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PETT - P-Zombies & Conscious Experiences


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PETT – P-Zombies & Conscious Experiences

 

What is a philosophical zombie/p-zombie?

 

[hidden] A philosophical zombie is a conjectural being that is indistinguishable from a normal human being, albeit it lacks conscious experience, qualia, or sentience. The concept of it is also utilized in supplementing arguments against certain forms of physicalism (e.g. materialism). To say the least, it’s one thing for said being to profess they feel a certain sensation/emotion (e.g. pain, happiness), and another to where they’re actually feeling X-sensation/emotion. [/hidden]

 

 

P-Zombies & Possession/Switching

 

[hidden] Focusing more on switching, and presuming possession is a gradual learning curve towards that, the activity entails that tulpa and host are shifting their awareness to where one takes dominion of the physical body while the other revels in some virtual, experiential reality in their head. By logic of the activity, the tulpa that’s treated as sentient may have the propensity to have conscious experience of perceptions going on since they would be interconnected to the mind.

 

However, with the concept of p-zombies, it allows questions on whether or not the tulpa would consciously experience these physical events vs. just tapping into cognitive heuristics to achieve these events. From the latter, this would lead to a presumption that they can operate the physical body without consciously experiencing what’s going on. Which raises the question if this is really switching altogether when the roles have been switched, but the one taking dominion of the physical body isn’t the actual experiencer, they’re just an observer. Which also leads to the question on whether or not the host themselves are p-zombies, though if this is the case, it would lead to some problems (e.g. solipsism where the host/tulpa feels the symbols that supplement their internal representation of reality is real vs. believing the symbols are merely representations.)

 

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Questions

 

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1. If a tulpa switches with a host to take dominion of the physical body, and they were asked by someone else on their state of being (e.g. “How are you doing?”), do you feel they would solely be referring to cognitive heuristics from before to state how they are vs. using that, and having the conscious experience of knowing they felt something?

 

2. Would the person talking to a tulpa find anything distinguishable from them and their host (e.g. mannerisms, tonality, demeanor)? If so, would they imply that they’re talking to the same person in spite of the nuances in behavior, if any?

 

3. Do you feel switching can be considered an end-game, or a turning point for both host and tulpa to realize that the tulpa is truly sentient in consciously experiencing those sensations? If not, what could be other activities in which the tulpa can have the potential to consciously experience things?

 

4. Should “treating” them as sentient become a matter of having a conviction that they are sentient beings once they, presumably, can have conscious experiences?

 

5. Would sentience entail just being capable of utilizing cognitive heuristics to state what’s going on without sapience (e.g. making the rationalization and judgement that they’re consciously experiencing something)?

 

6. Would one have a different mode of ethics if they had the conviction that their tulpa is consciously experiencing emotions and sensations via possession, or switching (e.g. a tulpa explicitly telling them what they felt in certain circumstances)?

 

7. Would one throw ethics out of the window if the tulpa isn’t capable of consciously experiencing those emotions and sensations?

 

8. If a tulpa would be solely going off of cognitive heuristics of physical sensations and movements, would this entail that they’re merely servitors instead? If so, would servitors be classified as p-zombies, and increase the gap of tulpas vs. servitors?

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My last post on p-zombies

 

Not worth reading

[hidden]In my case at least, my tulpas assuredly feel and think while switched. Some of them are more expressive and immersed in life than I am; I would appear more as a p-zombie than they. While not switched though, I can't say for sure that they truly feel things. I'm not going to call them p-zombies, but I'll say the idea of "cognitive heuristics" enabling them to express how they should feel without really feeling doesn't seem impossible. But it's no facade they show, even if so. If they really don't feel emotion like I do, they don't know it. If the actual experience of emotion is not happening in my brain, so be it, but my tulpas are not not in effect emotionless. Their emotions appear in their mindvoice, their actions, and appear to affect their personality in the long-term too. Whether or not they create the actual physical phenomenon of emotion in my brain is not relevant to my idea of a legitimate person-in-your-head, to me.

 

But y'know. I can't parallel process. Maybe someone out there has tulpas that can actually truly process real emotion through senses whilst the host continues to do so with separate ones. Maybe I'm just the only one being honest to myself. Maybe some tulpas are actually offended over this conversation.

 

But do we care about offense taken by a non-sentient thoughtform, should that be the case? Well, some people don't like killing bugs, especially large ones. Fish can't feel pain, would you torturously murder one because of that? Not to mention what goes on in video games these days. You see, we aren't reliant on whether another thing can feel or not to judge whether we act nicely or poorly to it. Evolution has surely foregone the debate over solipsism and p-zombies. Whether you're killing that friendly spider in the corner who just wants to keep your home bug-free, an old lady crossing the street in GTAV, or telling a tulpa its feelings don't matter because they don't exist, the morality in question is morals. Sure, maybe none of those things actually hurt anyone. But what they do do is show your character, your own value of what you may perceive to be unworthy of being treated well. And, I might add, doing these things may lessen the idea of inflicting pain in your mind, and make it more likely for you to do so without remorse in more important future scenarios. All in all it's just bad practice, man. Tulpa ethics is always an interesting conversation topic, but unfortunately this one doesn't have much use in this context. Whether something can feel or not doesn't really imply it's okay to hurt it, because the human on the giving-end is being affected through their own actions, in a way society deems negative. Good conversation though.[/hidden]

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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In my case at least' date=' my tulpas assuredly feel and think while switched. Some of them are more expressive and immersed in life than I am; I would appear more as a p-zombie than they.[/quote']

 

Just because they may seem more immersed in quotidian activities as you are doesn’t entail that you’ve suddenly lacked any conscious experience, qualia, or sentience yourself. And to presume that you’re more of a p-zombie than they are seems to contradict the theorization you had of an over-arching consciousness. You allow yourself to be considered more of a p-zombie than they are, ergo, feeling that consciousness can be reducible to the point where you’re the p-zombie, and their dispositions of higher levels of expressing has more complex behavior.

 

Now, if you’re putting p-zombie in context that you may be more stagnant in your disposition, and have been so used to this life, and feel your novelty of it is less compared to them, then you’re putting the p-zombie concept out of context.

 

If the actual experience of emotion is not happening in my brain' date=' so be it, but my tulpas are not not in effect emotionless.[/quote']

 

But if there’s a shared, over-arching consciousness within your line of logic, why would you take the fall of your experiences being psychosomatic, and yet outright deny that they couldn’t be emotionless via what you mentioned later on? To be open-minded that your phenomenal consciousness (e.g. your subjective sensations and emotions of your sensory perception) could be imaginary, and not hinged on anything physical in some way (e.g. your brain contributing to that feedback loop, presumably), I don’t know how you’re able to reconcile with past notions of an over-arching consciousness.

 

And I’m not saying this in a manner of proving that this is scientifically tractable, but either way, even when done for the sake of idea playing, you seem to destroy your theorization for augmenting the genuine nature of their being within context of your internal, private experience with them.

 

Their emotions appear in their mindvoice' date=' their actions, and appear to affect their personality in the long-term too. Whether or not they create the actual physical phenomenon of emotion in my brain is not relevant to my idea of a legitimate person-in-your-head, to me.[/quote']

 

I think you may have taken what I’ve stated out of context from the OP. When I meant that one would presume that sentience would entail (but not entirely) that they can tap into cognitive heuristics, have an internal representation of things, and what have you, I’m not saying that they’re an embodiment of those autonomous processes, nor did I state that they have to be the causation of phenomenological consciousness (which I feel you confused with physical). The epiphenomenalism thread doesn’t even have to be sequential to this one whatsoever, which makes me wonder why you felt the need to do so, especially if the intention of your post was to shut down the topic altogether, albeit in a euphemistic manner.

 

And sure, their emotions may appear in their mindvoice (which seems fairly peculiar to be confined within a voice), but what if this is merely them being able to put the right noises in the right contexts? In other words, they would be able to find the right pattern for the specific circumstance at hand (e.g. the host asking them how they are, and them placing the right context without necessarily being capable of consciously experiencing that). Now, that was structured in a what-if scenario, and not claiming they are doing that, mind you.

 

And if you would be able to discern meaning, have reasoning (and be so vocal about being capable of being reasonable and logical), you wouldn’t even be considered a p-zombie. I don’t know, I sense a melancholic disposition for your post in particular.

 

But y'know. I can't parallel process. Maybe someone out there has tulpas that can actually truly process real emotion through senses whilst the host continues to do so with separate ones.

 

I think there’s equivocation here as to who’s doing the processing; the brain, the tulpa, or the host? I didn’t have the intention of figuring out who’s in charge of the internal representation, autonomous processes, cognitive heuristics, etc.; let’s leave that for the brain housing that. It’s really a matter of who’s accessing that information, and has it as a guidance in consciously experiencing things. If anything, the over-arching consciousness seems to cater to both parties, and even x-amount of individuals being capable of experiencing their own thing because they’re sharing that access of information.

 

Maybe I'm just the only one being honest to myself.

 

Honest towards what? What in particular do you feel you’re potentially honest about more than others? Honest in the sense of the theorization of an over-arching consciousness, and yet willing to objectify your rudimentary capability of consciously experiencing things while accepting that there’s no possibility of them sharing that line of logic?

 

Maybe some tulpas are actually offended over this conversation.

 

They should feel offended for figuring out probabilities of what could make them, them? They should feel offended by a mere thought experiment applied with p-zombies that can be a heuristic to validate if they’re sentient or not? They should feel offended to have their existence fading because suddenly an array of syntax and words threatens them?

 

It’s more ethical to have their feelings protected through sugar-coating rather than just having a conversation about anything that can have them think deeper, and potentially use more complex behaviors and means of discerning things to experience something?

 

All in all it's just bad practice' date=' man. Tulpa ethics is always an interesting conversation topic, but unfortunately this one doesn't have much use in this context.[/quote']

 

If what you stated before this doesn’t entail you putting an ethical stance in context of p-zombies, then either this is just misinterpreting what stating an ethical stance is, or something. You just mentioned that it’s a bad practice at the end of the day; it’s an ethical stance that you forged that you placed an emotional value towards. You feel that this concept entirely cannot have any efficacy in analyzing what it means to be treated as sentient, and how one goes about creating their own imperatives of what sentience entails for them?

 

Well' date=' some people don't like killing bugs, especially large ones. Fish can't feel pain, would you torturously murder one because of that? Not to mention what goes on in video games these days.[/quote']

 

What does this have to do with the thread in general, if I may ask? I thought there would be something implied that we’re fixating on what may be going on in a person’s internal, private experience.

 

You see' date=' we aren't reliant on whether another thing can feel or not to judge whether we act nicely or poorly to it.[/quote']

 

So how we judge how we should assess ourselves to a tulpa has nothing to do with treating them as sentient? You feel that the persistent thought, with subsequent action of doing so does not entail that one would take a course of action, and also create a schemata of what sentience entails?

 

I’m interested in you putting this into context with some scenarios, if you will. I’m interested to see how one can absolve themselves from a course of action, and yet still treat them as sentient without being reliant on how we judge the experience.

 

Evolution has surely foregone the debate over solipsism and p-zombies.

 

Straw man.

 

Whether you're killing that friendly spider in the corner who just wants to keep your home bug-free' date=' an old lady crossing the street in GTAV, or telling a tulpa its feelings don't matter because they don't exist, the morality in question is morals[/quote']

 

Where did you derive the idea that we’re adopting nihilistic behaviors in the thread? And the circular reasoning with the morality in question is morals doesn’t even have any punch into this.

 

Sure' date=' maybe none of those things actually hurt anyone. But what they do do is show your character, your own value of what you may perceive to be unworthy of being treated well.[/quote']

 

You just made an ethical stance in a thread where you feel it didn’t have much use in that context.

 

Whether something can feel or not doesn't really imply it's okay to hurt it, because the human on the giving-end is being affected through their own actions, in a way society deems negative. Good conversation though.

________________________________________

 

Where did you get the idea that hurting someone is contingent on whether or not they can feel?

 

It’s like a euphemistic STFU. It seems fairly dogmatic to create presumptions that conversations over who is consciously experiencing something or not entails a discussion solely on them wanting to hurt them.

 

Man, I think you were just blowing this out of proportion.

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No seriously, I failed to write these posts in a way understandable to others.

[hidden]Dang man, I've never been misunderstood so many times so quickly in my life. Okay, for starters, saying that I seemed more like a p-zombie than my tulpas was referring to if someone were attempting to analyze my behavior and judge from there (like we're doing with our tulpas). I'm not very emotive and, if you had the preconception that I might be a p-zombie, a lot of how I act logically but not emotively would give you that impression, as opposed to my highly emotive and lively tulpas. You took that very wrong and then spread it over your entire reply...

 

I mean I want to reply to the responses you gave but most of them you forged with the idea that I consider myself a p-zombie. I don't.

 

Uh, mindvoice. Sorry, maybe that's like my use of the word "persona", because I use it to mean something different..? Mindvoice to me entails much more than just sound. It also includes imagery, emotions, intent, and to some extent also includes like "thought-trees" where they can say something and relatively directly show me their own thought process, which makes not understanding them almost impossible. Also I don't know what exactly you didn't get about their possibility of being p-zombies while effectively being normal people. I meant that maybe, somewhere along the line of thought, their thoughts are processed by the brain as ours would be, but skip the actual "feeling" part, and return an output of how they should feel and how it affects them. If that doesn't make sense then I dunno, I give up. All I said was tulpas might experience emotion in every way except the actual experience of feeling it.

 

Parallel processing, I still don't know what to tell you guys. It just doesn't happen for me. I could never keep up two different processes at once without combining them into one (what you do when attempting to rub your stomach and pat your head... I think???). While I'd say it's your brain, I don't know if you count my inability as my own person to do so as "me" or my brain, should it actually be physically possible to learn to do. My tulpas didn't have any success either, though.

 

"Being honest" response was off too, so I don't know how to respond again. I suppose what I meant was, well, sort of embarrassing now that you make me spell it out. I was implying that due to my empirical experiences that maybe everyone who thinks they're parallel processing has just learned to trick themselves efficiently into multitasking, or that maybe they aren't quite fit to judge their experience at all. That was probably one of the few statements I made in that post that I don't really think was.. Good. Tulpas taking offense wasn't meant to be taken quite so seriously, but it did have a point. I mean you're interested in this stuff so it's fine to you. But can you not see how a couple of people standing right next to you, arguing about whether you're even sentient or not could be a little, I dunno, rude? I mean my tulpas aren't offended and neither of us had any ill will, I just figure there are some who might. Not like we were going to stop our discussion because of it or anything.

 

The last paragraph was literally just me exploring... what I thought was the whole point of this discussion? I understand that you like philosophy because it's, well, philosophy, but I'm an objective-minded person. To me this entire subject is worth discussing because it has an effect on how we think about and act towards our tulpas. When someone comments on another user mistreating their tulpa, their answer being "Don't hurt them!" "Why not?" "Because it's... rude?" isn't so appealing. So I was giving the reasons I think the subject is important, which led to why you treat anything with respect, which isn't really dependent on what you're affecting's experience. A fish does not feel pain, yet we still feel immoral causing it unneeded harm. Whether a tulpa is truly feeling things or just a p-zombie falls under the same morality, that whether or not they actually feel anything has nothing to do with the morality of your actions. We don't judge whether we should inflict harm on something or someone from "Oh, but how will they feel?" so much as from a moral standpoint. I mean.. Why would a human feel bad for stomping through beautiful flowers, tearing them up from the ground? Plants certainly don't feel anything. It's a moral, that you should respect living things just for the fact that they're alive. And as far as I can tell, that's the case because you never know for absolute sure what will actually retaliate, or otherwise turn out poorly for you after harming it. And there's the desensitization of your overall moral standpoint on doing such things, as someone who finds great pleasure brutally murdering others in a video game is kind of not someone you'd be comfortable hanging out with?

 

Why all that? Because it seems like the most important effect any answer to this discussion would have. Knowledge is great, but if it has no use it has little value, except to inform other aspects of your thinking. That's pretty much what philosophy is all about. But I can't be bothered to put too much effort into philosophy without a solid reason it may help me. And don't get me wrong, after you I'm probably one of the most philosophical thinkers on this forum. But that's because I find value in it, and the things I choose to explore stand to greatly help myself or others with their conclusions. Maybe a biased example, but almost everything I know about tulpamancy came from my own mind, own thoughts over time. Mostly what I've gained from the forum is just a very large amount of anecdotal experiences that help to reassure me of ideas and theories I wasn't entirely sure of (or, on occasion, to directly combat a belief of mine). That's an example of something that is, really, largely just thought and mental, but had a huge effect on my life and later others'.

 

 

Well, there's some rectifications. I'd appreciate if you could re-read my previous post with this context, because you got a lot of bad impressions I didn't mean to imply from it. As for further discussion of p-zombies sans the moral aspect I brought into this, since you seemed to value it a lot more, I'm not quite sure what to say that I haven't already. My older post is a little outdated in terms of how I'd phrase it, but not really wrong to me in any way. If you could like.. re-reply to my post, maybe I could go from there?[/hidden]

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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Dang man, I've never been misunderstood so many times so quickly in my life. Okay, for starters, saying that I seemed more like a p-zombie than my tulpas was referring to if someone were attempting to analyze my behavior and judge from there (like we're doing with our tulpas). I'm not very emotive and, if you had the preconception that I might be a p-zombie, a lot of how I act logically but not emotively would give you that impression, as opposed to my highly emotive and lively tulpas. You took that very wrong and then spread it over your entire reply...

 

You seem to be misunderstanding the concept with movie zombies. A p-zombie can be the most expressive, cutesy anime girl you can imagine, but have no conscious experience. Stop conflating the two terms, and you might not be misunderstood.

 

The idea of tulpas being philosophical zombies is a difficult one to swallow for many hosts, depending on how invested they are in their tulpas. My host was very afraid for a long time in my first year that he was somehow doing things wrong, that I wasn't a "real" tulpa, that he was talking to nothing. Those fears luckily subsided with time.

 

I wonder what would happen if people got conclusive evidence that tulpas aren't conscious. I could imagine that many hosts would just continue business as usual, justifying their old beliefs to themselves as being better for themselves, and not being able to stop caring about their tulpas. I think that for many, the practice will still be valuable, for the same reasons that it's good and valuable now that we don't really know what we are, so I wonder if a binary confirmation of conscious experience would make a sudden change in how people here see their tulpas.

 

It seems to me that more than anything, switching serves to teach a host that they are not their body, and that the line between a tulpa and a host can be in many different places. Some people seem to be afraid of separation, or even the notion that tulpas have separate experience.

Feel free to ask me anything.

Suffering is self-imposed. Don't let it control you.

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I'd appreciate if you could re-read my previous post with this context' date=' because you got a lot of bad impressions I didn't mean to imply from it.[/quote']

 

TL;DR: I re-read it, but it, and the post you made after just portrays to me that:

 

“Well, okay Mr. Philosophy-Zelda, you can do your philosophy stuff since you like it, but I’ll be more objective-minded, and absolve myself from branches of philosophy (e.g. epistemology; study of knowledge), and ground my own foundations of a study of knowledge, and the nature of being. Since you know, I can step out of my perceptual horizon, and be objective-minded, and have a solid understanding of things that makes sense, to me while believing that to me doesn’t entail being bound by my subjective mind.”

 

Please take that paraphrase in jest, we need a offset on more serious endeavors once in a while :-P.

 

For more clarification on what I meant:

 

[hidden]

I understand that you like philosophy because it's' date=' well, philosophy, but I'm an objective-minded person. To me this entire subject is worth discussing because it has an effect on how we think about and act towards our tulpas.[/quote']

 

In my opinion, I would argue that it would be fairly difficult to be an objective-minded person as the understanding of nature, for example, entails of a connection with the objective world, and the subjective mind. And if there were attempts to be logical in the sense that could cater to the catalyst of science, I would say the catalyst of science is simply making the objective world knowable to the subjective mind.

 

And if you want to talk about knowledge, there would be a large, epistemic gap with “what is” and “what is to you.” Just like your previous post, you had to structure it within your context, and beliefs. So while you may feel you’re absolving yourself from philosophical thinking, no matter how much you would try to be objective-minded, you, just like all of us, are perceiving things via our perceptual horizon.

 

Epistemology is the study of knowledge, and a branch of philosophy, so in turn, you could say whatever you want about being objective minded, but unless you have a perspective broader than most, or even the totality of mankind somehow, you’re not transcending above your own perceptual horizon. I’m not capable of doing this either, and I know you’re trying to use empirical in the sense of the experiential foundations you’ve established, but this totality is still bounded by subjectivity.

[/hidden]

 

If you could like.. re-reply to my post' date=' maybe I could go from there? [/quote']

I have no need to reply back to the previous post as we would be going around in circles. If you could like, try to answer some of the questions, and structure the thought process for each, your experiential cases could offer a contrast, and even similarities for others wondering if the thought experiment can be a supplement in assuring to themselves of the activities (e.g. possession, switching, and even head pressures) could be a validation of this sentience that they were trying to accomplish through the self-fulfilling prophecy, IMO, of treating them as sentient.

 

This way, your subjective viewpoint along with others, if there’s any, can create some collective understanding in spite of circumstances. It may not be objective, or even universal, but still interesting nonetheless. Also, no need for rankings on who is more philosophically competent. We should become our own guideposts.

 

I wonder what would happen if people got conclusive evidence that tulpas aren't conscious. I could imagine that many hosts would just continue business as usual' date=' justifying their old beliefs to themselves as being better for themselves, and not being able to stop caring about their tulpas. I think that for many, the practice will still be valuable, for the same reasons that it's good and valuable now that we don't really know what we are, so I wonder if a binary confirmation of conscious experience would make a sudden change in how people here see their tulpas.[/quote']

 

[hidden]

 

IMO, speaking just for myself:

 

- I think it would absolve the double standard I seem to take with dream characters, and other thought forms in general. In other words, me acknowledging that I go through my natural sleep as anyone else dreaming about them, and waking up, and their existence being contingent on me wanting to cherish those experiential cases in my dreams, and my recollection of the events.

 

- The P-zombie concept may prove that physicalism is false, and that physically measuring consciousness (e.g. phenomenal) would not be enough. And it would end up increasing the ambiguity and difficulty of the hard problems of consciousness, and how we can define it entirely.

 

- Like what you mentioned with others potentially justifying their old beliefs, I think, in context of this what-if scenario, my ambition to continue furthering their capability to consciously experience things would be considered my own brand of self-delusion (since the real world just made it more ambiguous). As I would see the progressive strive towards said competency as a personal testament that the perceptual horizon I’m bound by is something I’m consciously experiencing myself. I would be probably be fighting myself for validation, and the existential horror would ensue.

 

 

 

- I’d still value the thought-forms within my mind since I would have more attachment towards my internal, private experiences in spite of the hypothetical, real world event having phenomenon that consistently destroys my beliefs to shreds.

 

- Though, that would set up another probability that our thoughts can influence the physical realm as well, and entail some heavy metaphysical aspects, and being demystified in general.

 

 

However, in that scenario where the p-zombie concept somehow had potency along with others that may attack physicalism in general:

 

- That reality of everyone around us being philosophical zombies would raise questions on how we would discern meaning in talking about philosophy, and other means of discourse. One would question how those p-zombies that aren’t able to consciously experience perceptions in some way would have a brain that housed those cognitive heuristics to rationalize and judge what’s going on.

 

- It would make the mind reducible to something, but I wouldn’t be capable of knowing the what-ifs, though.

 

 

But whatever the case, this thought experiment seems to make me convinced that seizing our confidence of our own sentience, and striving for methodologies that allows our tulpa(s) to eventually have conscious experience of things can become a reality for us. It may not have something scientifically tractable, but experiential tractable.

 

So rather than a newcomer feeling that their tulpas can’t be conscious, they would treat them as sentient while the “lack” (not a complete removal) of sentience, qualia, etc. becomes more complex due to the experiential learning they develop via those activities. It would be like

 

Before:

 

Assume sentience from the start -> Paradigm shift -> treat as sentient instead -> ???

 

After:

 

Treat as sentient -> Paradigm shift? -> Progressively create stronger convictions and assumptions of sentience based on prior experiential cases even if said convictions may not have a future in being scientifically tractable.

[/hidden]

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That's too many misconceptions (mostly mistakes in my own wording) to bother fixing. (Wait no, @Yuki I know full well what a P-zombie is. The context to why I said what I said how I said it wasn't fair to expect anyone that wasn't me to understand) Let's start over.

 

A philosophical zombie, to my understanding, is what appears to be a fully sentient creature capable of feeling and perceiving and generally being "conscious", but is actually none of that except what is required to give off the appearance of being such. That means you inflict pain on one it flinches and seems to show distress, but does not truly consciously experience it.

 

And you know what, we can't know. Only way to know would be to somehow share their consciousness, which is impossible according to your guys' beliefs. (Mine say my tulpas and I share a higher consciousness, but that's just me.) That means, if they're a perfect P-zombie, we'll never know. So it doesn't matter. Discussing if they are or not is just food for thought, and I honestly don't know how to comment on it. To me it's the same either way, so there's nothing for me to comment on. This subject is theoretically interesting but it does nothing for me.

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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LinkZelda, anytime I read any of your posts I feel like I'm reading a quantum physics report; it takes me an hour to decipher one page. I thought I'd chime in with a question: what exactly defines conscious experience, and HOW do we, on the outside, identify a p-zombie? Because to me (someone who hasn't heard of the subject before) unless you can delve into their mind, you have no way of knowing what they actually feel. If they are exhibiting all the features that we consider human/sentient, and appear to feel and have experiences, how is that different (from our perspective) than a real person? If a person internally is not a douchebag but exhibits all the features of one, does it really matter to us how they feel on the inside? We still perceive them as one, and that's all that we can rely on, our brain's perception of things.

I'm IBreakGames, a genuine dude.

 

We gave up on using different colors for each of us, so there's Al, Ollie, and Eva. We're all rabbits, get over it.

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We can't tell, and it's not different from our perspective. This is more for discussing what would be different just if they were or weren't, I think. So you see why I have no idea what to say. Nothing would be different..?

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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And you know what' date=' we can't know. Only way to know would be to somehow share their consciousness, which is impossible according to your guys' beliefs. [/quote']

 

These threads I made (it may be different for others that make their own PEET-related thread) should be treated as the OP playing devil’s advocate. In other words, it’s assumed they aren’t a committed opponent, but are still offering concepts for the sake of argument, and hammering out strengths and weaknesses towards said notions.

 

I could’ve sworn I mentioned the world devil’s advocate in those threads. But, somehow, you think I’m a committed opponent and advocate of said beliefs. Please stop trying to think it’s our belief system, when it’s just a thought experiment to have our personal beliefs tackle it. That whole emotional outburst wouldn't have been needed when you realized I'm not trying to militantly deter tulpas being created because of some inevitable suffering, or one-way dualism that cannot reconcile with itself, or that I couldn't know what my own mind could be.

 

 

(Mine say my tulpas and I share a higher consciousness' date=' but that's just me.)[/quote']

 

 

I guess what I mentioned to Yuki wasn’t clear enough. It was mostly showing the p-zombie concept wouldn’t make sense, even in an imaginary alternative reality, and would allow others to have a deeper conviction, if they wished, that there is a potential in them augmenting (for their tulpa) any presumed lack of qualia, sentience, etc. by developing an experiential learning of methodologies that foster this competency. The “lack” entailed that it wasn’t a complete incompetency, but just needed to be developed.

 

 

Again, you felt as if the sharing itself was contingent on your beliefs when it applied, in some way, to the rest of us.

 

__

 

Anyway, the “lack” of could entail questions on the probability of tulpas being able to possess/switch without the capability of consciously experiencing them simply because since they would be interconnected with our minds (since I highly doubt there’s a physical separation), and go off of those autonomous processes for physically moving the body.

 

Which makes one wonder how they would go about making suggestions in threads where the newcomer asks if the tulpa has to be sentient to do those activities in the first place.

 

Discussing if they are or not is just food for thought' date=' and I honestly don't know how to comment on it. To me it's the same either way, so there's nothing for me to comment on. This subject is theoretically interesting but it does nothing for me.[/quote']

 

Okay, if you can’t connect experiential cases of yours, or others to tackle the concept, then that’s okay as long as you’re not militantly wanting to shut down the topic altogether because of it.

 

If a person internally is not a douchebag but exhibits all the features of one' date=' does it really matter to us how they feel on the inside? We still perceive them as one, and that's all that we can rely on, our brain's perception of things.[/quote']

 

Well, if they’re doing things that entail being a douchebag, but felt internally that they aren’t, this might just be a bias blind spot.

 

what exactly defines conscious experience

 

I’m incapable of giving you a solid meaning on what conscious experience is since that’s contingent on the viewpoint one would adopt for consciousness. In the general sense, it could be how “aware” they are, and using whatever tool-bag for pointing out who may have conscious competence of unconscious competencies. But again, that might be an over-generalization.

 

and HOW do we' date=' on the outside, identify a p-zombie?... Because to me (someone who hasn't heard of the subject before) unless you can delve into their mind, you have no way of knowing what they actually feel.[/quote']

 

I wouldn’t be so sure myself since that would probably imply that one could step into their inner experience, and be conscious of it themselves to infer that there’s nothing associating with the things they’re doing, I think. For all we know, if someone’s mother were a p-zombie all their life, you’d have to wonder how her motherly predispositions came into being.

 

 

That means you inflict pain on one it flinches and seems to show distress, but does not truly consciously experience it.

 

And you know what, we can't know.

 

[hidden]If the logic behind switching involves the host and tulpa shifting their awareness, that “awareness” can be implied as some level of being “conscious” over the event. A lack of it doesn’t mean it’s impossible to be developed. Some probable ways we can tell, without implying that it could be scientifically tractable:

 

 

- When switching, the tulpa that’s presumably taking dominion over the body can collaborate with their host who can observe them trying to put the right noises (e.g. sensations, thoughts, etc.) in the right contexts. So, this would entail the tulpa trying to parse in how they experience something:

 

o Example 1: A host switches with the tulpa -> Tulpa takes control -> Someone asks how they’re doing -> They presumably are interconnected with the body since they’re implied to be sharing the same brain -> They’re aware of their state of being -> They acknowledge to the person of the right professions based on the emotional context. Instead of them touching a hot stove, and going “hahashahsdah I’m finnnne, man!, they will eventually have to put things in the right context, which would entail some degree of competency to judge and rationalize because they would be presumably be interconnected with predispositions for the mind to connect to assess the situation.

 

o But if it were the host who went through this query of how they’re doing, they might be so used to the phrase, and just give a generic response instead of stating how they’re actually doing. Simply because “how are you doing?” is a pleasantry, and people aren’t obligated to give a rat’s butt on how they’re doing. So don’t be surprised when a tulpa hears the question, sees the person walk off, and wonders why the hell they asked since that was their chance to tell them how they felt. :-P Unless the tulpa themselves were so used to it that they didn’t bother to care, and even then, they probably moved on to worry about other things.

 

The same logic with the right noises in the right contexts could apply to the concept of intrusive thoughts. Some may agree that it’s best to throw away those kinds of thoughts if something doesn’t feel right, or they add a speculation that it’s them parroting their tulpa. But what if those professions are their way of trying to put the right noise into the right context? What if it wasn’t developed as much, and the host didn’t ask them something more complex that may have involved them to use more complex, autonomous processes to assess the situation?[/hidden]

 

To say the least—The more they develop some experiential learning with putting the right noise in the right context, the less probable it would be for them to be p-zombies since tapping into their presumed inner experience with a shared mind, being interconnected with whatever experiential totality that was developed, and being conscious to the fact that they’re trying to assess something would negate the p-zombie concept altogether.

 

If one refuses this probability, and still feels they could be p-zombies, and one couldn’t know or tell the difference:

 

[hidden]

 

- They would presume that they cannot even know their own minds

 

- They would at least gain solace that they can’t truly tap into their tulpa’s presumed inner experience (for those that may paranoid about parroting/puppetting)

 

- They’d have to wonder about the efficacy of the mind having to put things into the right context in the first place when the person isn’t going to be cognizant of what they’ll be saying; Freudian slips wouldn’t even be considered as such at that point, I think, and you wouldn’t have anyone putting their hands over their mouths for that (unless they weren't used to implicit social norms).

 

 

- They would have to make a tulpa’s inability of consciously experiencing things reducible to something (e.g. a viewpoint on consciousness) while also feeling they as the host has more efficacy in consciously experiencing things; a weird dualism that somehow favors the host’s consistent reigning of their experiences.[/hidden]

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