stimulate that action or not. Thus, trust is the essential ingredient in the occurrence of interactions in general and is noteworthy in its governance impact on interactions involving people. Specifically, a person must achieve the necessary level of trust in anticipating the outcome of a transaction, or in some contributing factor to a transaction, or else they will choose not to participate in the transaction, or to participate in some different manner or degree. When the mind seeks to stimulate an action, if the level of trust is sufficient then the stimulus is effected, otherwise the stimulus is withheld. This, of course, presupposes that one has a choice relative to participation. Absent such discretion, if an interaction is forced, then people may still try to affect the outcome based on their level of trust in any optional means or characteristic of the interaction at their disposal. It is interesting to note a mental condition known as abulia that is symptomatic of the loss of mental capacity to effect independent action. This observation is not intended to draw a direct correlation between the concept of trust that we have suggested and this specific mental condition. Rather, we view the condition simply as indicative of the existence of a governing process for the stimulation of responses.

Trust can be discerned in the interactions with inanimate objects as well as those that include humans or various other organic participants. If we drop a brick, our expectation is that it will fall to the floor; an expectation or trust based on our understanding of the motion of free moving bricks as derived from our previous experience. If we have previously dropped a bucket, but not a brick, our facilities for metaphorical understanding will attempt to apply the correct context to the action of the brick. If we drop a brick directly over our foot, our essentially instinctive assessment that it is going to land on the foot may well be sufficient to trigger a near-reflex action, causing us to quickly move our foot. More generally, our facilities for metaphorical understanding encompass the establishment of trust based on experience. The first time we see someone release a helium filled balloon, we might actually exhibit surprise when the balloon goes up and not down. Should a tree appear near to falling in the forest, with no one around, there might still be a high degree of trust in our expectation that the tree will fall to the ground. Consequently, we might well choose to not park our automobile beside a dead and leaning tree which is next to the campground parking lot.

From a quantitative perspective, trust can be construed as a probability and in some instances can be rigidly specified. A concept with similar characteristics to trust is that of a scattering cross-section; that is, the probability of an interaction comprised of one elementary particle bouncing off of another elementary particle in a very specific fashion within a particle accelerator. The unit probability of a cross-section is called a barn. The unit derives from early studies on rather simple, high probability interactions. In one such interaction as an example, the probability that a 1/2 MeV electron will interact with a gold atom located in a stationary gold foil is so high that it’s like “hitting the side of a barn with a baseball.” (You really have to love the sense of humor of those atomic physicists.) The point is that in well-defined interaction environments, a level of trust can sometimes be quantitatively prescribed. Outside the laboratory, when we consciously talk about trust, we don’t typically ascribe such a quantitative assessment. We usually refer to it in very general terms: “I trust him,” “I don’t trust her,” “I trust the mortgage company to pay my property taxes on time.” All of these statements reflect a cognitively expressed evaluation of a level of trust, but the meaningful expression of trust is the one that results in action or inaction. If I jump out of the plane, I have made a profound evaluation that I trust the parachute to get me safely to the ground. This evaluation is highly dependent on the circumstances surrounding the immediate interaction, including any pertinent emotional response levels incurred within one’s mind regarding the pending interaction. One’s decision to take a sky dive might well be different if jumping alone is considered versus jumping with one’s new potential partner, who is an accomplished parachutist. It will certainly depend on the relative urgency of the needs involved; is

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