May 8, 2016

May 8, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader,

Hierarchical communication or what I call Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) has been going on for a long time. Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB), by contrast, the interaction of equity, is a still a novel event. The SVB/NVB distinction is not addressed by anyone, but me. This doesn’t mean, of course, that SVB or NVB wasn’t going on before it was called that way. It does mean, however, that we didn’t have a name for it. Mankind is in the process of discovering that SVB and NVB are natural, that is, real phenomena, which have been occurring in every language. Thus, every language consists of two languages; there is the Chinese version of SVB and there is the Chinese version of NVB. Likewise, there is the Christian version of SVB and the Christian version of NVB. Similarly, there is a Republican and a Democrat version of SVB and NVB. As coerciveness of NVB got a lot of things done, we have adhered to it to this very day. Most of our behavior is controlled by punitive contingencies rather than by positively reinforcing contingencies. However, the repertoires which have been created by these forceful contingencies, which gave rise to NVB, are very limited and are no longer capable of meeting the challenges faced by modern man. Nowhere is the limitation of our behavioral repertoire more apparent than in our interactions. In our past, NVB made SVB possible, but this is no longer the case. Hierarchical interactions have led to security and survival, but this is no longer true, at least, this is not the case in our communications. Due to our technology our communication has evolved in such a way that hierarchical, uni-directional communication has become a thing of the past. We are falling psychologically behind on non-hierarchical, multi-directional communication, made available to us by technology. We get carried away by our technology, because we have not yet learned how to use it to our advantage. Although technology paves the way for SVB, it isn’t happening, because we tend to believe that talking is an outdated behavior. It is not talking which is outdated, but it is NVB which is on its deathbed!!!

May 7, 2016

May 7, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader,

While many people bemoan the polarization that is currently going on the United States as well as in many other Western countries, I think something really positive is happening. Interestingly, the issue of political correctness repeatedly comes up. People, left and right, attempt to stop each other from saying things they don’t want to hear. To be able to say things that others don’t want to hear is to acknowledge the existence of what I call Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). If I don’t like what you say, I don’t like what I hear and you sound terrible to me. Under such circumstances, I am not listening to you, because my attention goes to what you say and not to how you say it. My ability to pay attention to how you say things is narrowed down by what you say. You may say what you say in the most polite and kind way, but I will still be offended or threatened by it. We are learning to acknowledge the fact that what is Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) to one person is NVB to another. There is no other way to learn about NVB, to recognize it, to discriminate it, than to sit with the simple fact that we, the listeners, don’t like to hear what the other person is saying. We would like him or her to shut up and our attempt, as speakers, to make him or her do that causes us to engage in NVB with him or her. In other words, we, that is, the speaker and the listener, or rather, the speaker and the listener who becomes the speaker, either engage in NVB or in SVB together. We, also pertains to the speaker-as-own-listener. Thus, the speaker-as-own-listener either engages in SVB or in NVB with him or herself. The ‘information-processing model’ assumes a speaker who sends and a listener who receives, but this model always separates the speaker and the listener and makes us completely overlook the speaker-as-own-listener, that is, the conscious speaker. During SVB, the speaker listens to him or herself while he or she speaks, but during NVB, the speaker doesn’t hear him or herself and is focused on coercing the listener to listen to him or to her. In NVB, the superior speaker demands the attention of the inferior listener.

May 6, 2016

May 6, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader,

One of the positive aspects about the technology, which currently rapidly erodes our social skills, is that everything is recorded. One of the inevitable isolating effects is that we are forced to have a closer look at ourselves. We can only be busy for so long with posting our selfies. Although we may still remain trapped in texting, at some point, we want to use our voice. We want to say it as it is, according to us and be heard. There is an evolution going on in which our meaningless visual and auditory imagery will slowly give way to more meaningful auditory-focused videos. A mature use of technology will eventually enhance our ability to better get along with each other. This use of technology informs us about the reality that what a Jew calls Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) is Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB) to a Muslim. Likewise, what a Muslim calls SVB is called NVB by a Jew. The fact that people have different beliefs doesn’t prevent them from having SVB among each other. People believe because it creates a situation in which they can have SVB with each other. Our technology will teach us that we don’t need these beliefs to have SVB. As we become more scientific about our interactions, we will be able to recognize that SVB doesn’t require us to have any belief. Although it can be said that SVB was made possible by belief, it transcends it. Naturally, occurrence of SVB depends on the environment and lack of SVB is explained by an environment which stimulates NVB instead of SVB. As we don’t know yet how to create and maintain the environments in which SVB can happen, we keep creating environments in which mostly NVB happens. NVB happens at a high response rate and SVB happens at a low response rate, but this is not because NVB is easy and SVB is difficult. SVB is effortless, but it can only happen if the environment is conducive to it. NVB, by contrast, is difficult and effortful, yet it only happens as long as environment variables stimulate and reinforce it. It should be apparent to the reader that the election cycle takes place in an environment of frustration, which sets the stage for NVB.  

May 5, 2016

May 5, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader,

I have taken a little holiday from my writing. Although today’s writing is dated May 5^th, it was written on May 14^th. It felt like I needed a break. In today’s writing I catch up with what has happened over the last ten days. Another semester is coming to an end and I am reaping the fruits of what I have sowed. The accumulative effects of Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) are very noticeable. All my students write and talk about it appreciatively and I am praising them. What a wonderful big experiment every semester is for me. There is a specific issue I want to address in today’s writing. Simply stated, unless we listen to what we don’t want to hear, we cannot get to what we want to hear. Stated differently, before we can progress into having more SVB, we must know about and listen to Noxious Verbal Behavior (NVB). It is common for people to want to have SVB when they first discover it, but once they realize it involves getting better at recognizing NVB, they are put off. Moreover, there are peculiar complications in discriminating these response classes. What is SVB for one person can be NVB for another. This is perhaps best explained by an example about politics. We are in the election season in the United States and every day we hear the news about Clinton, Trump and Sanders. It is an incredibly contentious presidential race and representatives of the left and the right are constantly demonizing each other. Those who think that they have SVB accuse those who have NVB, but the accusers have NVB themselves. Yet, they claim to have SVB, while they blame the other party for having NVB. The old idiom: The pot calling the kettle black seems to have lost all its meaning, but the reality is that one person continues to criticize another for a fault they themselves have. However, what is SVB to the Democrat is NVB to the Republican and what is SVB to the Republican is NVB to the Democrat. Other than listening to the tone of our voice while we speak, there is no way to figure out this conundrum. This election cycle is so heated, because we are slowly becoming aware of the SVB/NVB distinction!!!

May 4, 2016

May 4, 2016

Written by Maximus Peperkamp, M.S. Verbal Engineer

Dear Reader,

As long as you expect others to have Sound Verbal Behavior (SVB) with you, you are not going to have it. Such expectations signify that your knowledge about SVB is lacking, that is, you haven’t explored it often enough on your own. The negative experiences of your interactions with others will create the Motivating Operations in which you will begin to have SVB on your own more often. If you can’t have it with others this signifies that you are learning to have it with yourself. Once you know how to have it with yourself, you are able to have it with others, who, like you, also don’t know how to have it by themselves. We can create the possibility for others to have SVB, but each of us must go on with it by ourselves to further develop it. We didn’t learn SVB from our parents, because they didn’t know about it. At best they knew some of the bits and pieces, but it is up to us to put these pieces together. 

People may actually grow up with all the pieces available and still they don’t know how to put them together. The person who grows up in a family in which he or she was taught the ingredients of SVB, doesn’t learn how to have SVB, because he or she still has to deal with the world which is so different from his or her family. The more ingredients the person has learned in his or her family, the more problems this person is bound to have with the world in which people know less about these ingredients than in his or her family. Unless this presumably privileged person begins to work on him or herself, that is, unless he or she begins to listen to him or herself, while he or she speaks, he or she is not going achieve SVB with others. A background that consists of many or perhaps even all the pieces of SVB, doesn’t guarantee that the person who has such a background grows up to have SVB. To the contrary, often times, this person suffers tremendously, while only others learn from their suffering. Unless this suffering person becomes aware of his or her individual suffering, he or she will unable to have SVB with others.