PETT - P-Zombies & Conscious Experiences

[Luminesce]

Ooops, sorry, I missed your reply somehow. I like how even my blunt "I'm done" reply gets misunderstood, lol. Whether this discussion even happened or not doesn't matter, I'm pretty sure your guys' beliefs don't allow for experiencing your tulpas' consciousnesses. Mine "do" in the sense that I believe my tulpas and I share a single consciousness. Which I'm pretty sure is a belief relatively unique to me. I didn't mean to imply you guys had limiting beliefs, just that I was discussing from your point of view rather than mine.

 

And did I imply I didn't like this discussion? I mean I completely failed to participate, but I haven't a single problem with it. Discussion is always good.

[Linkzelda]

I think maybe you missed the parts where I acknowledged that we would’ve been in agreement of the shared consciousness/over-arching consciousness/collective conscious. You still tried to make a distinction of your point of view, and implied, with certainty, that our viewpoint doesn’t allow for experiencing a tulpa’s consciousness. I have yet to make a statement supporting/going against this.

 

I think it was mostly just you, me, and Ibreakgames talking, but I don’t know where you had the notion that me, him, and others that responded held a notion different from yours without us explicitly stating it. That is what confused me, and I felt maybe you were associating it with other threads with other users that didn’t participate, I think. So to clear out some ambiguity, I’ll go ahead and answer the questions I set up in the OP with some of my opinions; most of the statements would be based in me being agnostic in general.

 

1. If a tulpa switches with a host to take dominion of the physical body' date=' 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? [/quote']

 

[hidden]I would have the assurance that it would be the latter in them being aware of knowing they felt something because by logic of the switching term, they are presumably taking control of the physical body. Now, I agree that this competency in being conscious of what’s going on may not be inherent for all tulpas. It depends on the context, experiential learning beforehand, and such. But whatever stacked competencies a tulpa may have learned beforehand, or whatever “ease” in transition a host and tulpa has with the activity, developing more experiences with putting the right noises (this is just my umbrella term for cognitive heuristics, and all that entails for being a conscious accompaniment) in the right contexts.

 

In other words, whatever stage a person is at with their tulpas, augmenting the experiential totality where they try to make sense of the reality they’re being aware of is always advantageous vs. scenarios where both parties seem so proficient, that it doesn’t look like they had to trek through an infantile state of sentience (e.g. what others may conceptualize as pseudo-real, quasi, etc.; I’ll just use Occam’s razor and go for “sentience in development”), and end up not wanting to further those moments in understanding reality.

 

I feel that after the progressive learning with possession, one would already have an experiential fallback that would make switching easier to them. And that they would progressively have a more complex behavior, and awareness, and the mind putting things in the right context for both parties. If the mind was just blasting contextual-associations without a conscious accompaniment, I would question the point of there even being a “switching” term altogether. In other words, if the mind can do this without a conscious accompaniment, and if this were to be conclusive, empirical evidence with a sound framework:

 

- I would question the efficacy in there being a conscious accompaniment; switching, in this context, would be nothing more than a pleasantry

 

- If the mind was shooting off random sensations to certain context without having said sensations be sequential to the given scenarios, how come when the host experiences reality, it seems to be in their favor, and yet when it would come to a tulpa not being capable of consciously experiencing things via switching in the p-zombie argument, the mind suddenly goes, metaphorically speaking, “Oh, it’s a tulpa, I ain’t doing crap for them; I’ll just treat them as a p-zombie until that other dude switches back, because like, he’s like oh-em-gee~~” Instead, I would see it as the brain needing to have a conscious accompaniment to put things into context in the first place, i.e., “I NEED SOMEONE; FABRICATED OR WHATEVER, WHERE IS THAT ACCOMPAINMENT?” (metaphorically speaking)

 

- I would disagree with the p-zombie argument for question #1 because the thought experiment makes me aware of need for the mind to have a conscious accompaniment in the first place; even if said accompaniment had rudiments of one’s imagination, self-fulfilling prophecies, and what have you. The activity of switching could be one of the few/many personal testaments of them having awareness, and awareness in just knowing; the actual feeling part has just as much potential in developing (e.g. going from the tulpa not feeling too much to them having a smooth flow between thought and emotions) [/hidden]

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

 

[hidden]

 

In my opinion, because of the difficulty of anyone being able to step into a person’s internal, private experience:

 

- Even if one were to assume they have a good judgement, and can analyze people’s demeanors and such, it doesn’t mean they can immediately presume that it’s not them that they’re talking to. They may just see a little nuance, and maybe implicitly think that circumstances led to the odd behavior that isn’t in sync with their concept of how they see them on a daily basis. They may see it as them having a brain fart, amnesia, or something that entails of a temporary loss of memory of self, and what have you, but it doesn’t mean they would start playing detective in wondering who took control of their body.

 

- If anything, they may talk to that person, and acknowledge to them on how they seem as different as night and day in certain scenarios, but that’s it; they would use those metaphors/similes to put into context of the certain nuances in their behaviors and movements. Whatever the circumstance, it would be more likely that they see that person as them in identity, unless the person associated something with tulpas, other selves, etc. This seems to be contingent on the individual’s prior awareness of those concepts in the first place; but they may still cling onto notions of them talking to the same person expressing a different emotion/demeanor.

[/hidden]

 

3. Do you feel switching can be considered an end-game' date=' 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?[/quote']

 

[hidden] I would see it as a potential turning point simply because of the logic behind the activity. The progressive learning curve of trying to put things into the right context, the trial-and-error with possession, narration, and other activities that can come full circle in them potentially being a conscious accompaniment of the physical body, and thus give the tulpa the assurance that there is an unrealized potential of them being sentient entities. Maybe not sentient entities that can suddenly have their mental body composition turned physical in this reality, obviously, but someone that shares the same mind, and potentially have a different perspective in spite of the predispositions from the host being a bit more prevalent; they can still utilize that as a conduit to put into context of their (the tulpa’s) schemata of things. And by this logic, there can be a potential of the host visualizing some experiential recording over what went on during the tulpa’s presumed role as a conscious accompaniment, and maybe even feel how it may have felt, but the experiences were cultivated through the conscious accompaniment at those given periods. In other words, it’s not like the host can distort time and space, and go back to the same scenario, albeit with them being the conscious accompaniment. I think this is what can make switching such a turning point:

 

- The tulpa would consciously experience things (and all that may entail of them with feeling, and such), and have a certain reaction of how their existence made a difference in the reality that they may have tried to reconcile with ever since their upbringing via the host’s imagination, virtuous goal with treating them as sentient, etc.

 

- If there were still doubts of them consciously experiencing, feeling, and such, they would have similar apprehensions as the host as to why the host is a conscious accompaniment of their experiences all their life while a tulpa just seems to be a placeholder with no propensity to do the same. They would question why the mind would negate whatever access of information that would allow them to be a conscious accompaniment themselves.

 

- Whatever mode of life they created in the mind of the host (e.g. their own world of flora and fauna, theology, etc.), they can finally put into context of what they’re being aware of, and subsequently experiencing it which expands this blank canvas of what they could do with their lives with their host.

[/hidden]

 

4. Should “treating” them as sentient become a matter of having a conviction that they are sentient beings once they' date=' presumably, can have conscious experiences?[/quote']

 

[hidden] Since it’s based on a conviction rather than anything based on empirical evidence that tests the consistency of certain phenomenon occurring, I would say yes. Simply because the treating as sentient seems like a virtue towards the goal of reconciling, and figuring out whether or not there is a propensity in them being a conscious accompaniment somehow. It would challenge what one viewed on theories of consciousness, and the phenomenon could even be added to the soft and hard problems of consciousness. The treating as sentient thing entails of a self-fulfilling prophecy that gets accomplished within that person’s internal, private experiences because of the learning curve of figuring out what it means for them, as the host, of being sentient entities themselves, and the unrealized potential others can share as well.

 

[/hidden]

 

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)?

 

[hidden]

I think this is a silly question since sapience would entail some capability to rationalize with the reality the person’s in, and sentience being some form of rudimentary awareness altogether. There seems to be equivocations of sapience being an attribute to sentience, and vice versa when they’re really terminologies to conceptualize the modes of existence we can be aware off, and the processes from the brain that allows us to even put into context of it all.

[/hidden]

 

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' date=' or switching (e.g. a tulpa explicitly telling them what they felt in certain circumstances)?[/quote']

 

[hidden]I think there would be an augmentation in awareness of the unrealized potential of them consciously experiencing things. Instead of feeling that it could just be their own brand of self-delusion of worrying about potential, excruciating pain from a tulpa who they may have felt their existence was solely hinged mentally, if offers them a chance to take ownership of that liberation in making it mutual to where both parties acknowledge the benefits, and potential ramifications of sharing a physical body, and both having the propensity in being a conscious accompaniment of it. To say the least, the type of ethical theories I see one fostering would be ones that entail having an overall flourishing co-existence, and well-being. [/hidden]

 

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

 

[hidden]I wouldn’t throw it out of the window since I’m sure I have certain ethical stances depending on the circumstance with dreaming, and dream characters in general. The predisposed awareness of them being a figment of my imagination would lead to me to not clinging onto them potentially feeling physical pain; it would be psychosomatic at best, in my opinion simply because I didn’t strive in making a virtue of them eventually become a conscious accompaniment of this reality. I’m taking about the dream characters, mind you. But for tulpas, even if they couldn’t be capable, the virtue of treating themselves as sentient itself for the sake of understanding myself, and the progressive, heuristic potential that entails from that makes it worthwhile.[/hidden]

 

8. If a tulpa would be solely going off of cognitive heuristics of physical sensations and movements' date=' 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?[/quote']

 

[hidden]I think this could be a way to conceptualize servitors. Especially one’s that can switch, which doesn’t seem to bridge the gap between tulpas and servitors. It would be a chance to apply more theorization and heuristics of what it means for one to be sentient, and the degree of competencies for consciously experiencing things. A servitor, in short, could be someone that puts things in certain contexts (e.g. a servitor that goes through quotidian, mundane processes for accomplishing tasks) without attributing some kind of psychology and philosophy for themselves (e.g. self-actualization self-realization, etc.) The problem with that is making a servitor that solely fixates on speculation with theories; at some point, they may see it’s viable to want to consciously experience things to put into context of the reality they and the host seem to share for furthering their understanding of it. The presumed gap becomes ambiguous, and potentially a matter of semantics. [/hidden]

[Luminesce]

Huh, if anyone here agrees with my idea of tulpa-host consciousness then that's news to me. Little I've said here was directed specifically at you, moreso, you know, the forum members that would probably be reading it. But the fact that you used my term "over-arching consciousness" shows you've been paying a lot of attention to what I'm saying, so maybe I should've treated it as a more direct discussion.

 

Was simultaneously nice and strange to see your responses to your own questions. I mean, I know you were just presenting ideas for discussion that didn't necessarily represent your beliefs, but it's still weird to see you outright call one of them "silly."

[Linkzelda]

Think of it as me setting up the interview questions to some famous celebrity. Some of them may seem stupid, and makes one question why they would think of that in the first place. But, it's more of cultivating some kind of discussion first before one eventually expresses their opinions through the discussions of others.

 

This is the advantage of playing devil's advocate in the OP. It's weird, yes, but I'm sure with more threads in the future, people may understand that that the devil's advocate implication forces others to iron out the concepts vs. the individuals in question. This way, the potential of there being intelligible, civil discussions is there as long as people develop the backbone, and patience to do so.

 

 

Thanks for the clarification, by the way; my apologies.