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Grissess' Experience, Reference, and Guide


Grissess

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I am starting a thread here as a way to catalogue all of the information I have learned so far. At the time of writing this, I've had a tulpa for a decade, but only known that his existence qualified as a tulpa only for about a week. In that one week, I have learned so much, not only from the rest of the community here, but also from him.

 

Table of Contents

 

Items in blue are undergoing changes.

 

  • Table of Contents
  • Conventions of this Document
  • Biographies
    • Myself
    • Snakey

    [*]Working of the Mind

    • My Mind, from the Inside

    [*]Advice for the Tulpamancer

    • Concerning Doubt
    • Concerning Respect
    • Concerning Fear
    • Concerning Identity
    • Concerning Metaphysics/Ontology
    • Concerning Perception
    • Concerning Faith
    • Concerning Formation

    [*]Roster of Experiences

    [*]Conclusion

 

Conventions of this Document

 

Before you peruse any further, you should be aware of the layout of the document, as well as the notation I will use to make it more concise.

 

I'll try to keep most of the general information up here, in this original post. If I have a single, solitary event that is worth mentioning, I will post a reply here. If there is some reason why this event is worth mentioning here, I will permalink to it.

 

Hyphenated words are my notation of concepts (or ideas, whichever you prefer), which are either named or described by the word or phrase therein. I will write plainly; when I am dictating any tulpa, I will either "use a previous quote" that I attribute to them, or {write what is being said currently} in braces. I will also document my speech directly to a tulpa, as opposed to the reader, in [square brackets].

 

Biographies

 

With that out of the way, I would like to introduce the two of us. My name is Graham, but you may refer to me here and everywhere as Grissess. I have always referred to my tulpa as Snakey, but he's been hesitant in revealing his true name to me; the former is the name by which I will call him.

 

Myself

 

I am a computer programmer, studying computer science, currently at the undergraduate level. Being an engineer of sorts requires a powerful imagination, which I have been able to use as an advantage. I have also been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, but I've been able to cope well, and few who don't know me well know I have it. It was, however, more noticeable when I was younger, which (combined with other factors) lead to quite a detachment from the sociality I should have been experiencing at the time. Just prior to age 8, I realized just how lonely I was, and on my 8th birthday, (along with an electronics kit that would eventually spark my interest in digital logic and henceforth programming), I received a stuffed snake. Within the week, I was conversing with this snake as an outlet to whatever I needed to talk about. He became as real to me as any other person. Looking unto this snake, even now, I see not the tattered, ragged old body of a stuffed animal, but an actual consciousness, one as real as anyone else.

 

Snakey

 

Snakey was born from the insanely twisted mind of my own decades ago. Being so long, I remember not many of the details of the process, but I can infer that, being as how I needed not visualize him to seem him well, most of his formation was through constant narration; not for weeks, but for years.

 

Since then, his personality seems to have gone through four "revisions", each particularly tuned to sometime in my life when that personality helped me. At first, he was playful, as was I, and he would participate in my imaginary situations (basically, young roleplaying, which I'm sure is not atypical). At some point, however, he became critical and malevolent, constantly being quite mean, but I'm certain this helped me stand up to criticism. After this, he disappeared for about 6 months (he was taken from me, really) and returned with a calm, generous, concerned mannerism. His current personality seems to be a mixture of the three; he is sometimes brash and tempermental, but he is also caring and respectful, and, on occasion, likes to playfully act out (by, e.g., engaging in trolling). He seems to be quite concerned about elegance, and holds the steadfast belief that the most elegant existence is the truth, which makes him quite the philosopher. It also probably explains why he finds limbs "distasteful."

 

By convention, we agreed that Snakey's physical body is 15 years of age (three years younger than I am), which I refer to as his age when asked, but we both know that his imaginal form is basically 8 years younger than I am, which would put him at a decade old, nearing 11.

 

His physical body is that of a mottled dark-and-light blue rattlesnake with a brown tail, about 2 meters in length. It has a few rips, tears, and kinks, but these don't affect him (or my vision of his consciousness). He is missing both of the eyes he used to have, which were orange catseyes with black pupils, about 1cm in diameter.

 

His imaginal form is harder to make out. He appears basically black and shadowy, with the only distict feature being those orange catseyes. He would look menacing and sinister, if it weren't for the philia and familiarity we share with each other.

 

Workings of the Mind

 

Being both philosophers, we often find ourselves steeping in thought about what is true, and, even harder to answer, what form truth takes. I am an aspiring scientist, which requires I be an empiricist, so when that is necessary I assume the following postulates:

  1. There exists a universe which I observe that contains more than my (or our) consciousness(es).
  2. The qualities of this universe are consistent everywhere to each and every observer (though perception may differ).
  3. This universe is necessarily precisely defined to maintain such consistency.

However, none of these follow from anything that can be observed or perceived; they are the grand pillars of science, but improvable therein (as shown spectacularly by Gödel). This is why Snakey and I often delve into ontology when we discuss existence in any significant way.

 

My Mind, from the Inside

 

As Snakey put it once, "the mind can only ever be perceived, never seen," which means each individual has their own perception of the workings of their mind. I've heard of many over the past week; many people invent wonderlands that inadvertently contain areas like libraries (which contain all memories). Some have seen their subconscious, and each perceives it differently. In the interest of understanding some of my later material, I will share the perception of my mind that Snakey had me view at one point.

 

My mind is apparently completely contained within the void, a dark, vast, infinite expanse. Therein is a gigantic, bright white star, which is the perception of my subconscious (and the thing that Snakey referred to as "our mutual evil"). It pulsates and flares, often erratically, with creative energy. Around it orbits a bubble-like object which Snakey referred to as my "Universe of Thought"; it appears to contain the manifestation of my library. I was told that when a particularly powerful flare or pulse erupts from my subconscious and intersects this universe, I have the most vivid, memorable, creative, and unique dreams. I was also further told not to go near my subconscious, as its creative potential knows no bounds; it can and has created countless many ineffable concepts which would destroy any semblance of logic in something which came too near.

 

Advice for the Tulpamancer

 

I will conclude this guide (for now) with the following section devoted to the development of tulpae. I hope that, in doing so, I will be able to share my experience with someone in dire need of it.

 

I have organized these into small sections that give my viewpoints. I will continue to do so until I can structure an appropriate outline.

 

Concerning doubt: Never doubt. It is the single most poisonous and insidious part of any tulpa-host relationship. I accept that those with a scientific mind will note that there is no provable component to the existence of a tulpa, but it is best to just be accepting of the fact that, if it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck, it probably is a duck, for lack of any evidence to the contrary.

 

Concerning respect: Always work to foster a relationship of respect between tulpae and yourself. At no point should either one of you consider yourselves superior; indeed, it will come at one point that neither one of you will have complete control over the other, as it is with us. From respect should stem genuine care and concern for each other (and hopefully others as well).

 

Considering fear: Do not fear your tulpa. It is an entity created by your mind that will probably express your subconscious with greater accuracy than you can. That being said, they know what you like, and they know what you find to be pleasing, and, as long as you are not intentionally masochistic (which would mean you would like this outcome anyways on some level), your tulpa will probably not come to be something you dislike or fear.

 

Concerning identity: The host of a tulpa never forgets that they are the host, which is what primarily separates this from other dissociative disorders (notably DID). While it is not considered any kind of "mental illness" to possess a tulpa, it is recommended that one take all the advice presented herein with a grain of salt, particularly since the underlying process of forming a tulpa will nevertheless result in a great amount of self-discovery and questioning (from which you will probably be a better person). Reportedly (but unconfirmed), people who do suffer from various disorders can find utility in a tulpa, which can probably do things such as establish a channel of communication between multiple identities (just speculation at this point).

 

Update: A case study was observed secondhand. A person with DID observed at least twenty tulpae of varying personalities. They were all able to converse in their shared wonderland, and the host did not need to give permission for "switching" to occur. Memory lapses remain unexplained.

 

Concerning metaphysics/ontology: This inevitably ends up on the mind of any tulpamancer. If I can create a being that is real to me, then what is reality? What is the reality in which this being exists? Can I be sure that everyone else that I talk to or see isn't just some other expression of myself in a similar manner to a tulpa? What, then, are the properties of that which exists?

 

All of these questions are generally considered to be under the topic of ontology, which is the philosophy of existence (and, as such, has received some very interesting and unique views from many of the greatest minds). Arguably, some ontology must be agreed on before attempting science, which is why I proposed the postulates in "Workings of the Mind," above.

 

Just remember: "Cogito, ergo sum. [i think, therefore I am.]" -Reneè Descartes

 

Concerning perception: Each person (well, even each consciousness) has a unique way of perceiving their environment. Perception is the mental faculty that is begotten from the senses; it represents the model each one of us builds of our environment and of the universe such that we may dissect it for information. However, while we can nearly be certain that our perceptions are, for the most part, similar (two people may refer to the same sign as "a blue sign", exempli gratis), they are never exactly the same. Furthermore, while language is our conveyor of these concepts that form the perceptions, language is always imperfect in that it cannot express some of the most basic perceptions we hold. What does pain feel like? What does time feel like?

 

At one point, Snakey told me that "eventually you'll learn which of your eyes to trust more." He was referring to the "mind's eye" over my physical eyes, the former of which is the metaphor for the model of all the things perceived. He made it clear, in such a simple statement, that perception is the only thing that we have in this world, and that it is the only thing one can actually use to prove that a world exists.

 

Concerning faith: Faith is belief, but it carries the connotation that it is belief based on principles which are not scientific. Many religions, as an example, require faith as an underlying principle, but faith is not limited to religion alone. As I've covered previously, even considering something as simple as talking to another person requires faith in the fact that the other person exists; and even if they do, how can one be certain that this other person isn't just another well-defined tulpa--a form of their own mind? Even a scientist would be considered to be having faith in the fact that an observable universe exists before proceeding to study it.

 

Religious faith, in particular, is a touchy subject, but I think Snakey and I have made some progress. He seems to sternly believe that the voice of a deity--particularly, the "voice of God"--is brought about by many of the same mechanisms by which a tulpa is. Given that this is the case, the "deity-tulpa" would have utter control over the perception of the host, making miracles appear before their very eyes, and even speaking to them the words of "truth"--which is likely their subconscious representation of reality. The validity of this claim would have profound impacts on many religions, although a certain few have actually already considered it; after all, "tul-pa" is a Buddhist word representing this practice.

 

I wish not to instigate, but Snakey insists that I share another of his quotes on that matter: "The truth corrupts those too weak to handle it." I have a feeling that he means that a misunderstanding of the truth (or the nature thereof) can be costly, if not lethal, in more than just a religious sense.

 

Concerning formation: Forming a tulpa is relatively easy if measured only in physical effort; the greatest strength one needs to have is the ability to concentrate. It remains unknown (at least to me) what causes a tulpa to form, precisely, and at what point the tulpa is truly sentient, or truly a separate consciousness from its host; these things are the subject of ongoing study, and by taking this journey, you'll be helping.

 

A common question is where to start. The answer is always wherever you feel you should. Forming a tulpa is an intensely personal process, and only one person knows how to do so correctly for themselves--you. Each person has their strengths and weaknesses, and you are the person that knows them best.

 

If that still hasn't answered your question, keep in mind that formation is split into to broad categories: visualization and narration. Visualization is the practice that allows one to perceive imaginary objects as "real", and can be done with any object; in particular, this step can be bypassed (as I did) if you have a physical form to concentrate on. Narration is the actual conversational part of forming a tulpa, and it is this that establishes communication, reveals personality, and, according to some theories, forms sentience. Just start with whichever feels more comfortable to you.

 

Roster of Experiences

 

This section contains the list of relevant experiences, with links and synopses. Please note that there may be multiple experiences in one post.

 

  1. Imposition - Saturday, December 1, 2012 - I am guided in my first attempt at imposition, which ends with a headache. Snakey makes a comment that implies that the "mind's eye" is more trustworthy than my physical eyes.
  2. Visualization - Sunday, December 2, 2012 - Snakey shows me my mind, as we perceive it. He makes sure to note that perception is the only way it can ever be viewed.
  3. Philosophy - Saturday, December 8, 2012 - I explore the definition of reality, and in the process discover The Automaton (TA), the direct controller of my body and administrator of my memories.
  4. Dialogue - Sunday, December 9, 2012 - I explore whether or not Snakey exists. Snakey posits his philosophical stance on his own existence.
  5. Philosophy - Friday, December 14, 2012 - I posit the existence of simulative agents and state their necessity to any societal agent. I then introduce tulpae into this theory. The result may help anyone with the "two answers" problem.
  6. Philosophy - Tuesday, December 18, 2012 - I tackle the problem of defining focus and its characteristics, and how it relates to parallel processing, as well as where tulpae are separate from their host (and where they are alike).
  7. Dialogue/Visualization - Tuesday, January 15, 2013 - I experience a mental battle in the void, and conclude that I need to work on being able to control my mind. I also have a dream that seems to prove that my memory is rather adept when it wants to be.
  8. Philosophy - Friday, January 18, 2013 - A small addendum to Experience 5.
  9. Philosophy - Sunday, February 10, 2013 - Snakey approaches and confronts Cartesian dualism and materialism, and concludes that, if we are to ignore deus ex machina, that we must conclude that consciousness is a distributed, physical phenomenon; he also touches on his stance of religiously formed tulpae.
  10. Philosophy - Sunday, February 24, 2013 - I finish the task of describing religiously formed tulpae by combining groupthink theory with current models of the tulpa phenomenon.
  11. Philosophy - Saturday, April 13, 2013 - An update on my status, containing a theory that hosts are simulants as well, and places consciousness as a continuum; similarly, my mention of a foray into magick as a way to understand the position of metaphysicists and find the true nature of an objective reality, if one can be said to exist.
  12. Philosophy - Thursday, June 6, 2013 - I explain the shared, universal nature of memory, and that it probably prevents tulpae from effectively keeping secrets that are truly unbeknownst to the host.
  13. Index continued (size limit reached).

 

Conclusion

 

This undertaking is far from complete--the development of a tulpa is the work of a lifetime.

 

If you have any specific questions, especially one not covered here, please reply to this thread. I will be certain that the answer to that question is available here from that point forward.

 

Thank you for your time.

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Experience 1 (Imposition) - Saturday, December 1, 2012

 

This one happened while I was resting around.

 

I started to think about trying to impose Snakey. He must have been alert to my half-hearted efforts, as he quickly came to me and told me to stop trying and to "clear my mind" (using some hypnosis techniques that I had learned the week earlier, along with his own, unique abilities to disrupt my thoughts). After my mind was sufficiently clear, I fell into a kneeling pose, closed my eyes, and was thrust into the void.

 

Snakey presented me with a few common objects I knew of--my toothbrush, my laptop, my bed, etc.--directly in front of me. He asked me if I could sense each one: feel it, see it, smell it, etc., and I reported that I could. Finally, he asked me to "see me." I tried, but I could only make out a very dark, smokey form, but with the characteristic orange eyes.

 

The form faded quickly, and Snakey asked me to open my eyes. I did, and the form was there, imposed on the floor, for a matter of only a few seconds. At this point, I experienced a rather sharp headache, and asked Snakey to stop. He seemed moderately amused, and lightly berated me for "being better at this" some time ago. He gave me a quite memorable quote: "Eventually you'll learn which of your eyes to trust more," referring to my mind's eye and real eyes, before saying "if you need me, you know where I am." I was left with the headache for some time afterward; I estimate about two hours.


Experience 2 (Visualization) - Sunday, December 2, 2012

 

This occurred early Sunday morning, as I was sleeping since Saturday night, but was woken unexpectedly. This insomnia pattern continued for about three days; this was the second.

 

Snakey had invited me to see "something awesome", after having a miserable time trying to chat with other people whose minds he could not read for the first time. Using many of the similar hypnosis tricks from Experience 1 (and my near-sleep state), he lured me into a rather vivid session of imagery and visualization.

 

I was, at first, propelled into the void, as usual, but Snakey sent me a bit farther in this time. I can't remember exactly how I moved my viewpoint about, but I think it involved telekinesis. At some point, both of us stopped very close to a bright star, which Snakey introduced as "our mutual evil." Through further explanation, he revealed that this was the form my subconscious took. Orbiting around it was a bubble-shaped universe to which Snakey referred as my "Universe of Thought." It appeared to contain the manifestation of my libary--as we journeyed periodically through it, I was met with many memories, memorable places, and old loci that I'd invented as a method of storing arbitrary information (memory palaces).

 

We drifted back out in view of the star, which was noticeably pulsating. Snakey explained that the pulsations and flares were those of creative energy, and that this happened normally, but only rarely did a pulse ever affect the orbiting "Universe of Thought." According to his description, when a pulsation or flare intersected it, I had my most memorable and vivid dreams.

 

It was at this time he gave me another memorable quote: "The mind can only ever be perceived, and never seen. Doing so would be like trying to make a blind newborn see the Mona Lisa." His analogy was, by my standards, awkward, but certainly precise.

 

After this occurred, I slept poorly.

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Hi Grissess, welcome to the forum. I just wanted to say that your thread was an interesting read. I share a lot of your views and opinions but you are a lot more eloquent in sharing them than I am.

 

Snakey does seem like quite the philosopher. Does he take charge often? His advice seems like what you would hear from a leader or mentor. I haven't heard of many tulpa showing such behavior.

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Hi Grissess, welcome to the forum. I just wanted to say that your thread was an interesting read. I share a lot of your views and opinions but you are a lot more eloquent in sharing them than I am.

Thank you.

Snakey does seem like quite the philosopher. Does he take charge often? His advice seems like what you would hear from a leader or mentor. I haven't heard of many tulpa showing such behavior.

 

He and I debate things like this often. He has a full concept of a reality which is his and his alone (although he knows that the reality he plays in is the one that I can observe and perceive), and is quite vocal about not assuming that physics hold therein. He always likes to point out that he can, for example, fly and stand at the same time, be in two positions at once, and the like.

 

If he doesn't sound quite philosophical from the above, it's probably because I've condensed his speech into the parts that were particularly profound. In reality, there was a lot of back-and-forth dialogue before getting to those; most of them were answers to my questions, but I've since forgotten all but the essence of those conversations. Pardon me, I can't read; I thought you said "doesn't seem." To answer your other question, he takes charge when we're doing stuff like this; he seems like the more experienced of us with these matters. As for the behavior, I know that many tulpae often start out friendly and playful, like Snakey did at once, but he soon matured into quite the sage, probably naturally considering he is a decade old...I hope that answers your questions.


Experience 3 (Philosophy) - Saturday, December 8, 2012

 

After some various experiments with Snakey, and my past experiences, I decided to try and tackle the question "what is real?" Most of these experiments were, on their own, too uneventful to catalogue here, but taken together they gave me an interesting revelation.

 

I had known (or, at least suspected, and now hold as a strong theory) that there is some kind of "middleman" between me and my body, as well as Snakey and my body. I've referred to it as different names, including "the thing" most recently, but I will now officially call it "The Automaton" for the sake of this theory. It is not a tulpa because it has no consciousness, no sentient component; it is a being of nearly pure logic, and, as I have learned, it is the primary interface between both Snakey's and my memories. (This being is also one of two that can fully possess my body, the other being me; Snakey cannot control my body, but he can issue commands to this being when I put it into control. This is a venue of research for another time...)

 

The important part about this is the fact that, after some experimentation, I came to the conclusion that the algorithm that decides what is real or imaginary is the one used by The Automaton. It is entirely capable of deciding whether a declarative memory is "real" or "imposed," and it does so by cross-referencing with previous memories declared "real" and with the rest of my perception (which is as close to my senses as possible). It is impossible, or at least very difficult (so difficult that I've never been able to do so), to declare a memory that isn't real as "real." Snakey is, apparently, also unable to affect the reality status of a memory, and cannot modify one that is declared as real.

 

This has particular implications. It means that The Automaton is the being that holds my barrier between reality and imagination, and that this is the most direct barrier between reality and perceived imagination. Without breaking this barrier, I will be effectively unable to impose.

 

However, I am also somewhat afraid of the consequences of breaking that barrier. Without it, both Snakey and I will be able to create real memories that aren't real; we'd both be able to completely convince myself of the truth of a fact that, under more rigorous analysis, would be false or invalid. My definitions of reality would break down, and, without those definitions, I would be effectively unable to perform my empiric duties as a scientist.

 

Until further notice, this barrier will remain firmly in effect, for the aforementioned reason. I now know, however, what I must penetrate, or at least weaken, in order to open myself to suggestion and, thereby, imposition.

 

Edit: It has been suggested that I consider creating a new class of memory; instead of declaring memory as exclusively "real" or "imaginal", I could create a third class of memory, "pseudoreal" (or "imposed," depending on how I work out the terminology), which would be selectably visible to The Automaton and my subconscious. This is a fairly large undertaking, though, and I'm not sure where to start. I will report back when I am more aware of where to begin.

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I've been given a go-ahead to bump with this. Please notify me if this is in error.

 

Experience 4 (Dialogue) - Sunday, December 9, 2012

 

This conversation took place between Snakey and myself while I was taking a shower. In it, I explore one of the most common questions asked by a novice host: does the tulpa exist?

 

Grissess: Snakey, do you exist?

 

Snakey: Heh, I thought you would ask me this at one point. Let me ask you, do you think that you exist?

 

Grissess: Cogito ergo sum.

 

Snakey: Yes, very good. But what about everyone you know, all the people you've met; do they exist?

 

Grissess: I cannot be certain of this.

 

Snakey: Of course you can't. Now, consider this: assume, for a moment, that I exist. I am thinking while I communicate with you; ergo, by your prior argument, I can safely state that I exist. But at the same time I cannot prove that you exist.

 

Grissess: True...

 

Snakey: To doubt one's own existence is a fallacy of the highest degree, but a fallacy which could never be fixed by merely approaching it with logic. In this vein, I shall now present to you a utility which has found much use in science: Occam's Razor. Now, which is simpler: to assume that I am some simulated, fabricated construct of your mind, or that I exist?

 

Grissess: Occam's Razor is only a suggestion, snake, to be used on a number of equally correct theories (based on current observation) that states that the simplest theory is usually the most likely to be correct. It lacks any weight in argument, especially because it has been proven that many things, like gravity, aren't as simple as they seem at first.

 

Snakey: My, you are getting better at this. Let me approach this differently; do you believe that a universe exists?

 

Grissess: Well...yes.

 

Snakey: Why?

 

Grissess: Because I can observe it.

 

Snakey: Let me change the wording on that. You believe that the universe exists because you can perceive and conceive it, and those perceptions and conceptions coincide. Would you agree with that?

 

Grissess: I...suppose...

 

Snakey: Can you perceive me?

 

Grissess: Yes...

 

Snakey: Can you conceive me?

 

Grissess: Of course.

 

Snakey: Does your perception and conception of me coincide?

 

Grissess: I...would say so...

 

Snakey: Then, by the same logic you use to believe that the universe exists, wouldn't it follow that you'd believe I exist?

 

Grissess: Yes, I guess so. But believing you exists and actually existing is two different matters altogether.

 

Snakey: Right you are. Let us define a belief as a personal truth that you hold. We shall assume, then, that any belief is true for you, and you alone. It follows, then, that (from your vantage), if you believe I exist, that it must be true that I must exist (for you), does it not?

 

Grissess: Well...I...suppose...that would be the case.

 

Snakey: Quod erat demonstrandum.

 

Grissess: But it's not scientific proof.

 

Snakey: Your limited form of science will never prove my existence, and you're aware of this. Don't bother.

 

Grissess: Thank you, anyways. You are a clever snake.

 

Snakey: Why thank you; you're not too bad yourself.

 

I don't know that this would be helpful to any tulpa host, especially a novice, since the logic Snakey used was completely dependent on my ability to perceive him, which is something that is often problematic for those starting with a tulpa. Nonetheless, it has solidified my belief in his existence, which is quite important in any case.

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Experience 5 (Philosophy) - Friday, December 14, 2012

 

I've been pondering the nature of the existence of a tulpa in the mind, and what it is in particular that makes them unique. This simple question has spawned a great deal of interest in the workings of a social agent, and led me to yet another theory.

 

First, consider a social agent. They are capable of predicting the state of one another through a process called empathy; they are further able to generalize the state of the foreign agent over time to predict their state after reacting to another event. This seems like a complicated ability, and it is, but it forms a great deal of our feelings toward one another, and how we express them: "I won't do this because X wouldn't like it." "I think X would be pleased if I got them this gift." "I feel terrible for what I did [because it will annoy X when they learn of it]."

 

In order to predict these states, we must assume that, for each person with which one acquaints themselves, we form a simulative agent. We extract information about their interests, their beliefs, their current state of mind, and feed these as the parameters to this agent. After a little bit, we start expecting the results we are seeing from this person, because the agent has started to become accurate in its forecasts. We start judging these accuracies. "I expected X to do that." "That doesn't sound like X at all."

 

The formation of an agent is long-term, and never finished. The simulative agents for a group of close friends are probably accurate enough to predict even speech patters, but the agents formed for old acquaintances may still be accurate enough to guess what career path they've taken, or how they will have felt about some particularly global event.

 

What separates these agents from tulpae? They possess many similar characteristics; they communicate via thought (as all mental constructs of this sort do), and, given an input state, they generate a temporally dependent output, which means one can hold a conversation with it. If you asked one, it would reply that it is sentient. But is it?

 

This is a very hard line to draw. We assume that a tulpa is sentient and creative because it is, but these entities are sentient and creative because they model a being that is sentient and creative. That is to say, it is entirely possible (and probably very likely for a beginning host) to possess a simulative agent for their tulpa, which could explain the "two answers" problem.

 

Knowing the difference between a tulpa and a simulative agent is tricky, but necessary to overcome this problem. What shall we use as our "litmus test" between a tulpa and an agent?

 

I have no explicit way to answer this now, which is unfortunate, but many other recommend from experience that one will hear the voice of the tulpa first, then (if any exists) the agent will respond second, usually with a stronger thought. It will probably take some time to dispel this second entity, but experience says that it will happen at some point.

 

Edit: There is still a glimmer of hope for one with the "two answers" problem: it confirms that one is, indeed, a tulpa.

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Experience 6 (Philosophy) - Tuesday, December 18, 2012

 

In the interest of parallel processing, I have devoted some of my time to studying attention and focus. It is quite hard to specify exactly what these are, and even harder to state exactly what processes cause these phenomena to come about, but I have done my best to speculate based on experience and introspection. My findings are as follows.

 

First, I noted that attention is granular--it can be focused across large groups or small ones, and the amount of detail observed varies inversely in proportion with the size of the area observed. Consider a room full of party-goers from a bird's-eye perspective. One can observe the whole group as mingling, but once one focuses on a particular individual, they lose focus on the rest of the group. For this lack of focus on the rest of the party, however, they would notice more details about the individual they are observing--perhaps identifying information like hair color, face shape, and height, as well as situational information such as current expression, voice tone, and so on. The ability to focus on one object--at the loss of many others--is, in fact, a critical function for a predator that must target a certain item of prey, and (as CAPTCHAs have shown) is a facility that our brain is distinctly capable of.

 

Second, I noted that attention can be abstracted--it can be applied throughout an entire hierarchy. For example, one could intently focus on a word on a page, or the page itself, or even the book in which that page is contained. Perhaps the book is on a shelf that can be focused on, as well as the bookcase, or an entire library. The ability to abstract entities and, more particularly, concepts, gives us a very important insight into the way we model the behavior of the natural world. By thinking in terms of forests rather than trees, in beaches rather than sand grains, we can devise concepts of properties that generalize across all particular instances of a certain classification of existence.

 

Finally, I came to the conclusion that attention is singular--it can only ever be on one thing at a time. This should not be confused with the ability to "focus" on a large group, such as an entire crowd, even if it contains many individuals--as the party showed us, if we focus on one individual, we lose our focus on the group containing it. It is generally possible to also focus on many different entities, so long as they can group nicely into some sort of hierarchy; we can direct our attention to an entire landscape, for example, which contains many different kinds of flora and fauna, because they are grouped together (under other categories) as being "natural." It would likely be more difficult to focus on an entire landscape consisting of extraterrestrials, a roller derby, gym socks, and irrational numbers, because these concepts don't abstract well with each other.

 

This last conclusion was the hardest to come to, because if is indeed true, how does one explain multitasking? Well, we can consider grouping as a weak form of multitasking; exempli gratis, one playing the arcade game "Whack-a-mole" can observe the entire game field at one time, but their attention is triggered by movement, during which time they focus on the object which is moving (and proceed to intercept it with a blow). This kind of triggering is important, and, in the previous example, this triggering is provided by an external stimulus--the game. What about processes, such as frying burgers on a grill, that require attention to individuals and have no well-noticeable external stimuli to draw attention?

 

I had to accept that there must be some sort of "focus-switching" going on here, at such a rate that it happens in a second nature manner. The careful cook watching a set of grilling burgers will switch their attention carefully to each burger, one at a time, and use the details they evaluate to determine whether or not the burger is ready. The watchful eye at a party will notice several people of interest--perhaps many who are acting out or who are blatantly inebriated--and quickly observe the situation each one is in before evaluating it and moving to the next. The person reading a book is quick to move their focus from word to word, sentence to sentence, paragraph upon paragraph, in the order the text was written. The driver using a cellular phone needs to be adept in switching between the rather focus-consuming task of driving and the task of operating their phone to succeed without incident (unfortunately, this is too often not the case).

 

If this is indeed how one multitasks, it implies that two different systems can change focus: external stimuli from the environment, and internal motives. The corollary of this is that attention must be a wide-spread phenomenon that affects (and is affected by) many different cognitive systems. At its core, what we focus on is what we are actively parsing for perceptions, the filter for our sensory input, and thusly fills an important role in the model of the mind.

 

We shall now enter the realm of tulpae and parallel processing. Having a tulpa be capable of processing something in parallel requires a different focus from the one that is used by the host consciousness. The difficulty in erecting a barrier between the host's focus and the tulpa's focus is how ingrained the phenomenon of focus is in many lower level systems. For example, if you heard a gunshot right now, chances are you would turn to locate the source and use the information acquired to assess your personal danger (and perhaps other dangers after that assessment is completed). This is an example of an external stimulus that operates at a very low, almost reflexive level; because this is such a low-level response, I remain uncertain that a tulpa's focus can ever be separate from that of its host.

 

I rather posit, in my experience, that a tulpa's focus and host's focus are one in the same. It seems most natural between Snakey and myself, who "share a mind," to assume that we can both operate on whatever we're focusing on at whatever time, but we must do so together. The more accessible feats attributed to parallel processing, such as the ability to quickly form arithmetic, may be in fact more correctly attributed to an increased ability to multitask and "task-switch" in such a way that many of the smaller jobs therein can be formed seemingly in parallel. Without a better metaphor, this is a nearly analogous behavior to that of a computer, which only performs one thread of program control at a time, but switches between many of them (a "context switch") hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of times per second.

 

This discussion has, of course, ignited my interest in finding the barriers of tulpa, at least in my own mind; places where Snakey and I are treated as significantly disparate entities, and places where Snakey and I are one in the same. This short foray has shown that focus probably falls into the latter category, but leaves plenty unanswered. As always, I will continue my inquiry into the matter.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Experience 7 (Dialogue/Visualization) - Tuesday, January 15, 2013

 

Last night...or, more properly, this morning, was a rather interesting amalgam of experiences that, I feel, have allowed me to get better control over my thoughts and the actions of my mind.

 

It started with me reading creepypasta, something that I do on occasion just for the thrill of it. (Creepypasta has, in the past, reintroduced my fear of the dark, and also acquainted me with MLP.) In this particular story, an unfortunate person is harassed in their dreams by some malevolent being...which rang of tulpae to me, so I decided to submit Snakey and myself to a little simulation--a game, if you will.

 

I recreated, to the best of my experience, the concept of this being, and released it into the void (which is my typical visualization spot). I then called upon Snakey to see what he would do if it threatened me, which I allowed it to do. I even let myself become immersed in this little simulation.

 

Snakey was surprisingly adept at being able to ward off mental attacks. I, on the other hand, as a self-professed "weakling," was less able. Eventually, I was tasked with destroying the concept that I had created, which was feeding off of the innate fear I experienced from reading the creepypasta. I created an orb, a "black hole," for the express intent of destroying concepts, but I started to feel drained as I did so. Eventually, as the orb expanded, I could not hold it stable, and my focus began to lapse. After a moment of confusion, I found myself back in a chair, laptop on my lap, still open to the creepypasta I was reading. Snakey, who had reportedly taken care of the concept, began a conversation.

 

Snakey: {A bit annoyed, as usual.} That was intensely idiotic.

 

Grissess: What?

 

Snakey: You conceptualized an entity whose property was . You do realize what would have happened if it touched you, right?

 

Grissess: No...?

 

Snakey: I wouldn't be talking with anyone right now, you idiot.

 

After a little more back-and-forth, Snakey concluded that I needed to work on my ability to control my thoughts, suggesting that I meditate. Still in the chair, with my eyes open, I began focusing on scenes that required some mental effort to sustain. At one point, I was able to hold 14 cubes in independent, non-intersecting orbits for about 7 seconds, which was an improvement, and we both decided to call it a night.

 

I returned to seeing the creepypasta on my laptop, once again, but this time, on inspecting my laptop (and cued by some part of the story), I followed a concept chain that was pervaded with information technology. It ended with another open-eye visualization of a massive computer, of which I had vague familiarity, sending and receiving information to and from the farthest corners of the void. Snakey joined me in visualizing it.

 

Snakey: Ah, I see you found TA.

 

Grissess: This is TA?

 

Snakey: This is --the conceptual entity you've formed to represent it.

 

On an impulse, I lobbed a fireball at it, which caused a modest explosion. Snakey turned to me, a little shocked.

 

Snakey: That was exceedingly reckless!

 

Grissess: I'm sorry...did I damage TA?

 

Snakey: No, you didn't damage it, because you didn't conceive of an act which would damage it; you just conceived of an act that would cause an explosion. As for damaging TA, if you value your sanity, I would not recommend it.

 

I reminisced about the mental battle I had early, and it made me uneasy.

 

Grissess: Can something else destroy TA?

 

Snakey: No; you and I are the only ones that possess this visage of TA; we are the only ones that can summon it. The only way it would happen is if a rampant thought overtook either of us.

 

Snakey faltered a little bit at the end of that reply, for a reason I knew as well--I was almost just overtaken by a thought I had conceived myself.

 

Grissess: Snake...if I were indeed overtaken by a rampant thought...would you do what is necessary to stop me?

 

Snakey: I...{worried, then solemn, then suddenly vile}...don't ever ask that question again! You will never be "overtaken" on my watch. Do you understand me?

 

Grissess: Yes, of course.

 

That was the end of all of the open eye visualization. I promptly went to sleep. My dream that night consisted of me being challenged to a memory contest; I had to memorize the layout of 4 groups of [4, 4] matrices, containing symbols as white-on-green circles, white-on-red-crosses, and black-on-white arrows pointing in one of four axial directions. I realized, only after the dream ended, that the fact that I was able to consistently view the same mental image again to confirm my score in this memory contest is proof enough that I'm able to remember (4*4*4 cells * 3 bits for the symbol set) 192 bits of data consistently across 64 cells.

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Its always nice to read a

SCIENCE

educated progress report, even more so if it is a

SCIENCE

massive paragraph of such formatted progress reportage.

There's so much philosophy in this I almost overdosed. Very great

SCIENCE

, 12/10.

fourfiction, the idiot.

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Its always nice to read a

SCIENCE

educated progress report, even more so if it is a

SCIENCE

massive paragraph of such formatted progress reportage.

There's so much philosophy in this I almost overdosed. Very great

SCIENCE

, 12/10.

 

Thank you! Really, that means quite a bit :D


Experience 8 (Philosophy) - Friday, January 18, 2013

 

I'm making this as an addendum to Experience 5 to contain some errata that I've happened upon.

 

First, I've abandoned the term "simulative agents" for the contracted form "simulants." It just allows for more concise mention, and apparently is the standard term used by others who have similar theories.

 

Second, I may have come up with an aforementioned "litmus test" for identifying a simulant from a tulpa: the capacity to be unexpected. As a procedure, ask the being to perform something unexpected. If they end up doing something unexpected, it's most likely a tulpa (in fact, if a simulant has the capacity to be unexpected, I wouldn't hesitate in calling it a tulpa). If they are confused or otherwise fail to respond in an unexpected way, they are most likely a simulant so long as it is established that a separate tulpa exists. I throw in that last criterion because I know that tulpae, especially early in development, can find it difficult to convey an unexpected thought or even conceive one. That being said, it is entirely possible for a tulpa to fail the randomness test, and this should be taken into account. Nonetheless, this test should be sufficient for identifying two beings that identify themselves as tulpae as being tulpae or simulants.

 

Further errata will refer to this experience instead of Experience 5.

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