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Quick guide to PCT

Perceptual Control Theory (PCT) has been around for over 50 years, leaving a trail of papers, books, websites, posts, conversations, videos all over the web. This is a quick guide to get started with the most basic materials: introductory texts, books, demonstrations, papers, websites and finding others interested in PCT. Welcome! [...]
PCT in 11 steps - introduction by Bill Powers

Control is a process of acting on the world we perceive to make it the way we want it to be, and to keep it that way. Examples of control: standing upright; walking; steering a car; scrambling eggs; scratching an itch; knitting socks; singing a tune. Extruding a pseudopod to absorb a nanospeck of food (all organisms control, not only human beings). The smallest organisms control by biochemical means, bigger ones by means of a nervous system. [...]
A simple introduction to PCT

A simple start… PCT stands for Perceptual Control Theory. Big words, eh? The ‘big idea’ behind PCT is simple but don’t be surprised if it takes a while to get your head around. This is it…. ‘Behaviour is the control of perception’ That’s it. Or more simply, we do things to get what we want – now that sounds too simple! Let’s take it a step at a time… [...]
Once around the loop

Elements of the control loop have been labeled slightly different by different people at different times and for different purposes, whether for a very plain explanation or for more mathematical treatment of the physical functions. Dag Forssell describes the elements of the control loop step by step, as an introduction to the basics of PCT. [...]

Newsletter

July 6, 2023

Welcome to the Control Loop – the IAPCT newsletter. This newsletter shares updates on the latest developments in Perceptual Control [...]
New website

April 23, 2022

We proudly present to you our new IAPCT website. This site is build in wordpress by Eva de Hullu and [...]

environment clouds

Environmental Stability

January 30, 2022

A comprehensive introduction to PCT and its implications for the social and physical environment, on a global scale, are described in an online article by Kent McClelland. There are also a number of online articles that relate […]

Film, Media & Literature

Spiritual truths, 21st Century Renaissance, Computer Games, Pop and Rock Music, & more! […]

Economics & Marketing

To manage a successful business, you need to know what people want, how your business is perceived, and how to deal with people. It’s ripe for a PCT approach! […]

Education

January 30, 2022

Education is about more than teaching. Within education we need to know how to motivate students, how can we maximise the degree to which people learn, and often, how do we manage students or pupils when they don’t want to learn, or they disrupt others? […]

Robotics & Artificial Intelligence

January 30, 2022

PCT is emerging as a force in robotics. PCT lends itself well to the fields of artificial intelligence and robotics because it provides an exact mathematical framework to model psychological processes. […]

Biology and Neuroscience

Bill Powers developed PCT with biology in mind. We can split the relevance of PCT into two parts – function and structure. […]

mental health

Interventions for Mental Health Problems

January 30, 2022

When people find themselves struggling control has been disrupted. It is the loss of control not control, therefore, that is the problem when people are psychologically distressed. […]

Psychology

January 30, 2022

In explaining how living things control their perception, PCT is clearly highly relevant to psychology. Contemporary articles are making the case to the wider establishment that closed-loop, circular causality is much closer to how living systems actually function than the approach researchers still use. […]

Politics and Philosophy – a PCT introduction

January 30, 2022

PCT takes a strongly scientific approach to human nature. It proposes that people and other living systems are purposeful – and that the systems that are responsible for purposeful action are explainable in mechanistic terms. […]

Ways of Learning and Knowing: The Epistemology of Education

Hugh G. Petrie “For most of his career, Hugh was way ahead of his time. His papers in this volume still are. The role of the evolutionary process of blind variation and selective retention in […]

Doing Research on Purpose

Richard S. Marken (2014) The core of the book are six papers by Dr. Richard S. Marken which have been published in peer reviewed journals over the past decade explaining why Perceptual Control Theory (PCT) […]

Hold That Thought! Two Steps to Effective Counseling and Psychotherapy with the Method of Levels

December 11, 2022

Timothy A. Carey New View Pubns (January 1, 2008) Book description Believing that people with psychological problems get themselves better, Australian clinical psychologist, academic and researcher Timothy A. Carey introduces readers to the Method of […]

The Method of Levels. How to do Psychotherapy Without Getting in the Way

December 11, 2022

Timothy A. Carey “I’ve just finished the Method of Levels, and I’m astonished, delighted, and inspired. I was a psychotherapist for many years, using a variety of approaches (predominantly Gestalt Therapy, several versions of family […]

Living Control Systems III – The Fact of Control

Book + demonstration programs by William T. Powers (2008) Living Control Systems III continues Powers’ revolutionary approach to understanding living organisms as purposeful agents whose actions serve to control their environments. A unique feature of […]

Management and Leadership: Insight for Effective Practice

Dag Forssell “When i first learned of PCT about seven years ago, I read everything I could get my hands on and your articles, for me, most clearly explained PCT. Somehow, your unique use of […]

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