. In other words, such writing and speaking creates an illusion, which is maintained by even more writing, more reading, more speaking and more listening.

As we can see, effects of positively reinforced or negatively reinforced writing or speaking are very different for the reader and the listener. In the former, the reader and listener learn from the writer or speaker to distinguish between what is reinforcing and what is not, but in the latter, the reader and listener are carried away by the written or the spoken words, which allow the reader or listener to avoid whatever is described or said. The consequence of negative reinforcement is the opposite of discriminative learning, which only occurs only because of positive reinforcement. Another important difference is that the writer or the speaker whose writing or speaking is positively reinforced, isn’t maintaining and prolonging the aversive experiences, which are merely avoided and not resolved in negative reinforcement. Thus, negative reinforcement of behaviors, which take our attention away from our problems, prevents the positive reinforcement of the behaviors which are necessary to decrease problems or to be without them. This is an enormously important, but virtually unaddressed issue: writers and speakers, who are positively reinforcing are getting less and less attention, because writers and speakers who are negatively reinforcing to readers and listeners, dominate everywhere. Due to what we continuously read and hear, we have become better at negative reinforcement, but the refinement of our skills, which is necessary to positively reinforce others, is less and less addressed.

No matter what writers or speakers think about it, the negative reinforcement leads to an increase of behavior. What kind of behavior? Are writers and speakers going to increase intelligent, sensitive, positive human behavior, or are they increasing avoidance of aversive stimuli and inadvertently maintaining destructive, coercive, inhuman behavior? If writers and speakers wish to achieve the former, they must decrease their negative reinforcement in their readers and listeners. This would mean that writers will see a dramatic decrease in the sale of their books. Most books are sold because reading is negatively reinforced. Likewise, leaders and authorities, who speak at their listening followers, would see a decline of their willingness to listen, because listeners are positively reinforced to speak. A complete shift would occur when less was read and more was said and when what was read made saying things more likely. It involves transformation of readers and listeners into writers and speakers. Those who always did the writing and the speaking begin to read what these new writers have written and listen to what these new speakers are saying.

There is an increase of behavior due to reinforcement and there is a decrease due to punishment. In positive punishment behavior is decreased by presenting an unfavorable outcome. In negative punishment, behavior is decreased because it is followed by the removal of something we like. Writers and speakers decrease behaviors in their readers and listeners by means of positive and negative punishment. However, writers and speakers also write and speak because they struggle with and try to decrease their own unwanted behavior. A lot of writing and speaking is punishing in that it is an attempt to get rid of undesirable behavior. Writers and speakers align themselves with readers and listeners in their attempt to gain consensus about undesirable behaviors that need to be decreased.

The reader and the listener want to read and listen because they agree with the writer and the speaker about the kind of behavior that must be stopped. Agreement between the reader or the listener and the writer or the speaker, is based on reinforcement and not on punishment. If there was no behavior that needed to be decreased, there would be no need for punishment. If only behavior that was desirable had been reinforced, there would be no need for punishment. If undesirable behavior had never been reinforced, there would be no need for punishment. There are many positive consequences to reinforcing desirable behaviors. It dissolves the need for decreasing behavior. Moreover, there is no energy or time lost in learning behaviors that need to be decreased. This also saves us a lot of frustration. If our focus can remain on positive reinforcement, we keep learning desirable behaviors. Because we are so focused on problems, we spend most of our time being busy with decrease of behavior. Increase of behavior is also made possible by decrease of another behavior. However, if no behavior needs to be decreased, more increase of behavior possible. The reader and the listener, who are learning these new behaviors, are aware of the importance of language in this process.

The correct explanation of appropriate behaviors, which need not to be decreased, sets the stage for life-long learning. Discriminative learning, however, is increased more due to conversation than to reading. It is in conversation with one another that we attain the accuracy to describe the behaviors which don’t need to be decreased, which, therefore, can be increased endlessly and joyously. Writing can prepare us for this conversation, but it cannot replace it. Writing can refer to this conversation and can set the stage for it. Our speaking, however, will only make this conversation possible, if the speaker becomes a listener and if the listener becomes a speaker; turn-taking is essential to relationship.