Forums IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ PhotoReading, Memory Optimizer Can anyone please tell me what is NLP?

You always bring up a lot of interesting points in your posts.

Definitions (these are off the top of my head rather than "text book"):

Strategy: The method or steps one uses to do something. For example, my car buying decision strategy may be something like, "See a good looking car, read reviews of the car, look at that model of car on the sales lot, test drive the car, imagine myself driving the car in the future, buy the car."

Modelling: As I understand it (I haven't done much modelling yet), modelling is the act of eliciting and understand all of a person's strategies well enough to do what they do.

Model: Here it is being used in much the same way as the mathematical definition. The author was talking about building a model of some process to understand how it works better.

Elicitation: Getting someone to demonstrate the strategy/response/whatever, as in "eliciting a car-buying decision strategy."

How is NLP a science? Hmmm...well, by your definition, NLP presents a theory of how people communicate, their thought processes, etc. People (Practitioners) go out and test this theory and then report back to the community their findings, thus evolving the science (take a look at an NLP site's bookstore for that reporting-back part).

When I elicit someone's decision strategy, I'm using the Scientific Method. I propose a theory (He does this set of things to make a decision), then I test the theory by asking a question based on my theory of their strategy and observe the results. If my theory was correct I move on, if not I go back and reformulate the theory.

On the programming front, I'm a C++ programmer right now. I've worked in C, C++, Java, Pascal, and I can read and understand a half-dozen or so other languages.

I'm always intrigued when someone _doesn't_ think a Computer Scientist is a "real" scientist. I grant there is a difference between coders and computer scientists, just as there is a difference between, say, engineers and physicists.

I went to school for Computer Science. I learned how to analyze algorithms and formulate the theoretical and mathematical basis of how they work. When I'm trying to improve a sort algorithm's efficiency, again I use the Scientific Method.

So my real question to you is, what is _your_ definition of a scientist? Is it someone who applies the Scientific Method in his work? Is it someone who does theoretical work rather than application? Does a scientist have to wear a lab coat and sport a pocket protector? Where is your "Threshold for scientist-ness along the spectrum of the application of scientific principles?"

Mike