“Re SMTM: negative feedback on negative feedback” by Steven Byrnes

SlimeMoldTimeMold (SMTM) recently finished a 13-part series on psychology, “The Mind in the Wheel”, centering on feedback loops (“cybernetics”) as kind of a grand unified theory of the brain.

There are parts of their framework I like—in particular, I think there are innate drives (pain is bad, eating-when-hungry is good, etc.), and I think that the top priority of neuroscience & psychology should be to figure out exactly what they are and how they work.

But when we drill into details, I have lots of disagreements with SMTM's account.

I think there's a general failure mode of “grand unified theories of the brain”: the brain needn’t have any grand unified theory in the first place. I find that people with such theories are often doing the thing [...]

---

Outline:

(02:41) 0. PROLOGUE - EVERYBODY WANTS A ROCK

(03:17) 1. PART I - THERMOSTAT

(03:47) 1.1 Feedback is broader than the setpoint + comparator thing

(05:44) 1.2 Emotions do not correspond to error signals in homeostatic feedback loops

(07:01) 1.3 Happiness does not correspond to correcting error signals

(07:46) 1.4 Pleasure does not really correspond to correcting error signals either

(09:46) 1.5 My picture

(14:25) 2. PART II - MOTIVATION

(14:50) 2.1 Do governors vote for different voluntary actions?

(15:23) 2.2 Is there a gate that stops votes below a minimum threshold?

(16:54) 2.3 How do we think about executive function and self-control?

(18:20) 2.4 Is suffering good when it's under your control?

(19:32) 3. PART III - PERSONALITY AND INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES

(20:04) 4. PART IV - LEARNING

(23:25) 5. PART V - DEPRESSION AND OTHER DIAGNOSES

(25:40) 6. PART VI - CONFLICT AND OSCILLATION

(26:46) 7. PART VII - NO REALLY, SERIOUSLY, WHAT IS GOING ON?

(27:34) 71/2. INTERLUDE - I LOVE YOU FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL REASONS

(28:37) 8. PART VIII - ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

(34:37) 8.1 Do humans do instrumental convergence stuff?

(36:37) 9. PART IX - ANIMAL WELFARE

(37:01) 10. PART X - DYNAMIC METHODS

(41:13) 11. PART XI - OTHER METHODS

(41:23) 12. PART XII - HELP WANTED

The original text contained 4 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

---

First published:
May 14th, 2025

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/LfqFZvfSQhnCXHFE6/re-smtm-negative-feedback-on-negative-feedback

---

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

---

Images from the article:

---

---

Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.