What's new?

[Diageo]

What are you doing to change the world?

[Ganepark32]

I watched that video and have to say, some of it I just don't agree with. He rightly says that with our attention, we generally fixate on a single item because we can't process more than one at a time. This is kind of true as we can only perceptually fixate on a single item and properly process it whereas trying to do it with 2 or more increases the likelihood of selective information processing and contamination of said information resulting in inaccurate or incomplete memory. Yet, we do receive and, you could say, subconsciously process the fringe stimuli from the various sensory modalities as if you test people on this kind of thing, i.e. to fixate on something, they'll still be able to give information on things other than the fixated stimulus but just not in detail, as the guy in the video said.

 

However, he went on about how the compartmentalisation of the perceptual field, the real world, is to the detriment of our species. The way he was talking about it was as though it was something new but compartmentalisation has been part of the way in which we as humans process the world around us for decades, perhaps even longer. It's how we've evolved. The eye is specifically designed so that it primarily fixates on one object, in turn compartmentalising the world to make it more comprehensible. It's how our ears work as well, as studies have shown that if you tell a participant to fixate on the sound coming into the right ear while playing a different sound into the left, they will only be able to recall that information because that is what they've been primed to look for and it is what they'll focus on, blocking out the stimulus in the left ear (although this will be subconsciously processed as small bits can be recalled). As such, it explains why we often 'miss' certain things around us.

 

It's hardly to the detriment of humans to compartmentalise the world because if we took it as his 'wiggly world', we simply wouldn't be able to comprehend anything we experience; we'd be overloaded with information about each and everything single item resulting in a figurative brain melt, or even literal damage to the brain due to excessive blood flow as a result of trying to process everything.

 

It is worth noting, however, that neither intelligence or attention are understood fully. Intelligence doesn't simply refer to learning, as you seem to be getting at Jay (if I've got that wrong then apologies). It's an encompassing term which refers to the collaboration of various functions and systems (problem solving, visuo-spatial abilities, learning, thinking, etc.). Similarly, attention is an ambiguous term which, in terms of human psychology, hasn't been explained or given an accepted definition.

 

And as for whether a person can change, it's all about interactionalism and gene expression as a result of environmental influences. For some people, it's not truly possible to change who they are, any changes simply being superficial, but for others, if they meet a certain environmental condition, it's interaction with the physiological aspects of our being result in changes in our genes which can result in change. Although, it's perhaps less likely to happen in later age.[/wall of text]

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

I watched that video and have to say, some of it I just don't agree with. He rightly says that with our attention, we generally fixate on a single item because we can't process more than one at a time. This is kind of true as we can only perceptually fixate on a single item and properly process it whereas trying to do it with 2 or more increases the likelihood of selective information processing and contamination of said information resulting in inaccurate or incomplete memory. Yet, we do receive and, you could say, subconsciously process the fringe stimuli from the various sensory modalities as if you test people on this kind of thing, i.e. to fixate on something, they'll still be able to give information on things other than the fixated stimulus but just not in detail, as the guy in the video said.

 

However, he went on about how the compartmentalisation of the perceptual field, the real world, is to the detriment of our species. The way he was talking about it was as though it was something new but compartmentalisation has been part of the way in which we as humans process the world around us for decades, perhaps even longer. It's how we've evolved. The eye is specifically designed so that it primarily fixates on one object, in turn compartmentalising the world to make it more comprehensible. It's how our ears work as well, as studies have shown that if you tell a participant to fixate on the sound coming into the right ear while playing a different sound into the left, they will only be able to recall that information because that is what they've been primed to look for and it is what they'll focus on, blocking out the stimulus in the left ear (although this will be subconsciously processed as small bits can be recalled). As such, it explains why we often 'miss' certain things around us.

 

It's hardly to the detriment of humans to compartmentalise the world because if we took it as his 'wiggly world', we simply wouldn't be able to comprehend anything we experience; we'd be overloaded with information about each and everything single item resulting in a figurative brain melt, or even literal damage to the brain due to excessive blood flow as a result of trying to process everything.

 

It is worth noting, however, that neither intelligence or attention are understood fully. Intelligence doesn't simply refer to learning, as you seem to be getting at Jay (if I've got that wrong then apologies). It's an encompassing term which refers to the collaboration of various functions and systems (problem solving, visuo-spatial abilities, learning, thinking, etc.). Similarly, attention is an ambiguous term which, in terms of human psychology, hasn't been explained or given an accepted definition.

 

And as for whether a person can change, it's all about interactionalism and gene expression as a result of environmental influences. For some people, it's not truly possible to change who they are, any changes simply being superficial, but for others, if they meet a certain environmental condition, it's interaction with the physiological aspects of our being result in changes in our genes which can result in change. Although, it's perhaps less likely to happen in later age.[/wall of text]

 

Isn't the video guy's approach to the idea more philosophical than biological, though? About how we should be critical of our own world views and the ideas we hold as truths?

 

And when we're talking about people changing, I don't think we're talking on a genetic level, either.

[The Bard]

Its really funny how people repeat the same argument about essentialism and posit it as mind blowing. Like Fouault says "human knowledge is made for cutting, not for understanding." Our cognition works along mostly utilitarian lines. We see the world in a way pertaining closely to semiotics; once we see or feel or sense something for the first time, we come to attribute meaning to it, and from thenceforth, stop examining it, since we have already fit it into our conception of reality. Look at the way we process language; when you read a book in your native tongue, you're not examining every letter, every syllable, and all the minute details of structure (unless you consciously go out of your way to do so) but instead, you chunk them into larger phrases, glazing over the minutia. We do this with everything. The funny thing is, that this "expertise" of interpretation, makes it far far more difficult for you to incorporate new information into your tightly formed paradigm of understanding.

 

What this video is trying to get us to do is to fight a fundimental artifact of our cognition. Which is all fine and good, but it assumes we have the capacity to find another way of functioning.

 

Biologically, it is our frontal cortex that allows us, unlike other animals, to objectify "things" in thought and speculate as to their interactions. This part of our brain is woefully underdevelloped, being a relatively recent evolution, and is unlike the hind and midbrains which have had the benefit of millions of years of refinement.

 

Ramble ramble.

[jayseven]

I can't tell if you're arguing or agreeing with me. Honestly.

 

The video suggests that you can just accept the conflict between perceived reality and actual reality, and from that I take the meaning to be that you can be more understanding with this sort of higher awareness.

 

But anyway, once hologram theory is proved correct then we will realise it's not the biology that makes us. We make teh biology. But taht's a really stupid, winding, irrelevant addition to this already very lost and flaky thread!

 

I guess essentially I'm saying "groovy, dude".

[The Bard]

Yeah, well I think its fairly obvious that the way we percieve the world is not the way it exists outside us.

 

Also, the way that guy talks about nouns and verbs indicated a sway towards linguistic determinism. We do "cut nature at its joints" to better understand it, but we don't think of it solely in terms of grammatical units. I guess his argument was really to do with the fact that we artificially subdivide phenomena and things, which are really convergent and inter-related.

 

The thing is, when you come to that realisation, it takes some of the brunt off your own opinions, because you come to realise it means that nonthing you believe is cast in stone, and is only "true" in comparison to a normative yardstick, which is usually culturally or socially ordained, and therefore everything you think is entirely subjective.

 

I just don't have the same drive to be "right" as I did a few years ago. Which is probably all fair and well because I was the most egregious motherfucker around.

[chairdriver]

I just don't have the same drive to be "right" as I did a few years ago.

 

"I too thought that when proved wrong I lost somehow"

[jayseven]

Bard - that's me too I used to be quite vehement about my opinions, but these days (despite the odd outburst, which is usually because the person I'm arguing is incapable of seeing things any other way, so I find myself putting my opinionated hat on) I am very much "I can see what you mean" with everything. EVERYTHING. It ruins my life.

 

Everything is so entirely devoid of meaning, so why bother doing anything that you don't want to do? For a future self you don't even know exists? Fuck that, I think I'll do what I want right now. I thin.... BUT THEN WHY BE MORAL! I have a set of morals that prevent me from acting completely primal, but why? I don't know. But by following my chosen morals I feel 'proud'. So why not impose my morals on others? Well because my morals include the above "I see what you mean", so in general I can accept other ways (to an extent, again parenthesis to cover my arse which just proves my point of inability to just 'be').... AAGGGH IT SPIRALS IN MY MIND pandora, you lied! I thought I would be left with hope but all I have is the ability to fucking think which drains, oh how it draaaiiiins...

 

Bleh. Hence why I like philosophy. A fine quote from yesterday;

 

C: "If you don't want to go, you don't have to"

J: "I don't know if I don't want to go until I've gone"

C: "If you could do anything, what would you do?"

J: "Talk about philosophy, of the absence of meaning with existence and the essence of being"

R: "I'm really proud of my mittens!"

J: "..."

 

So yeah, whatever I was saying. It's just rambles and turnabouts.

[Diageo]

I think life has no meaning, that meaning itself was created by us. All DNA does is reproduce. Therefore the meaning of our existence is reproduction. That's what I think.

[The Bard]

Your ideas of morality and doing things are based on the idea that the things we do, the moralities and predispositions that give us shape, are informed by conscious thoughts and acts. I don't believe this to be the case for you, me, or anyone. I believe that we are syphoned into a narrow tract that we cannot avoid, and whatever semblane of choice we think we have, exists only because we see things on such a microscopic scale. Once asked to defend our moralities (usually, in my case, through an inner monologue rather than with other people, because I have no friends), we rationalise to the extreme, because we seek to defend the very ideals that take us hostage.

 

Also, I tend to take Heidegger's opinion about our sense of self; it has very little to do with a holistic self contained being, since, firstly, I think we are a bank of reference points, a set of reactions for everything around us, and what we are and do is limited by, and in response to the world around us. Secondly, any solid sense we can concieve of who we are, comes about through a projection of ourselves into the future, we act in the present according to the way we see ourselves in times to come.

 

I cannot remember the last time I did something that wasn't done through a sense of duty either to myself, or to the paranoid, overly anxious sense of morality that has been hammered into me. If I had my way I would do nothing all day other than lie in bed and snort amphetamine. I am coerced into being, into docility through the machinations of a world that is horrendously out of control. We are all players in a grand narrative that we augment but cannot shape.

 

I feel as if I'm speaking in vagaries now, which, undoubtedly, I am. So whatever. I'm sure there are a great many holes in my understanding, but unfortunately I really don't care, since my kind of understanding has no practical applications, serves only to make me miserable, and is pretty much liable to be incomprehensible to others.

 

I think life has no meaning, that meaning itself was created by us. All DNA does is reproduce. Therefore the meaning of our existence is reproduction. That's what I think.

 

Look at the way we process "music." Random combinations of sound that work on the basis of the fact that our brain projects a pattern. If this mental patten is corroborated with by the actual sounds we hear, our dopamine neurone pathway gets excited, we feel pleasure. We feel great at the fact that we had an internal ability to make sense of something. That something, outside us, is nonsense. It has no meaning, and all we have done by listening to music is find a way to manipulate our pleasure pathways.

 

We crave "meaning," and a sense of understanding. We want to be a part of something, rather than just buoys in an ocean of unreason. Why do you think religion is so popular? Because it gives a sense of overwhelming purpose and meaning.

Edited November 28, 2010 by The Bard
Automerged Doublepost

[jayseven]

Mmmm yes. I was reading up on the hologram theory at this spiritual site to be taken with a punch of salt earlier today, and it made me realise that most people are split into one of two groups - those who worry about life and those who worry about death. I'm a life-worrier. In death I believe I'll still be contained within the one in which everything is contained, in whatever element that reality truly is, where existence isn't a necessary predicate. Or something.

 

Anyway; people who worry about death are too predisposed with rationality and logic to feel there is any point in wasting a portion of their short life in giving it any respect by thinking about it. Of course I'm generalising, but in these tropes it makes sense to ponder.

 

P.S. Meet 2011 gin and chronic? Chronic bleeding of the philospores, that is.

[Dannyboy-the-Dane]

My head is hurting from reading this thread. But in a good way. I think.

[chairdriver]

I certainly worry about life more than death.

[tapedeck]

As cmolpex beigns we tkae in mroe tahn we fisrt prseume. Seeing viuslaly is sencoadry to waht our mind unedsrtnads.

 

OK so I'm trying to make a basic

point through what you just read.

Deletion is as much a part of life as selection. We select what we don't see on a sub conscious level which means that our sub conscious memory knows far more than we presume. (I'm a firm believer that what we don't know can be more important than what we do. It's what we do with this information that perhaps defines us.)

Edited November 29, 2010 by tapedeck

[Diageo]

I can't tell if you're arguing or agreeing with me. Honestly.

 

 

 

 

Look at the way we process "music." Random combinations of sound that work on the basis of the fact that our brain projects a pattern. If this mental patten is corroborated with by the actual sounds we hear, our dopamine neurone pathway gets excited, we feel pleasure. We feel great at the fact that we had an internal ability to make sense of something. That something, outside us, is nonsense. It has no meaning, and all we have done by listening to music is find a way to manipulate our pleasure pathways.

 

We crave "meaning," and a sense of understanding. We want to be a part of something, rather than just buoys in an ocean of unreason. Why do you think religion is so popular? Because it gives a sense of overwhelming purpose and meaning.

I know what you mean Jayseven.

[The Bard]

Sozzles, was in a weird headspace last night. Also, I didn't feel the need to "agree" necessarily, but was just playing off what the two of you said, without really reaching a conclusion.

[jayseven]

S'all good, bardy!

 

As cmolpex beigns we tkae in mroe tahn we fisrt prseume. Seeing viuslaly is sencoadry to waht our mind unedsrtnads.

 

OK so I'm trying to make a basic

point through what you just read.

Deletion is as much a part of life as selection. We select what we don't see on a sub conscious level which means that our sub conscious memory knows far more than we presume. (I'm a firm believer that what we don't know can be more important than what we do. It's what we do with this information that perhaps defines us.)

 

If the wodrs are seffhlud in an aaabcehilptl oderr, it deos not raeimn as easy to dceeihpr. woh tboua fi uoy cwitcs ynlo eht tirsf dna tasl setterl? owh baout fi noly hte ifrst wto eltters rae wsitched? All are still readable, some methods just take longer to decipher.

 

What we don't know we know, and what we know we don't know. Lovely little annoying sentence right there :P

 

There's no point to this post btw.