Behavioral and Brain Sciences



Open Peer Commentary

Freud meets Skinner: Hyperbolic curves, elliptical theories, and Ainslie Interests


Federico Sanabria a1 and Peter R. Killeen a1
a1 Department of Psychology, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287-1104 Federico.Sanabria@asu.edu Killeen@asu.edu http://www.asu.edu/clas/psych/research/blab/ http://www.asu.edu/clas/psych/people/faculty/pkilleen.html

Abstract

Ainslie advances Freud's and Skinner's theories of homunculi by basing their emergent complexity on the interaction of simple algorithms. The rules of competition and cooperation of these interests are underspecified, but they provide a new way of thinking about the basic elements of conditioning, particularly conditioned stimuli (CSs).