EFTA00764378.pdf

From: John Cacioppo To: Jeffrey Epstein <[email protected]> Subject: Re: Book Date: Sun, 31 Jan 2010 15:24:27 +0000 The term "invisible force" has other meanings besides the attraction created by mass. The attraction felt between two people has a causal mechanism that can be understood through empirical investigation. Mass may well be (inversely) related to this attraction but for different reasons than gravitational pull. I found the metaphor useful for making the point that people often think forces like gravity or magnetism operate through specifiable mechanisms even when they can't "see" these mechanisms, whereas they tend to think forces acting on the human mind and behavior operate through magic or divine intervention unless they can "see" the mechanism. Make the force acting on people visible, and we overestimate the extent to which we "understand" it. For instance, advances in technical and quantitative methods of neuroscience over the past two decades have caught the attention of the investigators in various fields of psychology and in related disciplines, but the advance that has captured the attention of the media and the imagination of the public is functional neuroimaging. The notion seems to be that if you can visualize putative changes in brain activation to specific tasks in the normal human brain, then you have captured something real; no more concerns about the validity of self-reports or behavior, if it can be seen in the brain then it must be true. The seductive appeal of neuroimaging is reminiscent of how most people feel about eye-witness evidence — and it is at least as fraught with error. On 1/31/10 9:02 AM, "Jeffrey Epstein" [email protected]> wrote: but market " forces" are not equivalent to the scientific concept of forces of gravity, or magnetism. it is an english metaphor , not a equivalent concept. the greeks had four words for different types of love. To say i am attracted to someone, doesn't really tell the true story unless, of course she is really massive. On Sun, Jan 31, 2010 at 9:28 AM, John Cacioppo .ca wrote: Jeffrey, We do not have a physicist in the Network, and we are not using force in the sense of mass * acceleration, instead we are using force to mean the power to Influence, affect, or control — the same sense in which the term is used in the notion of "market forces." John On 1/31/10 6:59 AM, "Jeffrey Epstein" <[email protected] <[email protected]» wrote: thanks„ is there a physics person in the group..?, i love some of the insights. . how do you define forces. On Sat, Jan 30, 2010 at 5:03 PM, John Cacioppo > wrote: Jeffrey, l uggested that you might wish to see a copy of our forthcoming book, so I have attached a copy. We look forward to seeing you in a couple weeks. EFTA00764378 All the best, John EFTA00764379