[sentience] Learning vs Knowing: Do Tulpas Need Time to Understand Things in Their Own Way?

[Cat_ShadowGriffin]

Last night, Ranger wanted to chat again and I asked if he wanted me to explain some Calculus concepts to him. He expressed interest in fronting during class time, but he was dormant for most of my time in calculus class so I wanted to make sure he was up to speed. Since he knew I figured out something I was confused about, he asked me to talk about the vectors problem I did during my homework.

 

I was experimenting with the idea of explaining this concept to someone else before Ranger asked for my explanation, so I went with telling him the explanation I already came up with. He told me my explanation didn't make sense to him and he asked for me to use "layman's terms". After going back and forth a few times, I finally showed him that vector addition resulted in the destination point after moving in the direction of the first vector and then in the direction of the other vector. Suddenly everything clicked, and he told me that it made sense to him.

 

On the first day of class, one of the reasons Ranger was a little uncomfortable was because he never took notes, much less learn Spanish in school before. He was capable of note taking the way I did it, but this bothered him. When we went over the homework the next day, he perked up and seemed more engaged when he gave suggestions for how to organize the notes. I bet he would have been happier if he had a note taking system he had to craft and tweak over time, and I have the feeling our note taking style will change throughout the semester so he's more comfortable with it.

 

In the past, Ranger has also explained that he likes my brother re-explaining things to him because he said even though he understands "how" or "what", he doesn't know "why". I wonder if this too is about learning the information for himself. Literally, he could explain "the why" if it's a simple fact. Then again, he currently isn't looking for a deeper explanation for why the sky is blue.

 

Re-learning how to do something isn't always valuable for a Tulpa. For example, Ranger learned how to speak English and write using knowledge I already learned, muscle memory, and accessing my memories. But if a Tulpa is asked to explain something as complex as calculus, do they really have the greatest understanding of the material just because their host understands it?

 

My ultimate question is this: Even though Tulpas are capable of gaining information and knowledge from their host's memories, is it better if they take the time to process certain things for themselves?

[Bear]

That's an interesting question, Cat. First of all, it's well known that showing or teaching someone else a concept reinforces your own understanding. So going over it with your tulpa will definitely reinforce it. I used to explain hard concepts to myself given no one else to help, and I was a tutor for a lot of my college career, even in classes I was currently taking.

 

Secondly, I have zero interest in sports. I understand baseball concepts, that doesn't mean i would be able to dynamically play the game well. Though i wss asked to try out for football (american football) in highschool, i was afraid of injury so i never did. Also i don't know the first thing about it and can't really even follow a game well. So even if someone knowledgeable about it explained it to me, i would probably not be able to pay attention. As in I woukd rather be cutting my fingernails or washing my hair.

 

However, Misha wants to know about soccer (football) (another game i could follow, but would rather die my hair orange than watch). If we were explained the advanced concepts of the sport, she'd be paying attention.

 

Misha also shares my love of math, Dashie would rather talk about guns than math, but I could care less about that either. So it makes sense to me that Ranger wouldn't have been paying attention and also would shrink into his shell to avoid following complicated neuro pathways just to understand vector operators himself.

 

The way i would explain this is, Ranger loves you and wants to help you understand, but probably wouldn't care himself otherwise.

 

Asking Dashie to research line integration, would be like asking me to watch 50+ videos on the intricacy of sniper rifle accuracy calculations. Either of us could do it, but we'd much rather those two tasks be switched.

 

Perspective, passion, interests all matter a great deal for learning.

[Ember.Vesper]

Vesper: How much personal processing or experience is required seems very deeply dependant on the nature of the knowledge or activity. When I'm talking to someone out-system, relevant knowledge from Ember's memories will just pop into my mind, things I really don't feel I should know, but somehow do. And so I'll offer, a bit gingerly, observations on history, mythology, and physics that I never knew in my old life. I'm also much much better at maths in this life, which is actually surprisingly fun. (Contrariwise, I'll hold back from mentioning matters from psychology that I am not certain of but feel I should be.)

 

Ember pushed me hard for a while to try driving, but I wanted to make sure we were safe if it went poorly. So one night in a quiet and empty car park, I took over and found it shockingly, disconcertingly easy. Muscle memory stayed with the body and I was able to access it without thinking.

 

But then when Ember wanted me to try cooking, I was very quickly overwhelmed, freaked, and could barely be coaxed to front for days. Suddenly it wasn't about knowledge or muscle memory, but about coordinating large numbers of different tasks which needed to be done quickly, where the order of steps mattered. I watched her continue the meal after I switched out and was shocked by just how much information she was juggling at once as she confidently flew back and forth across the kitchen.

 

Regarding Bear's treatment of perspective and passion -- Ember likes to have clothes that are custom made or modified, but hates to sew. I enjoy sewing, so I've taken that over. From the first instant, I've questioned every element of Ember's technique. She struggled for years, doing a little, as quickly as possible, and going long stretches before the trying again. I turned to Youtube in search of what she was doing wrong and have been able to improve where she could not.

 

Iris: About a month ago, I played my original character in Ember's roleplaying game. I had assumed that playing oneself would not be difficult. I was surprised by how much I needed to make up on the spot. As with cooking, Ember's vast experience means it feels easy to her, which makes it look easy to us. It is not. Creativity, decisiveness, and other improvisational skills are much less easily transferred than knowledge.

 

Vesper does not front if she would be exposed to sunlight, nor does she even allow her form to be exposed to it. This has contributed to her never having driven under challenging traffic conditions. A couple of weeks ago, both Ember and Vesper were very deeply distressed and I switched in at a red light for our safety. I had never driven before, in this world or my own, but found my ability in no way inferior to Ember's, and my concentration considerably superior.

 

Vesper: There appears to be a range of complex activities -- including cooking, roleplaying, and quite possibly calculus -- where access to memories and the body aren't enough to transfer the skill. I'm afraid I haven't tried any vector calculus. Ember used it quite a bit in her quantum mechanics courses, but she's forgotten almost everything she once knew about it.

[Jamie]

Most of it transfers over, but everyone does things in their own way. The "What" is easy and already known (This pot is used for making pasta, I know where the keys are on a keyboard without looking, the milk is at the back of the store, etc) but the "how I do this" is often fresh territory. One random example, from the view of a host: Cassidy made hot cocoa by a recipe one day. A few days later, my sister wanted me to make more, and so I did. I could do it just fine, but it was like my first time making that recipe. I wasn't sure what would taste right, or what I was really doing, while Cassidy had been confidently tossing in ingredients, completely sure that they'd work. I knew what I was doing: but I wasn't sure how I would do it, yet. If that makes sense. 

 

And Cassidy did the same thing, completely. I let him front in a night college class once, about half-way through. He took notes but they weren't on the things I usually note down. I liked to answer the questions in that class, and Cassidy knew the answers himself, but he was too scared to speak out. All or practically all of the usual information is available, but it's being processing differently. Sometimes with better results, sometimes not, and sometimes it's just a difference of personality. 

 

I guess, to answer your question, I think tulpas do learn something from doing things themselves, even if they have the host's memory. Neither of my tulpas feel comfortable forming opinions on movies/books/etc unless they experience them "firsthand", because they'll always notice and remember different things then I've stored in my memory of that movie/book/etc. I think it's the same with anything else: singing, calculus, writing, cooking, whatever. 

 

 

-J

___

Even though Tulpas are capable of gaining information and knowledge from their host's memories, is it better if they take the time to process certain things for themselves?

 

Yes, and I think it goes both ways. If something is really important, then everyone in a system who fronts should process it, to make sure they have a good, individualized understanding. Before someone starts lighting candles, they should make sure they have their own sense of fire safety, and won't twirl their skirt or anything around. Before someone starts to drive, they should make sure they can notice cars in their periphery, and not get distracted by their phone. Even if they know exactly how the host does something, tulpas don't act exactly like their hosts. 

 

In most cases, tulpas can get along fine with what they know secondhand. Sometimes, it's also fun to do things for the first time, and see what you make of it. 

 

-Cassidy

[CM]

Oh, definitely.

Desmond fronts somewhat frequently, and I've learned that he can't cook or draw. The muscle memory and knowledge is there, but he doesn't know what to do with them. Or, well, I suppose he cooks just fine, it's the seasoning he has trouble getting right. His food is always too spicy. With art, it's like the blank canvas and freedom to do whatever plus all the steps required to finish a piece freak him out a little. He doesn't get inspired to draw and he's incapable of thinking composition and colors. It's interesting. I'd encourage him to try anyway but he refuses to, most of the time.

[Summer]

Yes, our system feel very comfortable if we fully learned something on our own volitions, our very own steps. We usually take in nihi's knowledge and try to mix our own understamding to it so that we all have different criteria on how we understood the criteria matter, especially when it comes to skill based activities and decision makings.

 

It does not only expand our understanding of a subject manner but also understand each other's reasoning. Plus it is really satisfying if you learned something for yourself, especially me who feel very proud if I learn something through my own interest.

[Aijada]

I'll say that my own perspective and ability to just automatically remember skills i haven't already tried has improved dramatically as i've gotten older.  When i was first piecing together general knowledge and physical possession seven years ago, there was a huge amount of learning certain things that i did at first.  Certain basic failures at handling cultery.  Certain types of knowledge like foreign languages that were completely opaque to me even though my host could understand and translate.  There was definitely a clumsy mismatch with certain things that i felt i should just understand but needed to work my mastery of a bit more.  My host deliberately reviewed certain math rules, and made sure i learned driving in a parking lot before i tried that one personally.  Practice singing songs your brain has memorised; it's a great way to improve your general ability to recall and it's a great way to get in the habit of hearing the next idea you need when you need it.

 

But nowadays, there's practically no skill i won't just trust my pre-acquired knowledge on.  Strange power tools i've never seen before, navigating cities i've personally not ever been to, extremely finicky ingredients for some obscure dish from the old country.  Whatever.  I can gauge most of them just by feeling how close i am to unfound remembrances of the situations.  I can rely on pre-learned behaviours just fine at this point, but part of it is that i have a wider body of knowlege that i'm also certain of: basic physics, social conventions, the ability to pause and just think ahead enough to figure out what's going to happen....

 

At a certain point i stopped being amazed at every new experience i was learning about the world, and started to be much more just a competent grownup who knows how to get things done.  By this point, i mostly just count that i know what i think i know.  Dad keeps paying attention, but it's vanishingly rare for me to overlook any detail even when i'm just flying on instinctive memory.