random rewards

B. F. Skinner, pioneer in behavioral psychology, conducted infamous tests on rats and pigeons to discover reactions to reward. He found he could teach a mindless animal to do a very complicated task simply by breaking said task into small increments and rewarding the animal every time it incidentally completed a step. He got pigs to vacuum. He found that as soon as the reward was taken away or a punishment induced, the animal desisted from said behavior. They persisted most determinedly, however, if the reward was given at random intervals, unpredictably interspersed with punishment, on the off-chance that a reward would be given. Everyday example: a girl waits by the phone for hours despite the fact that her boyfriend rarely calls.

I was thinking about Skinner today because I was ready to give up on my dad. He hasn't really been Dad in a long time, and I am afraid of him in those times when he doesn't really register my presence and annoyed with him when he does see me and ignores me. I try, less and less frequently, to have a relationship with him. I recently invited him to a John Wayne movie and he told me that he didn't want to. He didn't even pretend to be busy. He never comes to family events and he is now talking of moving to New Mexico (don't get me started on him and his plans!) In the year I lived in Texas he never called me once. So I don't try too much anymore.

But today I was given three free tickets to the BYU basketball game. I invited my friends initially, but I was given chair seats, so I couldn't sit with the fourth if she came via and all-sports pass. So I tried to figure out whom to take. In a fit of who knows what--a last ditch effort maybe--I called my dad. Not only did he answer the phone but he also agreed with enthusiasm to come. I was speechless (which is itself a figure of speech since I usually wax gregarious). The conversation didn't last long but it left me feeling bemused. Dad's behavior, completely inconsistent, makes it impossible for me to give up. Every once in a while, sometimes after long spells of decline and disinterest, my dad surfaces for a day or an hour of a relationship. For those moments, I keep trying and probably will keep trying despite common negative results. I am no more an agent unto myself than Skinner's vacuuming pigs.

idle minds

Life is noisy. Even the mind cannot shut out the background distractions, the parts of the brain that keep tickertape on your spending and a laundry list of things to-do in case one has a spare moment (for we must avoid those devilishly idle hands). In class, professors tell us what they think and what Great Thinkers have thought before us. What do you think about those thinkers, their tests ask us, and from a more practical standpoint, what will the professor think about what we think about these thinkers? My sisters quote movies at me, and while I am responding to the situation at hand my brain is scouring my repertoire to find the right character with the right voice with the right line who matches not only what was said but what I am expected to say next. It’s like I’m in a play with a script the length of all media I’ve consumed in days past. Think, think, think. Did you get that reference? Are you on your toes?

Sometimes I just want the world inside my head to be a little less bombarded by the world outside it. I need to stop thinking what I’ll term as motor thoughts. These are the types of thoughts that get us from one place to the next, that get us through a test, a conversation, a chore. These are like motor skills, those which result in motion, the more precise the better. Thoughts can be like that: some result in motion through life, some quite task-specific and others rather more foundational. Converse to motor thoughts are latent thoughts, as related to the first as potential energy is to kinetic energy in physics. The two cannot exist at the same time. Sometimes I need latent thoughts.

Latent thoughts are always there, but they are quiet, so quiet that the rest of the mind must be absolutely still in order to hear them. They are Potential. These are personal philosophies, dreams and creative energy. We have worlds inside our heads waiting for our God-like forces to unleash them. But we never pause long enough to understand. Self-reflection is a way to listen to latent thoughts. Journal writing, poetry, art, a long walk dedicated to observing. These are ways in which we begin to listen to the little voices inside, these little voices which sound somewhat arbitrary (for they are not relevant to the external world of motor thoughts) and oftentimes deep in some silly way. It is when we are listening quite hard that new ideas begin to form and God-dropped seeds begin to ferment and grow.

I have never wondered the purpose of my existence in the same moment in which I am balancing my budget. I have never let my mind trace the edges of eternal mysteries when I’ve gone over a class syllabus. I don’t dwell on hope and love and dreams when I am watching Arrested Development. But I can do those things when I take make the conscious effort to stop thinking my motor thoughts, to leave the world of kinetics behind. Then I am free to focus on Potential.