Who we are..

[geordief]

2 questions.

1: Is my sense of who I am (when I am aware of it) the same as another person's sense of who they are?(ie is it a basic shared function of simply being alive?)

2:Is this sense of who we are (when we are aware of it) actually the same as who we actually are?(ie is who we are a direct function of who we think we are and are our delusions about how we perceive of ourselves "real" even if deluded**?)

**it would be my personal assumption that our self perceptions are probably shot through with delusions ,that hopefully we can try to "float above" or ignore.

 

[DaveC426913]

1: This is a qualium (pl.: qualia). Something we cannot experience of others. Like: do you see red the same as I see red?

2: What do you mean by who we "actually" are? Because of (1, above) we are the only ones who can ever know.

Who we are internally is not the same thing as who we present ourselves as externally.

 

[Wizard of Whatever]

2 questions.

1: Is my sense of who I am (when I am aware of it) the same as another person's sense of who they are?(ie is it a basic shared function of simply being alive?)

2:Is this sense of who we are (when we are aware of it) actually the same as who we actually are?(ie is who we are a direct function of who we think we are and are our delusions about how we perceive of ourselves "real" even if deluded**?)

**it would be my personal assumption that our self perceptions are probably shot through with delusions ,that hopefully we can try to "float above" or ignore.

#1. No, individuality is absolute.
#2. Partially. In this world there is always some doubt.

 

[C C]

2 questions.

1: Is my sense of who I am (when I am aware of it) the same as another person's sense of who they are?(ie is it a basic shared function of simply being alive?)

Humans have general characteristics that they share (thus allowing them to be subsumed by the same classification). But a specific person will have their own unique mix of variable personality traits and bodily conditions that a lesser number of others may possess. Like being bipolar and having one leg missing.

2:Is this sense of who we are (when we are aware of it) actually the same as who we actually are?(ie is who we are a direct function of who we think we are and are our delusions about how we perceive of ourselves "real" even if deluded**?)

**it would be my personal assumption that our self perceptions are probably shot through with delusions ,that hopefully we can try to "float above" or ignore.

Obviously, one would indeed have imperfect objective knowledge or representation of one's self -- if some ultimate entity actually existed that possessed such. A substitute for the latter would be many people each providing a non-white lie account of _X_ individual, and a consensus or summary narrative being derived from that. But the latter would be severely flawed, since outer observers of another person are just that -- limited to external appearances and lacking constant surveillance, and without access to what is privately transpiring and neurally stored past information.
_

 

[geordief]

1: This is a qualium (pl.: qualia). Something we cannot experience of others. Like: do you see red the same as I see red

I can see why you might say it is a qualium (I have only recently begun to learn about that concept ) but might not the capacity for self awareness (not always engaged but perhaps always loitering in the background once the understanding has been gained) not be appreciated as perhaps different from other "internal perceptions" in that in essence it is a perception of the perceiver rather than a perception of an external stimulus ?

Might it be that this is so fundamental an experience that there are no gradations or differences that could change the experience from one living being to another.

I think I appreciate that if we were to observe the physical mental activity of 2 people who claimed to be thinking of being aware of their own existence that no 2 "readouts" will be the same but perhaps we might see something that they had in common ?

2: What do you mean by who we "actually" are? Because of (1, above) we are the only ones who can ever know.

I think I overstated it.Perhaps I should have said there is a part of us where the act of understanding that we exist and the very fact of us existing fuse together into the same thing at that particular moment.

Of course we are more than that and our activities continue after that moment and we exist equally in those moments,but in different ways.

More generally there are lots of things we cannot know but that does not prevent us making educated (or half arsed) guesses and I don't feel it is a wild supposition to imagine that it may be that all living creatures that are self aware(or think they are) may have something in common (equally ,of course they may not- outside the external stimuli that they do share in large part )

 

[TheVat]

Might it be that this is so fundamental an experience that there are no gradations or differences that could change the experience from one living being to another.

I think I appreciate that if we were to observe the physical mental activity of 2 people who claimed to be thinking of being aware of their own existence that no 2 "readouts" will be the same but perhaps we might see something that they had in common ?

I feel there is that commonality. Consciousness floating free of memories and thoughts, as happens in meditation. A more generic awareness, free of worldly attachments and preoccupation, sometimes referred to as the Buddha nature.

 

[DaveC426913]

I can see why you might say it is a qualium (I have only recently begun to learn about that concept ) but might not the capacity for self awareness (not always engaged but perhaps always loitering in the background once the understanding has been gained) not be appreciated as perhaps different from other "internal perceptions" in that in essence it is a perception of the perceiver rather than a perception of an external stimulus ?

I'm not sure that internal versus external makes a difference. To be "me" is to know, among other things, that the number 2 is yellow and that sunny Sunday afternoons are when the best 'Afternoon Delight' happens. A million things make up the feelings that are me that could never be fully mimicked.

Might it be that this is so fundamental an experience that there are no gradations or differences that could change the experience from one living being to another.

You would find commonalities, of course.

I think I overstated it.Perhaps I should have said there is a part of us where the act of understanding that we exist and the very fact of us existing fuse together into the same thing at that particular moment.

It could be the same thing if you broaden it enough until the nuances are lost. If I blur a picture of a London bus and a firetruck sufficiently, I could show them both to you and you might say they are the same.

More generally there are lots of things we cannot know but that does not prevent us making educated (or half arsed) guesses and I don't feel it is a wild supposition to imagine that it may be that all living creatures that are self aware(or think they are) may have something in common

I am certain we do, else, for example, We both ponder about what it means to have a self, otherwise I could not even join you in this conversation.

And I said what about Breakfast at Tiffany's?
She said I think I remember that film and
As I recall I think we both kinda liked it
And I said well that's the one thing we've got
(guitar riff)

I'm not very good at this philosophizing thing...

 

[geordief]

I am certain we do, else, for example, We both ponder about what it means to have a self, otherwise I could not even join you in this conversation.

And I said what about Breakfast at Tiffany's?
She said I think I remember that film and
As I recall I think we both kinda liked it
And I said well that's the one thing we've got
(guitar riff)

I'm not very good at this philosophizing thing...

Do we "have " a self though? Might it not be an attribute of a "living system" (that is what we are ,aren't we?) and possibly as much a property of that system's environment as of the individual living entity itself?

It could be the same thing if you broaden it enough until the nuances are lost. If I blur a picture of a London bus and a firetruck sufficiently, I could show them both to you and you might say they are the same

Yes that seems more likely.

 

[DaveC426913]

Do we "have " a self though?

Yes. That's what "theory of mind" means.

"..the ability to understand that others have their own thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions, which may be different from one's own..."

The corollary of this is that we understand that we are an entity, distinct from others, that is bounded by our own body.

Humans have it, dolphins, apes, some birds.

(A trick to test the intelligence of a dog is to hide a treat underneath a blanket that they are sitting on. Only the smartest dogs are capable of recognizing that it is their own body that is preventing them from getting the treat and they consciously get their own body off the blanket.)


Robert J. Sawyer - Canada's pre-eminent speculative ficton author - whote a Hugo- and Aurora-winning trilogy called Wake/Watch/Wonder about a spontaneously-formed internet-based mind that lay in an unconscious torpor, until a portion of the web went down (China shut its network borders) and only then did "Webmind" wake to become aware of "self" versus the "not-self".
Fascinating.

Wake (WWW, #1)

Caitlin Decter is young, pretty, feisty, a genius at ma…

www.goodreads.com

 

[wegs]

2 questions.

1: Is my sense of who I am (when I am aware of it) the same as another person's sense of who they are?(ie is it a basic shared function of simply being alive?)

2:Is this sense of who we are (when we are aware of it) actually the same as who we actually are?(ie is who we are a direct function of who we think we are and are our delusions about how we perceive of ourselves "real" even if deluded**?)

**it would be my personal assumption that our self perceptions are probably shot through with delusions ,that hopefully we can try to "float above" or ignore.

1) I think being aware of the fact that “I exist” - is shared. But the experience of being that self is shaped by unique emotions, memories, and beliefs, so it feels very different from person to person.

2) Hmm, not sure I’d agree. Our self-image is possibly distorted by our ego, fear, trauma or faulty memory. But even if it's flawed, it still shapes our reality and behavior. Delusions can be “real” in their impact, even though they’re not “true.”

Just my way of thinking about it.

 

[geordief]

es. That's what "theory of mind" means.

"..the ability to understand that others have their own thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions, which may be different from one's own..."

The corollary of this is that we understand that we are an entity, distinct from others, that is bounded by our own body.

So our body "has" a "self" ?

"Self" is a dynamic biological construction ...

My carping about "do we have it?" might have been based on a (flawed?) understanding that our conscious mind "had" a "self" -possibly on account of having been indoctrinated early on that we "had" a soul by the good foot soldiers in the RC church.

Reading through some of reviews of your book my take might be that the "anti self" represented by one's alive environment still "bleeds into" our own "self construct" and that the dichotomy is a bit fuzzy but still valid.

If someone is starved of such reference points does the light in them dim and die or do they have enough "body fat" to last a lifetime?

When we are born is it our parents who actually "breathe life" into us wih their own life?

If we take away such stimuli from test tube babies what would happen ? (apart from whoever did it going to jail ,hopefully)

 

[DaveC426913]

So our body "has" a "self" ?

"Self" is a dynamic biological construction ...

Self is a construct of the mind. Mind is an emergent property of a complex brain.

Reading through some of reviews of your book my take might be that the "anti self" represented by one's alive environment still "bleeds into" our own "self construct" and that the dichotomy is a bit fuzzy but still valid.

Yes. That's something the books explore.

 

[geordief]

I feel there is that commonality. Consciousness floating free of memories and thoughts, as happens in meditation. A more generic awareness, free of worldly attachments and preoccupation, sometimes referred to as the Buddha nature.

Well the meditation I am familiar with emphasized that in the technique the mind is attracted to "regions" of pleasure (which drives the process)

So I wouldn't call that "unworldly" more like going to your own private store of dopamine in the brain.

The advice was to supplement this "inner" activity with activity in the real world .
When I was once asked why I did this I replied "I enjoy it" (I didn't add that it was also free -I haven't paid a thing for 50 years even if I can't claim to enjoy it so much -I suspect you have to live a high energy life to get the most out of it)

 

[TheVat]

Robert J. Sawyer - Canada's pre-eminent speculative ficton author - whote a Hugo- and Aurora-winning trilogy called Wake/Watch/Wonder about a spontaneously-formed internet-based mind that lay in an unconscious torpor, until a portion of the web went down (China shut its network borders) and only then did "Webmind" wake to become aware of "self" versus the "not-self".

A favorite novel of mine. The clever notion of a background of cellular automata on the web caused by corrupted packet loss - very original and high-concept SF. For an information science nerd like me, it was a unique joy to find a novel where people run Shannon entropy graphs on cellular automata to gauge how complex the information in them is. Sawyer is near top of my list of "famous people you'd like to have dinner with."

 

[DaveC426913]

Sawyer is near top of my list of "famous people you'd like to have dinner with."

I have met and spoken to him several times, always spontaneously, at events and concert theatres in Toronto.

I probably cashed my books out to him when he worked at Bakka Bookshop back in the 80s.

 

[TheVat]

Well the meditation I am familiar with emphasized that in the technique the mind is attracted to "regions" of pleasure (which drives the process)

So I wouldn't call that "unworldly" more like going to your own private store of dopamine in the brain.

Different types of meditation for sure. What I was exposed to is more finding the inner observer who watches all those desires and pleasures go by, aware of them but also not attaching to any of them or really thinking about. I compare it to a feeling that's like a rising bubble in a lake and your mind is the lake, as it sees where the bubble came from, how in rising it expands as the pressure drops, and pops at the surface. A part of your mind, the Buddha-nature, watches the bubbles calmly and knows it is not the bubbles.

 

[Wizard of Whatever]

Different types of meditation for sure. What I was exposed to is more finding the inner observer who watches all those desires and pleasures go by, aware of them but also not attaching to any of them or really thinking about. I compare it to a feeling that's like a rising bubble in a lake and your mind is the lake, as it sees where the bubble came from, how in rising it expands as the pressure drops, and pops at the surface. A part of your mind, the Buddha-nature, watches the bubbles calmly and knows it is not the bubbles.

Shut down the mind. You will evolve faster.

 

[Opine]

Yes. That's what "theory of mind" means.

"..the ability to understand that others have their own thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions, which may be different from one's own..."

The corollary of this is that we understand that we are an entity, distinct from others, that is bounded by our own body.

Humans have it, dolphins, apes, some birds.

(A trick to test the intelligence of a dog is to hide a treat underneath a blanket that they are sitting on. Only the smartest dogs are capable of recognizing that it is their own body that is preventing them from getting the treat and they consciously get their own body off the blanket.)


Robert J. Sawyer - Canada's pre-eminent speculative ficton author - whote a Hugo- and Aurora-winning trilogy called Wake/Watch/Wonder about a spontaneously-formed internet-based mind that lay in an unconscious torpor, until a portion of the web went down (China shut its network borders) and only then did "Webmind" wake to become aware of "self" versus the "not-self".
Fascinating.

Wake (WWW, #1)

Caitlin Decter is young, pretty, feisty, a genius at ma…

www.goodreads.com

There is only one consciousness that unites us. It is immortal. Whereas matter and form are illusion or maya.

 

[DaveC426913]

There is only one consciousness that unites us. It is immortal. Whereas matter and form are illusion or maya.

OK, that's an opinion.

No explanation, no defense, no evidence, not even a rationale why you might think this.

Here, we call this preaching.




What you've said is analogous to this:

"I know that red is the best colour. All other colours are inferior. Trust me in this."
"Why do you say it is so? And how do you know it is so?"
"Because I like red better. Red is important to me."
"OK. that doesn't explain
a] why it should objectively be so - why anyone but you should think red is better.
b] how you claim to know that this is true, as opposed to it merely being your belief.

 

[C C]

There is only one consciousness that unites us. It is immortal. Whereas matter and form are illusion or maya.

Just in terms of an abstraction hanging together well, I have less problem with generic subjectivity or a ubiquitous "witness" or a literal God's eye view (etc) when it's depicted purely as grand manifestation with no meanings and significances whatsoever attached to it. Lacking not only judgments but anything to do with cognition (identification and understanding). But that may be a rare occurrence, if it ever happens at all in literature and lectures.

There always seems to be a suggestion of a degree of intellectual apprehension lingering, even after supposedly eliminating reason, concepts, language, self, etc. The latter is dependent upon information storage and actively utilizing that to make make distinctions and establish connections between phenomenal events.

Of course, at a specific or individual level an "overarching manifestation" of existence (or whatever) would contain these thoughts of memory-based entities like humans who would be representing, classifying, and comprehending the world in various ways (because that falls out of the intricate structure of their brains). But a "panphenomanal whole" itself would be missing a corresponding cause for such cognition, like that. And there's no reason why it should be "intelligent", since the latter entails limited organisms struggling to get past the representations of their brains and grasp "what's going on" as it really is. (Even if the latter were -- ultimately, just the unity of all private manifestations -- from visual to tactile, and many alien modes unknown to humankind.)

In contrast, for strict materialism (where matter is normally non-conscious and thereby devoid of appearances) death is a return to what the universe normally is to itself: the absence of everything -- no representations and manifestations. And those products of brains also lack any "cosmic" overarching unity with each other, and there is no entertaining of Russellian monism (where most matter activity might harbor primitive internal states -- not just the complex ones of neural processes).
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

What Is the Difference Between the Self and the Witness?
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/...e-difference-between-the-self-and-the-witness

KEY POINTS: There is a difference between witness consciousness and the self. Witness consciousness refers to the process of cultivating "pure awareness" without judgment of good or bad. The self grips the world and motivates you to act in service of your interests. Buddhism has long clarified the difference; modern psychology needs to be more explicit about it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

David Darling (Zen Physics): Living in a world of words and concepts and inherited beliefs, says Zen, we have lost the power to grasp reality directly. Our minds are permeated with notions of cause and effect, subject and object, being and nonbeing, life and death. Inevitably this leads to conflict and a feeling of personal detachment and alienation from the world. Zen's whole emphasis is on the experience of reality as it is, rather than the solution of problems that, in the end, arise merely from our mistaken beliefs.

Because it eschews the use of the intellect, Zen can appear nihilistic (which it is not) and elusive (which it is). Certainly, it would be hard to conceive of a system that stood in greater contrast with the logical, symbol-based formulations of contemporary science. More than any other product of the Oriental mind, Zen is convinced that no language or symbolic mapping of the world can come close to expressing the ultimate truth.

... Zen differs from other meditative forms, including other schools of Buddhism, in that it does not start from where we are and gradually lead us to a clear view of the true way of the world. The sole purpose of studying Zen is to have Zen experiences — sudden moments, like flashes of lightning, when the intellect is short-circuited and there is no longer a barrier between the experiencer and reality. Sometimes its methods can seem bizarre and even startling. To catch the flavor, if a Zen master found you reading this book he might grab it from you and hit you over the head with it, saying: “Here’s something else for you to think about!” Such shock tactics, however, are intended not to offend but rather to wake us up from our normal symbol-bound frame of mind.
_