To be a fluent speaker of the language, one does not have to memorize all possible word combinations accepted as being well–formed sentences. That would be impossible. Yet somehow, we know that certain sequences of words constitute understandable sentences while others do not. For example, consider the previous sentence with the words reversed:
Not do others while sentences understandable constitute words of sequences certain that know we somehow yet.
Although each word may be easily understood, this sequence doesn't impress us as a meaningful sentence. Since the words are precisely the same set presented previously in a different order, we may conclude that the condition of well–formedness must be attributed to the order or sequence in which we see or hear the words. Given a finite vocabulary and a small set of generating principles, a syntax, it is possible to create an infinite number of well–formed sentences by changing the order of the words in an appropriate manner. To learn a language, it is necessary only to learn its vocabulary and syntax.[7]
In particle physics, electrons, protons, neutrons and other subatomic entities make up the set of structural elements; the syntax is the set of rules of possible interactions among various combinations of particles. In a similar manner, models such as banking, government, art, agriculture and film production are constructed of a set of structural elements and a syntax.
Neurolinguistic programming shows us that the complexities of human behavior, like the infinite number of possible well–formed sentences in a language, can be reduced to a finite number of structural elements and a syntax. In the context of the NLP model we maintain that all behavior — from learning, remembering and motivation to making a choice, communication and change —is the result of systematically ordered sequences of sensory representations. Many of the problems and phenomena that have baffled behavioral scientists in the past can be understood, predicted and changed by using the NLP model. To accomplish this, we join the magician on his stage, so to speak, and begin to poke around the mirrors and other apparatus of the thaumaturgical art to gain a
new perspective on what happens before, during and after the waving of that magic wand which generates such a fascinating array of experiences for us all.
Because certain aspects of the structural elements and syntax of every model are experienced (or defined) as being within or beyond human control, every model contains within itself another behavioral model that identifies the possibilities and limitations of human behavior with respect to desired goals or outcomes.
Borrowing a flow chart from decision theory, we can represent this model visually as:
We will assume that the people concerned with the model represented by this diagram agree that environmental variables include all dimensions of experience beyond their control and that decision variables include all dimensions of experience within their control. For example, an executive planning committee would agree that they could decide when and where to build a new manufacturing plant toward achieving the outcome of increased production and sales; they would also agree that production and sales would be affected by inflation, government monetary policy, competition and consumer demand, which lie outside their control.
Again, the magician knows that under the watchful eyes of an attentive audience, on a stage of limited size, he can't possibly "make" an elephant weighing several tons disappear — unless he utilizes those same constraints (environmental variables) effectively in achieving his outcome — the disappearing act. Outcomes depend on contributions from both environmental variables and decision variables.
In fact, one of the major historical trends in the evolution of models of behavior is the transformation or utilization of experiences once regarded as environmental variables into decision variables. This trend is particularly evident in recent technological advances in the computer sciences and in manned space travel — more effective models operating to expand the potentials of human behavior.
Just as the computer and information processing industries have advanced tremendously in the past twenty five years due to the new technology provided by the semiconductor (the processing capacity of what once used to require a machine that filled a large room is now available from a chip no bigger than the head of a pin), so too we intend that the behavioral professions and sciences will advance in the coming decades as the result of the new technology provided by neurolinguistic programming.
1.4 Western Scientific Models
In many ancient traditional cultures, much of the activity of the people was experienced as being determined by forces beyond their control, forces often assumed as originating outside the realm of experience available to the human senses. Decisions such as when to plant, how to cope with disease and when to change living sites were regarded as a function of these forces — the gods, the planets or other entities whose processes were either capricious or at least beyond human comprehension.
Western scientific models, in contrast, are grounded in the realm of sensory experience. By claiming sense phenomena as their structural elements or building blocks, scientific models derive the generalizations they offer as guiding principles for human behavior from a domain of experience that is available, potentially at least, to all members of the human species. Observations and/or experiments are conducted to determine whether aspects of patterning (often required to be measurable or quantifiable) can be discovered. The attitude implicit in the scientific model is that any portion of our experience can be understood and eventually controlled if we are willing to study the processes which underlie that experience. Technology, the systematic application of scientific principles to obtain useful outcomes, evolves as we discover how our behavior affects a particular set of structural elements in the context of each new scientific discovery. Useful applications may be many steps removed or only indirectly related to the immediate frame of reference of a new discovery, but practical uses or outcomes often become evident if the search is undertaken.
As a result of this process, more and more dimensions of experience from the class of environmental variables have been shifted to the class of decision variables. Not long ago in our historical past, waterfalls — though considered awe–inspiring and beautiful— were thought to be a hindrance to the spread and development of industry and commerce because they prevented rivers from being utilized for transportation and communication. Today we have learned to use them as sources of hydroelectric power which, in turn, has paved the way to greatly increased choices with respect to transportation and communication. Again, we once viewed the appearance of mold on bread as a sign that the bread was useless. We learned, however, to use the mold itself by deriving penicillin from it — one of the most brilliant and useful medical discoveries in history. The principle of inoculation in preventive medicine involves the transformation of bacteria and viruses associated with the onset of particular diseases into weakened forms whose introduction into the human body stimulates our immunological systems to protect us from those same diseases.
7
In the actual experience of learning a language, its syntax is understood to include more than simply formal grammatical rules, particularly in spoken language where rhythm, tone, inflection, rate of delivery, volume shifts, etc. contribute to the meaning–making process. Slang, vernacular, regional dialects and the specialized languages of various professions and trades constitute special mini–languages within the domain of the primary language.