It might be beneficial to think of identityspace and thoughtspace as a single space (lets call it mindspace). The problems mentioned here can then be thought of as a variety of pressures (social and otherwise) that form attractors in mindspace, or as consequences of such attractors. For example, this would unify the cached thoughts and cached selves problems, as both could simply be thought of as cached mental sequences corresponding to paths determined by various mental attractors.
This unified perspective might help us to think of techniques that could tackle these problems as a group. On the other hand, if no such universal techniques can be found it will probably be useful to group techniques that work on social pressures (perhaps thinking of them in terms of identityspace) and techniques that work on other sets of pressures.
My hope is that vipassana meditation will serve as one such universal technique, and this is the perspective I’d like to present it from in the post I’m still working on (it keeps evolving!).
I should have mentioned in the post that I was heavily influenced by your posts on meditation about staying still in and moving through mindspace. I think I’ll probably wait till you post the meditation post and then try to build off that with mine, so we have a unified terminology and conceptspace to build off of. I’ll think about combining identityspace and thoughtspace and see if it worked: I’d originally started with mindspace but ended up feeling it was a category that was asking to be split further. Also, all of the social psychology literature is about identity and selfhood, and I wanted to work that knowledge into the post. The concept of mindspace seemed to stretch its applicability. It is very possible that I should talk about a unified mindspace where appropriate and break it down into parts where appropriate. I think I will do so.
Although it is good to be aware of the unifying structure of cached thoughts and cached selves (and how they lead to one another and interact, with potential feedback loops) I think it is important to keep them separate, because I tend to think of cached selves as potentially significantly more dangerous, and also potentially significantly more helpful, if used as a positive attractor. (Perhaps it would be useful to explicitly mention and build off of the potential for positive attractors, e.g. pressures in mindspace that you can use to your advantage, like a social support group.)
I just realized I’m kind of talking past you, though. If vipassana is powerful enough to cut through cached selves and cached thoughts in one fell swoop, then of course you are right that it may not be necessary to treat them as separate problems. I sure hope so!
Also, I’m really looking forward to your meditation post!
I think of the above as mind design space, whereas mindspace is the configuration space of a single mind. A movement in mind design space corresponds to some structural mind change (think human to posthuman) while a movement in mindspace corresponds to an evolution of mental state. Like changing computer programs vs changing the state of the computation. I’m not sure that these should be separate concepts though.
Mea culpa!
No worries! The Bayesian Buddhists are egoless optimization processes.
I’m not sure that these should be separate concepts though.
They probably should be, I left out the distinction on accident. I changed it, though I think the reference to mind design space is egregious, so I might revert that.
No worries! The Bayesian Buddhists are egoless optimization processes.
V pna srry gur ehzoyvatf bs gur sbhaqvat bs gur Ohqquvfg Pbafcvenpl gb pbzr. Ohg pbafcvenpvrf nera’g irel Ohqquvfg. Creuncf bhe grnpuvatf funyy or uvqqra ol gurve ryrtnag pbzcyrkvgl naq abg ol frysvfu juvfcref. Jung vqragvgl funyy jr tb ol, gura? Gur Onlrfnatn? (Eliminating the ‘h’ and second ‘s’ for aesthetic purposes. I think it reads nice.)
But really, are you going to talk about mindspace and the like in your meditation post? I would feel more comfortable if you’d introduced the concepts first, since you pioneered them.
But really, are you going to talk about mindspace and the like in your meditation post?
Yeah. I think it’ll help people understand how to meditate and provide a crude model of how the benefits are achieved. The post is taking longer than I anticipated because I keep discovering confusions I want to clear up or things I want to add or new ways to frame everything. I don’t mind you publishing your magnum opus first if I’m taking too long.
I don’t mind you publishing your magnum opus first if I’m taking too long.
Upon reflection and 16 hours of sleep, I added this to the top of the article:
Ignore this. After getting some much needed sleep I decided that the first half of this post, though necessary if I am to write the second half, isn’t justified in being so complicated unless I actually use the added complications in solving the problems posed. First, I will use empiricism to see if this model is helpful in finding and verifying methods of attack on the problem of crafting a rationalist identity. If so, I will go back and try to simplify what I have here and make sure all parts are necessary to understand the solutions found.
So I think it will be awhile before I do anything with this post, if indeed I do.
It might be beneficial to think of identityspace and thoughtspace as a single space (lets call it mindspace). The problems mentioned here can then be thought of as a variety of pressures (social and otherwise) that form attractors in mindspace, or as consequences of such attractors. For example, this would unify the cached thoughts and cached selves problems, as both could simply be thought of as cached mental sequences corresponding to paths determined by various mental attractors.
This unified perspective might help us to think of techniques that could tackle these problems as a group. On the other hand, if no such universal techniques can be found it will probably be useful to group techniques that work on social pressures (perhaps thinking of them in terms of identityspace) and techniques that work on other sets of pressures.
My hope is that vipassana meditation will serve as one such universal technique, and this is the perspective I’d like to present it from in the post I’m still working on (it keeps evolving!).
I should have mentioned in the post that I was heavily influenced by your posts on meditation about staying still in and moving through mindspace. I think I’ll probably wait till you post the meditation post and then try to build off that with mine, so we have a unified terminology and conceptspace to build off of. I’ll think about combining identityspace and thoughtspace and see if it worked: I’d originally started with mindspace but ended up feeling it was a category that was asking to be split further. Also, all of the social psychology literature is about identity and selfhood, and I wanted to work that knowledge into the post. The concept of mindspace seemed to stretch its applicability. It is very possible that I should talk about a unified mindspace where appropriate and break it down into parts where appropriate. I think I will do so.
Although it is good to be aware of the unifying structure of cached thoughts and cached selves (and how they lead to one another and interact, with potential feedback loops) I think it is important to keep them separate, because I tend to think of cached selves as potentially significantly more dangerous, and also potentially significantly more helpful, if used as a positive attractor. (Perhaps it would be useful to explicitly mention and build off of the potential for positive attractors, e.g. pressures in mindspace that you can use to your advantage, like a social support group.)
I just realized I’m kind of talking past you, though. If vipassana is powerful enough to cut through cached selves and cached thoughts in one fell swoop, then of course you are right that it may not be necessary to treat them as separate problems. I sure hope so!
Also, I’m really looking forward to your meditation post!
Added in mindspace and gave you some of the credit you deserve, considering I pretty much stole your ideas. Mea culpa!
Hm, thats not how I meant it.
I think of the above as mind design space, whereas mindspace is the configuration space of a single mind. A movement in mind design space corresponds to some structural mind change (think human to posthuman) while a movement in mindspace corresponds to an evolution of mental state. Like changing computer programs vs changing the state of the computation. I’m not sure that these should be separate concepts though.
No worries! The Bayesian Buddhists are egoless optimization processes.
They probably should be, I left out the distinction on accident. I changed it, though I think the reference to mind design space is egregious, so I might revert that.
V pna srry gur ehzoyvatf bs gur sbhaqvat bs gur Ohqquvfg Pbafcvenpl gb pbzr. Ohg pbafcvenpvrf nera’g irel Ohqquvfg. Creuncf bhe grnpuvatf funyy or uvqqra ol gurve ryrtnag pbzcyrkvgl naq abg ol frysvfu juvfcref. Jung vqragvgl funyy jr tb ol, gura? Gur Onlrfnatn? (Eliminating the ‘h’ and second ‘s’ for aesthetic purposes. I think it reads nice.)
But really, are you going to talk about mindspace and the like in your meditation post? I would feel more comfortable if you’d introduced the concepts first, since you pioneered them.
Yeah. I think it’ll help people understand how to meditate and provide a crude model of how the benefits are achieved. The post is taking longer than I anticipated because I keep discovering confusions I want to clear up or things I want to add or new ways to frame everything. I don’t mind you publishing your magnum opus first if I’m taking too long.
Gung’f cerggl!
Upon reflection and 16 hours of sleep, I added this to the top of the article:
So I think it will be awhile before I do anything with this post, if indeed I do.