Autistic brains be stupid. Well, obviously not stupid, they just seem to work, or not work, in mysterious ways.
The main one that has always got me, about mine, is that I have no memory for sound, absolutely none. I can't remember a song, or a sound. I can't remember what my parents sounded like and none of my memories carry, for want of a better word, a soundtrack. I can remember what I was thinking and what others were saying, but not hearing them say it, nor any other sound. I also don't dream in sound, at least as far as I know. All my dreams are silent.
And yet, and it's a big yet. I have an excellent memory for voices and sounds. Like many autistics I have near perfect pitch, at least when I'm hearing others sing, or music playing. Just don't ask me to reproduce it, because I can't. If I meet someone I haven't met for a while, then I will almost certainly not recognise their face, or remember their name, but there is a very good chance that I will recognise them from their voice. I am also very good at detecting accents. Even the slightest hint of one in, say, an actor pretending to be an american, will get me searching Wikipedian to see if I am right about their actual nationality.
So, if I can tell the sound of a Honda CBR engine two blocks away, or a voice, or an accent buried deep, I must have the memories to compare against. And yet... nope.
To put what you're saying in a couple of labeled boxes to clarify what I mean:
What I'm reading is that your brain has a strong recognition or association memory, which are categories of implicit memory, but your brain is not strong on episodic memory, which is a category of explicit memory. You also seem to have a brain that associates stronger on auditory stimuli than on other senses, at least when using your implicit memory.
I'm not read up on whether there's an association between this combination of memory function with autism, or if it's just that one axis of being you is your autism and another axis is how your memory works. I'm hoping others here are read up on this! Fascinating topic.
I would love to see others who know their research better clarify this, whether an emphasis on implicit memory is a common trait among autistic people or not, and whether strong focus on memory for a particular sense is.
@clacke@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
perhaps familiar with it. I just learned this year soooo much, what has it taught me,
the more I learn the less I know .
QI’ve done metacog work since small. Metacognition is basically teaching yourself how to think. Think of them as altralight inference as why things happen they way they do. Most embodied systems l learn watching others or experience.
So when I learned about autism it was like 😮 this is why after dx it expanded my worldview, it’s so vast it can cause paradigm shifts by some . It’s a tough time.
If you have specific questions just lmk im happy to share any experiences :)
@clacke@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
Plus when you look at the health problems you can get as you get older sux. It makes it harder to function in society basically. All the wears upon you then you add generational a trauma it’s a lot for many of us to navigate without assistance. We obviously think differently. Extreme hyperphantasia in adults hyper phantasia, more vivid recall. Cited by nih I can get the paper :)
"Explicit memory involves recalling previously learned information that requires conscious effort to receive" for example personal experience ("x happened to me on y day") and factual information you had to learn ("city is the capital of y country")
"Implicit memory is unconscious and effortless" for example muscle memory (how to ride a bike etc), understanding categories (knowing what things are), having emotional associations with things (you react emotionally in certain ways to certain things) .
Lots to think about here, for example explicit memory of things that fall in my special interest is stronger than things that don't.
Constant earworms seem related to implicit (short term auditory) memory.
Also the differences in encoding the different forms of memory vs retrieving them.
eg I have vivid visual memory but have difficulty recognising people.
@clacke i am not sure whether this question can be usefully addressed based on current research about memory in autism, because it is all so unclear still and points in conflicting directions. impaired episodic memory is a common finding, but regarding the rest, i don't think we have concrete findings yet.
@miaoue The text in the article seems to vaguely point toward "implicit memory unaffected, explicit memory impaired", so the answer to "is it 'autistic brain'?" seems to be "could be, yeah"!
@pathfinder To put what what you're saying in a couple of labeled boxes:
I think what you're saying is that your brain has a strong recognition or association memory, which are categories of implicit memory, but your brain is not strong on episodic memory, which is a category of explicit memory. You also seem to have a brain that associates stronger on auditory stimuli than on other senses.
I'm not read up on whether there's an association between this combination of memory function with autism, or if it's just that one axis of being you is your autism (which you seem to be implying, apologies if I read it wrong) and another axis is how your memory works.
watch The Prisoner, then watch Patrick McGoohan try to do a "neutral" USA accent in Danger Man. he always slips as soon as another British person is in the scene.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic this is so interesting, having no reproduction of sound in your mind yet having excellent memory when you’re actually comparing what you’re hearing to what you’ve heard before.
I can mentally reproduce sounds, but I don’t have perfect pitch. My relative pitch is pretty damn good tho, so if I have a reference in working memory, I can name notes relative to that reference, until a few seconds later. Then it’s gone until I take another reference “measurement”.
I don’t have a particular talent in identifying accents but I can imitate the way people say words, even if I don’t know the language. It’s not like I can immediately imitate a whole sentence in a language I can’t speak hearing it off TV but, say, if a person is in front of me and repeats the word a few times, I’m pretty sure I can imitate it perfectly within a couple tries
@CynAq@actuallyautistic
Oh God, the mimicry of a strong accent. I can't count how many times that dropped me in it as a child. I couldn't stop myself, the way I can now for some reason, and it was almost always taken wrong.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic they must’ve thought you were takin’ a piss, if I’m getting my Britishism correct.
My skill in imitating speech wasn’t something I discovered early on in my life. I learned English as a second language from age 10 forward and when I was late teens, I had some insecurities about my accent so I started paying more attention to how people were speaking. Then I learned by deliberate practice how to use my vocal tract and mouth in different ways. I also learned singing in that same period because that’s pretty much the same skill set essentially.
@CynAq@actuallyautistic
They pretty much did think I was taking the piss. But, it was never something I learnt. It was just something I couldn't stop myself doing. On the other hand, I'm bloody useless at learning other languages. Perhaps, it's because I can't remember the sound of them. So I always envy those of you who can.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I have a pet theory as to why British people in particular aren’t very proficient in learning other languages.
This is a bit of a joke of course so, not to be taken seriously, but, I think British people already have too much to learn as every town essentially speaks a different language. The rest of the world don’t have this problem to the same degree so they can at least squeeze the simplified and abridged version of English in there next to their own.
@CynAq@actuallyautistic
And nothing to do with the fact that we obviously already speak God's tongue and therefore don't need to. I mean, there is a reason why God always speaks with a British accent in films. 😆
Although, you may also be definitely onto something too. 😀
@pathfinder I can’t imitate any other accent if it is English if my life depended on it, but I can generally speak with a really good accent words in a completely different language. I think it’s because I can hear the nuance easier in a completely different word or language. Also I enunciate in my speech patterns regardless of language. French & English I speak fluently with a particularly autistic accent on top of the local (Toronto or Paris). I@[email protected]@actuallyautistic
@JoBlakely@actuallyautistic
It tends to be only really strong accents that I copied. And the thing with British dialects, is that there are a lot of those.
@homelessjun@CynAq@actuallyautistic
Pattern recognition at the very least. Apparently the first thing a child learns when they are learning to speak, is not the words, but the cadence of the words, the accent.
agreed. as soon as i started talking i was experimenting with word sounds, trying different sounds with words. i still do this. and i remember experimenting with sounds a lot before i started talking. also sang a lot from very young until i ripped a vocal cord.
@homelessjun@CynAq@actuallyautistic
A vocal cord, ouch! I didn't actually speak until I was 5 or 6. When I learnt is anyone's guess. Because there is a strong possibility that I knew how, but just didn't see the point. To be honest, even now I mostly struggle with seeing the point.
@pathfinder My Dad could mimic people's accents so well, it's a wonder to me that he never got punched, though he was asked where - in the country of accent origin - he came from. I can do it, and also tune into broken English. @CynAq@actuallyautistic
@Tooden@CynAq@actuallyautistic
The University I went to had a lot of Irish people in it, after befriending one of them and spending a lot of time in his company, so many of the others couldn't believe I wasn't Irish, simply because they'd heard him and me speak. He thought it was hysterical.
@pathfinder That was Dad's specialty. I suppose it came naturally, because his mother was from County Clare, though she didn't sound Irish to me. @CynAq@actuallyautistic
i have never been outside the states but have been accused of being from various countries when someone hears me speak. it was confusing because it never occurred to me that i sound different, or, "foreign" to anyone else at times.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic That's interesting -- I have almost the exact opposite: I can play bits of music (and sometimes other audio -- basically anything I've listened to enough times) like a tape-player. It's how I play musical instruments (or sing): part of my brain seems to be able to "read" a little ahead of what I'm currently playing, so I can do the necessary muscle-movements at the right time.
I can also fast-forward to recite lyrics faster than they're usually sung.
@woozle@actuallyautistic
My father was like that. He was the musician in the family and also, I have no doubt, autistic, although he didn't live long enough to learn that. We can often be very good with pattern recognition. But, the patterns we work best with, vary so very much.
@woozle@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I have a very difficult time with dual processing. If my brain is to work i cant have other distractions.
Like, i can pick out the drums or the bass and kind of tune out the rest, or i can listen to the song as a whole, but i cant think about one song while another is playing (or even skip ahead).
@hellomiakoda@actuallyautistic
Everyone has an accent, we just tend to think that we don't. Autistic's, though, tend not to be so noticeable. Perhaps the so called, flat-affect voice.
I do not know how flat or not-flat my affect is at this point. I know it's definitely FLATTER than when I was masking, and I like it that way. I just have no idea how flat compared to others.
@hellomiakoda@actuallyautistic
Unless you hear yourself recorded, you don't. I hated how I sounded on my first answer machine recording and blamed the machine. 😀
"Autistic brains be stupid. Well, obviously not stupid, they just seem to work, or not work, in mysterious ways."
I think of it this way...
If I put my laptop out in the blazing sun, slammed in it's keyboard repeated, forced it to connect to the internet through twisted up strips of tinfoil, and shot a microwave gun at it...
My laptop would not work in "mysterious ways" too.
My brain is said laptop, and allist society is the rest of that analogy.
So, i am / was a musician. As a teen (late 80s) i was REALLY into Metallica. One thing i would do to entertain myself while riding the bus is to listen to one of the tracks in my head and individually isolate instruments. I remember being able to listen to just the drum track, and then do things like get rid of the high-hat or toms.
Admittedly, I'd listened to those songs HUNDREDS of times.
@alexpsmith@pathfinder@actuallyautistic i don't know that I can call what I have an eidetic memory, but of the things I can recall, music and lyrics are among the few things I can recall with striking clarity.
I've learned from a friend of a different flavor of neurodivergence in which eidetic memory is tied closely to emotion, and in this way i can connect the dots between how music is a special interest and outlet for complex feels… and how music can resonate with me in a way that sticks...
@alexpsmith@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I remember thinking when i was getting diagnostic testing for autism, we got to the short term memory test and i did so terribly, as i often do trying to remember stuff...
but i also remember thinking if she would've sang the things she was testing me on i'd probably have nailed it
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic In my case, I am gradually going deaf. But I have an excellent auditory memory. I'm a musician, actually. By listening to the first notes of the introduction I can recognize almost any piece of music I have ever heard in my life. I remember instrument solos note by note and repeat them and scat. It also happens to me that I don't remember faces, even though I met them a few days ago, but I remember the voices of the people very well. But if the sound is distant I don't distinguish thunder from an airplane, or a cat from a baby. Auditory is my main sensory hypersensitivity, the others They are smell and touch, of which I have strong memories and precision.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic just to clarify, do you mean perfect (absolute) pitch or relative pitch? the latter is where, once you're given a starting note, you can hit the right intervals for a piece from there :bugcat_nod:
@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
I literally can't sing a note and have never tried to learn a musical instrument. But, I can tell if something is off, when I hear others. So, I'm assuming absolute. And by off, I mean that it is like my spatial awareness when I can look at two things and tell you instantly which is higher, or wider or bigger, even if it is only by millimetres.
@OctaviaConAmore@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
not saying I have it, but I have hurt my already limited abilities trying to exercise the relative sort before I ever found the absolute sort 😀
@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
I'm going to go with one. Obviously, if it's something I know, but don't ask me to remember it, I know when something's off. But, otherwise, a single wrong note within a pattern.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic oh, a single wrong note in a pattern? so not like, someone hits one note on a piano completely out of context and you scrunch your nose, right? :blobhaj_think:
@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
I think it has to be within the context of what they are playing. As I don't play instruments, I have no context to tell if a single key is right or not. Although, with other things, I do have experience of, I can tell. Like listening to an engine, or the sound of a voice.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic ah, then you have relative pitch, not "perfect" pitch (and considering how the latter deteriorates with age and causes problems, I would argue relative is the better of the two in most cases :jolteon_giggle: ) (I put the sarcastic quote marks there because it is anything but perfect)
@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
Good to know. 😀 Thank you for taking this time, I've often wondered. Because whilst sound, when it's off, bothers me intensely, given that my musical ability may be near zero, I did wonder how.
@punishmenthurts@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic well key and tuning are sort of different. Usually in music they call relative pitch the ability to identify any other note given a single note. (So while I might not know exactly where A is, if you play me an A I can give you a perfect B flat or D or any note you want)
@clowncollege@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
.
when I learn a song, I'll have the melody in my head, uh, unmoored form scale, I have a hearing issue or just amusia. But I'll start where I think it should start, and try, see if I sound alright with the guitar, and if not, I will try starting singing all over the place, keeping the relative melody, looking for a place that seems right
Pitch is just wave frequency and there's nothing special about any specific frequency. To call A 440 hertz is basically an arbitrary designation. To do that in an equal temperament tuning system is to pick an arbitrary designation within an arbitrary tuning system.
What we call an in tune A today would be considered sharp or flat at different points in history when the convention was different and the 12 note equal temperament system is a specifically European thing so I'm still pretty confused.
As in, maybe it's off to you but would be on to someone else, how do we decide that your on is the absolute on based on a sense you have, that kind of thing.
@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic it's honestly more me being triggered by how other people use the term "absolute" to talk about music than what you're even saying so sorry if my tone sounds confrontational I don't mean to be
@clowncollege@pathfinder@actuallyautistic yeah, it's definitely not the best word in that slot, but while relative pitch has a name that works really well, "absolute" or "perfect" pitch are definitely lacking, and I haven't found anything better to replace them :blobfox_laugh_sweat: do you happen to have any handy word to replace "absolute" in this context that isn't the full paragraph I used to describe is somewhere in this thread? :giggle:
@OctaviaConAmore@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I doubt there's a word that will aptly describe it without being confusing in some other way too, it's a kind of weird thing to even exist given that it's predicated on a cultural thing but it seems innate. I think probably ultimately the frustration comes from how taken for granted 12 tone et is.
as for 12-tone being taken for granted, considering its sheer dominance, especially in English-familiar places, it's not too surprising, though definitely a bit annoying :zerotwo_shrug:
It's more the concept that there are 12 magic things called "notes" that only special people can understand or make use of seems a really harsh way to look at it.
The actual music itself is great, people keep making great music the way fish stay swimming
@clowncollege@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
In most cases, I would say you were right. But my father was a musician and had perfect pitch and he and I would flinch at the same things.
@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic also for clarification I'm a professional musician myself, a composer, and an autistic person with a special interest in tuning theory who can tell you the difference between a Pythagorean and a syntonic comma.
@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic I think there's also probably a more highly granular or whatever you want to call it sense of sound itself (which is probably related to like sensory issues and headphones and such) and so it's like an autistic double whammy of pattern recognition and sensory differences.
I know for me I got really heavy into music when I was young because my audio environment was so overwhelming to me my whole life and it was the first time I ever was able to have any control over it. Add to that the stim effect of playing and the opportunity to do the same thing over and over again for hours every day and I was hooked
@clowncollege I'm not getting the reference here. I do hope you aren't inferring that country music is somehow 'deficient' in tone or pitch?
I was brought up on Classical, Operetta, Beatles, Rock, Pop, Jazz, Blues, and Country. I know what music is, and I sang in choirs and choruses. Every genre has good, and bad. Like Kevin, I wince at off-key, and I also cringe at atonal rubbish. @pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
@Tooden@clowncollege@pathfinder@actuallyautistic "western" here isn't being used in the context of genre, but in the context of different tuning systems and musical traditions around the world, where the 12-tone scale based one is generally called "western" musical tradition :bugcat_nod:
@Tooden@pathfinder@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic I would argue that country music, by virtue of string bends and blue notes, is actually less deficient in that regard than say, solo piano music which is exclusively limited to those 12 notes
@pathfinder@clowncollege@OctaviaConAmore@actuallyautistic
.
I often have that response to myself, and sometimes even to other people's mistakes (I have fun watching the anthem on the hockey games), I often know when I'm wrong (I mean, I often don't), but I rarely know if I'm sharp or flat, WTF to do about it when I'm wrong.
@clowncollege@pathfinder@actuallyautistic to add further context to non-musicians here, "absolute" pitch is what is commonly referred to as "perfect" pitch, where someone is tuned into the 440A equal temperament notes we use in a lot of music that they can hear one note out of context and tell whether it's in-tune or not compared to that set of frequencies, as well as identify which note it is :zerotwo_shrug: (kind of like people can tell what the temperature is just by feel, or the colour of something by sight)
relative pitch is where someone has the ability to tell whether a note is in-tune or out of tune (within a system like 12 tone equal temperament) relative to a starting pitch, whether that's a 440Hz A, 430, 415, 442, etc, but can't name those notes by themselves, nor even with other notes unless they're given the name of one of those notes to compare to the rest :bugcat_nod:
I wish I had a little bit less pervasive sound memory. It stands me in good stead with other humans, though, bc I am bad with faces and names, so once someone talks, I know if I know them.
Sounds, voices, accents, they all come with strong physical sensation and thus, strong memory. Sounds get stuck in my head, sometimes on repeat. I have to change my alarm tone frequently because even if I choose a seemingly pleasant one, it will end up stuck on a loop in my head. Sometimes I can sit down and reproduce it on the piano. But I don't think I have perfect pitch, despite having been a musician my entire life.
@arisummerland@actuallyautistic
Definitely. Although, the word you might have been looking for is frustrating. I obviously have the memories, just no way to recall them, even in dreams.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic Yes, frustrating as well. I'm aphantasic, but I still dream. I haven't considered whether I can hear things in my dreams or not, though.
@pathfinder@arisummerland@actuallyautistic I have a suggestion on how to remember, based on similar experience: by recalling the reaction you had during the dream as an observer to its content.
I recently confirmed to myself my dream visuals are much higher fidelity than my waking visualization this way. That's because during a dream I had a strong reaction to how visually beautiful an island was, though when I woke my visual memory of the island was too foggy to have caused that reaction.
@pathfinder@arisummerland@actuallyautistic Occasionally I've been able to prompt dream topics by deliberately fixating on them before sleep. I wonder if you could prompt a dream of attending a concert or something similar, then try to remember your dreaming reaction.
Would be very curious to hear what you might learn.
@arisummerland@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I always have a concert going on in my head. It’s not always what people would consider music but I generally enjoy it.sometimes I want it to go away and it won’t but I mostly exist peacefully with the sounds in my head.
@pathfinder@actuallyautistic I'm the same for faces and names. I need contextual cues to "remember" who a person is.
Yet, I can easily recall in exquisite detail, the minutia of our last few IRL interactions. Who was sitting where, who was wearing what, perfumes / aftershave, food eaten, drinks, who else was there, etc. just not what their face looks like
@devxvda@actuallyautistic
With faces, I'm not entirely sure whether that's because we don't pay attention to them because we know we won't remember, or whether it's just the whole eye contact thing and we just don't like to and because it doesn't actually mean that much to us.
And yet, if someone showed you a series of photo's of people's faces and asked you if they weren't a certain person, there is probably a good chance that you would answer correctly. A bit like me with sound. The memories are obviously there, just not in a way we can access.
If I bumped into someone on the street, it would take me a while to know who they are as I'm missing the contextual cues. The voice helps a lot, although sometimes I can struggle with that on calls if I don't know whose voice to expect.
@pathfinder@devxvda@actuallyautistic I have a weird thing with people and faces. If you show me a series of photos, I have no issues with picking the ones belonging to the same person. But don’t ask me to recognize the person in real life - I can’t. Like, pictures and a real person are so different to me, I can’t make the connection
@olena@devxvda@actuallyautistic
In a way I'm the same. I can remember photos of people, but not the people themselves. So if I remember my parents faces, what I'm actually doing is remembering a photo of them, as it seems to be the only memory of their image that I can access.
It's possible that photos as objects are simpler to remember, whereas people's images are too complex for us to adequately remember.
@pathfinder@devxvda@actuallyautistic you know, just yesterday I was thinking that in a way, I don’t remember most of my life. Like, there are some details my brain occasionally reminds me(usually when something related happens), there are some memories of emotions, there are some points of shame - episodes I wish to not even remember that they happened - but I don’t actually remember what I was doing, what I was saying, what actually happened. I have some resume of my life, like some knowledge of ‘and then happened this, and after that I was doing that’ - but it’s just knowledge of some facts, I don’t actually remember myself going through all of that. I have a feeling of living for a while, a have some vague images and emotional imprints - but I am not even sure how much of that is actual memory and how much is some key-word recreation. I wonder if it’s a common experience. If not - maybe that’s exactly why it’s easy for me after going away to never come back and never feel any nostalgia. Maybe to miss something one needs to actually remember something
@olena@pathfinder@devxvda@actuallyautistic This is absolutely me. I don't remember much of anything before I was about 12 years old, and most of the "memories" that I have are stories that my family members have repeated over and over...not MY memories, but descriptions of theirs.
On the other hand, I can remember certain events with fantastic clarity. I have been asked to write reports on events that I've witnessed and I've been told, later when they've reviewed video footage, that my memory seemed to be the most reliable.
I tend to not forget "important" things (although I have been bit before). I would probably make a good executive assistant if I enjoyed talking on the phone and kissing ass.
As I've gotten older though I've started remembering more. Like you, I may get a random emotional reaction or a visual cue and later, when I'm thinking about it, I can sometimes focus on that cue and remember a whole lot more. So far it's been a pleasant exploration, if a bit slow and inconsistent.
@roknrol@olena@pathfinder@devxvda@actuallyautistic
same, I always spoke that way about my life before I was twelve too. After reading Neurotribes, I’ve decided that I had something like an “awakening,” around then.
.
I don’t have family stories instead so much, but I have the few vivid ones.
I’m starting to think my sense of missing time is getting less now, thinking that a lot of it was simply empty, me alone with the TV or outside somewhere, mostly alone.
@olena@actuallyautistic@pathfinder@devxvda I remember the stories I tell about memorable events in my life, but other than that I have very few memories, and rarely are they visual.
I also don’t really consider myself to be the same person. Sure, I seem to have some continuity in the stories, but there are distinct divisions in my life as told by those stories and therefore my memory. I think of myself as just the latest person to play the lead role in these stories. I have warm feelings for most of the previous people who occupied this body, but they don’t feel like me.
The eternal question. What is self? Is it merely the memory of the progression or is there something making that journey? A consistency in and of itself.
@pathfinder@bhawthorne@olena@actuallyautistic@devxvda not that i want to derail this thread... but have y'all been watching #XMen97, specifically with regard to the Jean Grey/Madelyn Pryor plot thread where because of Jean's super psychic powers, she can't distinguish between her memories and her clone’s… to which one asks "does it matter if you actually gave birth if you can remember the pull of your child's tears to soothe and love him?”
@pathfinder@bhawthorne@olena@actuallyautistic@devxvda ...specifically holidays alone in my apartment, i struggle between a new life in Chicago and being pulled right back to just months ago when I was (not happily, but still) married for all these years and, being such, was part of very different activity levels and vibes around holidays.
Has me now preparing for what might be a really difficult 4th of July having been basically the mayor of the 4th of July in my town the last few years
@aaronesilvers@pathfinder@bhawthorne@actuallyautistic@devxvda haven’t seen Xmen that far. Separation from my kid probably was the only one I actually felt painful. Luckily, we meet from time to time, when the uni has holidays and there are flights available for not the craziest prices.
I think the concept of a continuous and unitary self is vastly overstated and feels like a missed opportunity to me. I know who I am in this moment. I feel a connection to the stories of who I was before. That’s really all I can be sure of. I also feel relative disconnection from some of the people in earlier stories. Of course, the fact that I have had different names at different times or in different places reflects some of those intentional changes.
asking such a vexing question contemplative philosophical question haha
It surely must be a trick.
😅😬😲❤️
I’ll try and admit defeat before I start:
the self perhaps could be described by some:
a phenomena of the embodied system model of what we call “mind and body”,of which in itself is a complex system of complex systems, among other organisms and life forms and within other complex systems and other forms of existence.
This phenomena could be represented by the momentary culmination of which said systems are constantly emergent, and by which those systems new moments emerge at various stages and scale.🧐
@everyday_human@pathfinder@bhawthorne@actuallyautistic@devxvda and biology. They say, there’s about 2kg of simbiotic microflora living in our body, and the gut biome has been linked to our mental health among other things, so I wonder how many literal us are there actually in our consciousness
@pathfinder@olena@bhawthorne@actuallyautistic@devxvda
So why do we use predicative inference, and iterative inference combined with life’s experience within the mind enveloped by our embodied systems to explain the biological and philosophical of the human experience existentially as a concept?
Because awareness, even at the simplistic level of me/not me, is perception. Perception enables choice, which means we have a sense of a self interacting with the universe. (actually what we have is an interaction with our perception of the universe). Awareness of self creates its own sense of self.
Which is kind of like us forgetting that the program we are running isn't actually the same as the computer.
@everyday_human@pathfinder@olena@actuallyautistic@devxvda Honestly? I don’t do that.
It’s not really a concept I feel a need to explain. I know it’s a bit Cartesian of me, but given the primacy in my worldview of sensation and subjective experience, I don’t particularly feel a need to explain the human experience to others. I figure they are capable of experiencing it directly, to the extent that they choose to do so.
My philosophical journey could be approximated by an arc from childhood solipsism (I am all that is), to young adult anthroposophy (there is an accessible and objective spiritual world on par with the physical world), to atheist animism (there are no omnipotent/omniscient beings outside of ourselves, but all things are imbued with spirit). Each of these stages has had at its base a distinct focus on my subjective experiences of the natural and spiritual worlds, as opposed to the built and intellectual worlds.
Owen Barfield’s Saving the Appearances made a big impression on me when I read it in university, as has four decades of practice in a nature-centered spiritual tradition.
I’ve read a couple of papers on it now for 5-6 year.
There’s papers out there on it I’m not positive of the sampling size or who the best minds are in on it because of sub-specialty medically/biologically.
It indeed can affect the whole embodied system and also with Interoception epistemically 🤔
@pathfinder@devxvda@actuallyautistic as for remembering people’s images - the funny thing is, if I have seen a person once - I will know I did when I see them again(though most probably will have no idea when and where), but I always mix up and confuse people which others don’t even consider similar-looking. To me pretty often two or more people may look very alike, to the point of confusion, while others are really puzzled when I say they look alike because they see nothing in common between them. That said, I was able to tell apart the identical twins I studied with, but I could never say how, idk, they just felt differently
@devxvda@pathfinder@actuallyautistic
THIS IS INTERESTING, I wonder if it's MOSTLY Autistics who experience this, because faces are all about WHO, and that's social, and we are socially attenuated otherwise as well, right?