I had a similar experience; one day I couldn’t snap my fingers, the next I could. While I was in the former state, I noticed an interesting thing: every single time I had a conversation about my inability to snap with someone who could, it went like this:
Me: You know, I actually have never been able to snap my fingers.
Other person: Really? (snaps fingers)
Me: Why did you do that? I already know what it looks like when someone snaps their fingers.
Other person: … You know, I’m not sure why I did it.
I still have no idea why everyone’s first reaction was to snap their own fingers. Was it pride at having a skill someone else didn’t? Was it an impulse to demonstrate it based on some low-level expectation that I might go “Ooooh, that’s how to snap your fingers!” Were they just double-checking that they still knew how?
I still have no idea why everyone’s first reaction was to snap their own fingers.
Important data:
1) Everyone did it.
2) Everyone claimed not to know why they did it (I am taking you at your word—that your dialog is representative)
Both of these point to something close to an involuntary reflex.
Recall the game, “Simon Says”. That game is fun because it is hard (under the right conditions) to avoid doing what someone commands you to do. It takes concentration to hear the command and then not perform the action. One might have thought (and one would have been wrong) that someone playing “Simon Says” would hear the command, then decide whether it was in the right form, then follow it. Everyone wants to play it this way and thus win. But the nervous system has a strong tendency to short-circuit the path from hearing the command to performing the action. You try to consider the command carefully before performing the action, but you fail!
This suggests that the mental path from thought to action is only imperfectly under voluntary control. What it takes to suppress, or amplify, this path is presumably not simple.
Did you stop? So I don’t think the difficulty is avoiding compliance with commands in general. Rather, it’s switching between the mental modes of “complying” and “not complying” under time pressure.
The very fact that there is a “compliance mode” rather than individual acts of hearing each command and deciding whether or not to obey each command one at a time I think demonstrates that all is not in accordance with our folk model of voluntary action, according to which each action is willed. Rather, the mental path from thought to action is only imperfectly under voluntary control.
By the way the book The Illusion of Conscious Will deeply explores the limitations of voluntary control, which as Wegner demonstrates is in some sense a fiction.
Weirdly I did it while reading the post… I think in part because I had had to consciously learn it myself so I was checking the movement (aside: what no-one told me was the sound comes from the impact on the the pad of the thumb, not the two fingers rubbing against each other as I had thought, when I realised that it became easier).
Though [deleted]’s theory makes a lot of sense. In general people reflexively perform actions when prompted. BLINK
I clap with one hand all the time if I’m holding something in my other hand. You just have to find something to hit. Walls and/or other body parts work well.
Were you going to the pool regularly and swimming in a life jacket? The transition from swimming with flotation to swimming without is one that everyone makes (unless they learn how to swim perfect front crawl in the shallow end before ever trying out the deep end). Kids can make it quite suddenly, and although I can usually tell what they’re doing differently (body position, arm and leg movements, etc), I don’t think they can.
Yeah, I was, although it was usually with a kickboard rather than a life jacket. I did stay out of water I couldn’t stand in, but three to four feet of water is still deep enough to swim in.
I don’t know how I learned to swim. One day I couldn’t stay afloat without a life jacket or other flotation device, and the next day I could.
This reminds me of how I learned to whistle. I tried to whistle once every morning right after I woke up. One day I woke up and I could whistle.
I had a similar experience; one day I couldn’t snap my fingers, the next I could. While I was in the former state, I noticed an interesting thing: every single time I had a conversation about my inability to snap with someone who could, it went like this:
I still have no idea why everyone’s first reaction was to snap their own fingers. Was it pride at having a skill someone else didn’t? Was it an impulse to demonstrate it based on some low-level expectation that I might go “Ooooh, that’s how to snap your fingers!” Were they just double-checking that they still knew how?
Important data:
1) Everyone did it. 2) Everyone claimed not to know why they did it (I am taking you at your word—that your dialog is representative)
Both of these point to something close to an involuntary reflex.
Recall the game, “Simon Says”. That game is fun because it is hard (under the right conditions) to avoid doing what someone commands you to do. It takes concentration to hear the command and then not perform the action. One might have thought (and one would have been wrong) that someone playing “Simon Says” would hear the command, then decide whether it was in the right form, then follow it. Everyone wants to play it this way and thus win. But the nervous system has a strong tendency to short-circuit the path from hearing the command to performing the action. You try to consider the command carefully before performing the action, but you fail!
This suggests that the mental path from thought to action is only imperfectly under voluntary control. What it takes to suppress, or amplify, this path is presumably not simple.
Stop reading this.
Did you stop? So I don’t think the difficulty is avoiding compliance with commands in general. Rather, it’s switching between the mental modes of “complying” and “not complying” under time pressure.
The very fact that there is a “compliance mode” rather than individual acts of hearing each command and deciding whether or not to obey each command one at a time I think demonstrates that all is not in accordance with our folk model of voluntary action, according to which each action is willed. Rather, the mental path from thought to action is only imperfectly under voluntary control.
By the way the book The Illusion of Conscious Will deeply explores the limitations of voluntary control, which as Wegner demonstrates is in some sense a fiction.
Weirdly I did it while reading the post… I think in part because I had had to consciously learn it myself so I was checking the movement (aside: what no-one told me was the sound comes from the impact on the the pad of the thumb, not the two fingers rubbing against each other as I had thought, when I realised that it became easier).
Though [deleted]’s theory makes a lot of sense. In general people reflexively perform actions when prompted. BLINK
I still can’t clap with one hand. my life is not complete.
Well, if you can’t clap with one hand, try clapping without one hand ;)
I clap with one hand all the time if I’m holding something in my other hand. You just have to find something to hit. Walls and/or other body parts work well.
You can also clap with one hand by hitting your fingertips against the palm of your hand.
Its not particularly loud.
Were you going to the pool regularly and swimming in a life jacket? The transition from swimming with flotation to swimming without is one that everyone makes (unless they learn how to swim perfect front crawl in the shallow end before ever trying out the deep end). Kids can make it quite suddenly, and although I can usually tell what they’re doing differently (body position, arm and leg movements, etc), I don’t think they can.
Yeah, I was, although it was usually with a kickboard rather than a life jacket. I did stay out of water I couldn’t stand in, but three to four feet of water is still deep enough to swim in.