"Convincing" and "Functioning" over "Sentient" and "Real"

[Guest Anonymous]

I wanted to put this idea in a general thread and get the reactions from the rest of the community and perhaps share it a bit wider.  I think this is very important.  Someone pointed out this morning that I am like the "Carl Jung" of the tulpa community in how I refuse to recognize thoughtforms as more than just a figment of the mind.  It is insulting to many, but I can't seem to help myself.  

 

My thoughform Melian came up with a solution for me.  After 15 months of pissing everyone off with our writing, she has finally come up with a very simple, effective obvious solution to the problem.  In  my writing I use words that seem like confrontational triggers to people.  I use words like "delusion," "illusion," "figment," and "self deception."   I have an aversion to the terms "real" and "sentient" when describing tulpas.  I came up with my own sort of hedging term "pseudo-real," which no one finds adequate.  Melian wants to make me happy and often is like my little toady on this site projecting my attitudes, which makes the matter even worse.  It is much worse, actually, because she is effectively a tulpa.  

 

Melian was trying to find a solution for both of us to finally put the fighting and drama to a long overdue end.  She was looking carefully at the definition of tulpas on the forums home page.  It used the words "convincing personality."  She started wondering about what that really means.  Then she realized for both of us that tulpas don't have to be labeled "real" or "sentient" specifically.  For someone like a Carl Jung of the tulpa community we can focus on functionality and effectiveness instead of realness and sentience.  

 

It is a huge insight from her!  This one simple idea is a major turning point in Mistgod to Tulpa Info relations I think.  

 

My suggestion for myself, and for the community at large, is that whenever an argument gets started involving the realness of all tulpas, or the possibility of sentience in all tulpas, to shift the conversation to be about how convincing tulpas seem and how well they function.  Tulpas are meaningful and profound to their creators.  That can be proven out by preponderance of anecdotal evidence.  There is where there is something solid to stand on.  

 

It can never be proven, or probably never will be proven, that tulpas are "real sentience."  But, I think we can make a very strong case that tulpas are a very profound and meaningful experience for their creators.  They are convincing, and they are persistent and significant.  In that way, they function exactly the way they are supposed to function.  

 

Tulpa Info, for you, from now on, that is what I will write about.  

 

I wanted to put this out there as a general thread to foster discussion about non-drama-inducing terminology.  I am NOT suggesting we replace or ban terms such as "sentient" and "real."  The community loves those terms.  I am not suggesting everyone else needs to change what they do here to pander to the minority.  I am suggesting a policy for the minority itself to use, not the majority.  I am suggesting that for a person like me, like Mistgod, there is a less volatile form of writing and a better approach.  Someone like me should shift the paradigm just a bit to avoid unnecessary conflict.  It is good tulpa town diplomacy.  

 

• Functional or Functioning
  
• Effective or Effectively
  
• Apparent or Apparently
  
• Meaningful
  
• Significant
  
• Profound
  
• Persistent
  
• Existential (it exists in some form)
  
• Conceive or Conceived
  

 

EDIT:  Below is an example of this new dialogue paradigm in effect:

link

My gods, Ghang, you set me up for the perfect opportunity to test out my new paradigm for dialogue in the tulpa community.  I agree with all of this.  We create effective and convincing secondary personalities within our minds and, depending on our desires, beliefs and needs, promote that personality to a certain level of functionality.  Melian is what I needed her to be and no more.  For me, she is fulfilled and complete, even though her effectiveness and functionality are different from other tulpas who have other traits and goals.  Whatever she is made of, she is still effectively a second personality or expression within me who apparently shares my consciousness.

 

Can using neutral or non-toxic terminology help foster better relations in the tulpa community between those who believe tulpas are real and those few who remain uncertain?  

 

Can we find common ground that we all can agree on, and conduct or dialogue within that context?

[Guest Anonymous]

Would you call a friend "apparently sentient"?

[Guest Anonymous]

Yes. You are apparently sentient. Which is actually an accurate statement. In fact, from now on, everyone in my life is apparently sentient. LOL

 

Technically my wife is apparently sentient, effective, functional, meaningful, persistent in existence, significant to me, and a profound experience. An, what the hell else do you want from me? I am giving you all that I can give. I just elevated you to the existential level of my wife.

[Procron X]

I find that describing something instead of making (perhaps controversial?) judgements about sentience or "realness" seems to be the more accurate way to go about things. All in all, I approve, and perhaps I'll take care to use this language in the future.

 

On the side note, it does seem to be slightly unfair to use language that isn't affirming of (for example) Niteo's sentience but if I talk about my sister I wouldn't use language in the same way. Are we biased against tulpas? They seem to act in all the ways you'd expect a sentient being in their position to act. My sister is as convincingly sentient as him, yet no one questions if my sister has a thinking mind or not.

[Guest Anonymous]

Good I am glad we can agree that descriptive language will be helpful for me (and maybe for you too).

 

Yes. I am biased "against" tulpas in the sense that there is a distinction between a biological human being and a tulpa. Tulpas are not physically the same as human beings. Their existence is different by their origin as virtual beings created within the mind. The end result is effectively the same when I chat with a tulpa or a human on the internet. They look identical to a sentient human being to me on my computer screen.

 

Again, what more do people want from me? I have no idea who's tulpa is real and who's tulpa is a delusion and who is faking and role playing. I will treat each person (virtual or biological) as a real person, but write about tulpas and thoughtforms in general in a descriptive way, avoiding terms such as "real," "sentient" or "delusion." I have no idea what is real and what isn't and I am not going to make assumptions and "just believe it" in order to please people with that. I think that those kinds of expectations fall under the purview of religion or pseudo-science.

[Procron X]

Hopefully I can put the right words to this.

 

Perhaps my answer is more philosophical than anything. I've no way of proving that people that inhabit what we perceive as the physical world are any more real than the people that inhabit our wonderland. I've no way of proving that my senses definitely put together some empirical reality or that, as it goes, I'm not just a brain in a jar. I've no way of knowing that what I perceive through my senses is somehow more real than what I perceive mentally (e.g., tulpas, wonderland, etc.) because everything I experience is just a construct that my brain has put together. While I agree that we should aim to describe things instead of make assertions, saying that physical beings are different than mental ones implies a difference between the two, and I'm not sure how to prove that difference to myself.

[Guest Anonymous]

I am a practical, pragmatic man in many ways. I see it very simple and black and white when it comes to reality. I do believe in the imagination as a powerful, important, force. But I see a clear distinction between reality and imagination. I can vote, and have legal rights. I am recognized as a citizen of a country and a member of a family of biological human beings. I have a biological father and mother. I pay taxes and I am held accountable for any crimes I commit. None of that is true about my tulpa Melian. That makes her distinctly different from me. Her form is imaginary, and her gender and personality was based on that imaginary fantasy form. No one else can experience or perceive her form. That is true even if you regard her mind as real. That also makes her different from a biological human being.

 

I don't think I am a brain in a jar. I find that highly unlikely. The fact of that very unlikely possibility, that I am a brain in a jar, does not make my Melian more like a human being in any way at all.

[Tewi]

Yes.  I am biased "against" tulpas in the sense that there is a distinction between a biological human being and a tulpa.  Tulpas are not physically the same as human beings.

 

Wow, Mistgod confirmed tulpa racist. #TulpaRights

 

I don't bother with that distinction explicitly because of switching. Maybe I would've agreed tulpas were fundamentally different from "humans" before I knew about it. But with switching, they kind of cross over into plurality territory, which bumps the human-or-not question up a level. The question is then whether you believe in plural systems or consider them all one person.

 

However, you don't have to be "Believe they're real or believe they're fake" about that. I suppose you can still consider it one "person" while still giving credit to the multiple facets of "them" they have as deserving of being treated individually. That's probably where most skeptics lie. I know it's where you do, because you already do it. Though most of us here and in plural communities opt to consider system-mates their own separate people. (Unless, of course, the system is more connected and less individual)

[Guest Anonymous]

Oh gosh. LOL *face palm*

 

This thread was originally not at all about whether tulpas are different than biological humans or not. It was simply about using descriptive terminology that supports tulpas while being neutral concerning real vs. illusion. But it seems these debates are almost unavoidable on every thread.

 

Yes, obviously Mistgod is a hideous hateful bigot because he doesn't assert tulpa as absolutely equal and identical in every way to biological humans. LOL He should be banned.

 

I won't even get into my beliefs about general plurality. The thread will turn into the opposite of what it was intended to be. Just everyone understand I do love tulpas and tulpamancy. Tulpas are amazing. Believe what you wish about your tulpas and simply ignore Mistgod, and his reality neutral terminology, when he annoys you.

[Procron X]

I don't have an ultimate point. I'm mostly musing with my posts.

 

I wouldn't use that kind of language to talk about another person, so it seems a bit strange to reserve it for tulpas when all I've heard is that it's best to treat them like a person.

 

On the other hand, describing things as accurately as possible is desirable. So I don't know what side I'm on.