Grex Agora47 Conference

Item 73: SURVEY!

Entered by aga on Wed Oct 8 22:17:17 2003:

Do you have cognitive guests, based on real people but built to suit, who
occasionally pop into your head, whereupon you begin intense mental discourse?
I do, and I know some other people who do, but I'm not sure it's universal.
35 responses total.

#1 of 35 by tod on Wed Oct 8 22:33:49 2003:

This response has been erased.



#2 of 35 by scott on Wed Oct 8 23:40:13 2003:

They ridicule me endlessly, and when I can grab one I choke it death.


#3 of 35 by aga on Thu Oct 9 00:00:18 2003:

Nononon.  They're guests.  They're well-behaved.  You guys probably don't have
the cognitive power to have them.


#4 of 35 by jaklumen on Thu Oct 9 01:05:28 2003:

Oooh.  Condescending.  Do you expect this survey to continue with that 
attitude?


#5 of 35 by other on Thu Oct 9 01:36:28 2003:

I often debate with myself, but the reticent self who always says things 
like "it's probably not worth the bother" wins with distressing 
frequency.


#6 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 01:53:09 2003:

Of all the people in this item, I'm probably the one with the most advanced
mind:  It holds debates between me and OTHER PEOPLE.


#7 of 35 by other on Thu Oct 9 02:15:10 2003:

That must be a definition of advanced with which I am not familiar.  If 
your mind is the example of the definition, then the word I would have 
used is "defective."


#8 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 02:19:40 2003:

Why?


#9 of 35 by other on Thu Oct 9 02:35:53 2003:

Based solely on the ability (or lack thereof) you have thus far 
demonstrated on Grex to participate in discussions.


#10 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 02:43:16 2003:

Is it really an inability?  I think it's mostly just an
idon'treallycaremuchility.  I, you know, am quite able to participate in
discussions, but really now why would I bother with serious such on Grex?


#11 of 35 by other on Thu Oct 9 02:46:50 2003:

Well, then.  That both alters the basis for my conclusion and 
significantly strengthens it.  After all, why would you bother to post 
all the drivel you do in the midst of other people's discussions if you 
have no interest in participating in the discussions UNLESS you had a 
defective mind?


#12 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 02:51:36 2003:

Anyways, other, even if I had a defective mind, it hardly means all people
who have 'Tarpist style cognitive guests do.  You're off topic.


#13 of 35 by other on Thu Oct 9 03:41:31 2003:

Well.  If that ain't the putz calling the kettle a schmuck...


#14 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 04:49:15 2003:

You're the one who thinks talking about something unrelated proves your point.
Stop filibustering.


#15 of 35 by krj on Thu Oct 9 07:19:12 2003:

Is this getting you any closer to getting laid, David?


#16 of 35 by tsty on Thu Oct 9 07:30:18 2003:

well, nok krj, it involves 'intense mental discourse' nto intercourse.....


#17 of 35 by jep on Thu Oct 9 12:55:21 2003:

I thought resp:6 was funny.

I do not entertain parties in my mind.  My feelings were hurt when I 
invited over some imaginary friends but they were too busy with 
implausible "other plans".


#18 of 35 by gull on Thu Oct 9 13:58:02 2003:

Re #15: I think he's hoping to seduce one of his cognitive guests.


#19 of 35 by scott on Thu Oct 9 15:43:31 2003:

Actually, I've got a different (but still interesting) way of thinking.  The
logical part of my brain tends to run things, and is right in front of
everything else.  However, it's not very good at figuring out emotional issues
and intuitive things.  Those parts of the brain tend to take much longer to
communicate with the outside world.  So whenever some tricky, non-obvious
problem comes up, the logical part has learned to put it aside (usually for
a day) to see what answers seep up from other parts of the brain.  It's
surprising what good answers I come up with, when I spend the time waiting
for them to arrive.


#20 of 35 by remmers on Thu Oct 9 16:21:48 2003:

Re #0: My thinking occasionally takes the form of imaginary conversations
with real people.  I'm not sure this is what you mean, though.  They don't
just "pop into my head" and start gabbing; I summon them.  I'm always
very conscious of the fact that I'm just thinking about them; there's
no illusion that these visitations have any autonomy of their own.

Is there any apparent physical dimension to your "guests"?  Can you visualize
them clearly?  Hear their voices as if they were real people in the same
room with you?

Re #19:  Oh yes, I became very much aware of background mental processing
when I was a student of mathematics.  Faced with a novel math problem that
that I was having a hard time solving, I'd put it aside for a while and
think about other things.  When I'd come back to it a few hours or a couple
of days later, the solution would often just jump out at me.


#21 of 35 by tod on Thu Oct 9 16:23:03 2003:

This response has been erased.



#22 of 35 by rcurl on Thu Oct 9 16:47:23 2003:

Also Re #19: I experience the same phenomenon of unconcious mental
processing in a wide range of thought processes. It happens with difficult
mathematical problems, as remmers recounts, but also in much more common
things, like crossword puzzles or just remembering names. I will get stuck
on a crossword puzzle, but if I put it aside for a while, words just seems
to fall into place when I pick it up again. I am now applying this to
trying to remember the name of a store that I have been to but can't
recall. I can visualize the store but, in what is probably what is called
a "senior moment", I can't recall its name. I have the catalog in my
bookshelf, but am determined to recall the name and not look it up, so am
applying "unconcious mental processing". It's there somewhere.....



#23 of 35 by tod on Thu Oct 9 16:59:56 2003:

This response has been erased.



#24 of 35 by happyboy on Thu Oct 9 17:02:51 2003:

i turn into a baloney sannidge.


#25 of 35 by dah on Thu Oct 9 18:29:15 2003:

Re. 20:  No, there's nothing physical to it.  Indeed, it most often happens
when I'm withdrawn in thought and slightly disassociated from my surroundings.
I'm not sure what you mean by summoning them; mine just fit into my train of
thought where apt.  Usually, the discussions asimply me explaining complex
thoughts I have in normal language; that is, I am able to reaffirm what I know
on a higher level by explaining it to a conciousness apparently other than
my own.  But let's not think I'm crazy here:  I understand that the cognitive
guests are simply part of my mind, and they're not overbearing or anything
like that. 


#26 of 35 by mdw on Thu Oct 9 18:52:51 2003:

There's a difference between intelligence, common sense, & experience.
Wisdom is some combination of at least the last two that you only get
with age.  Experience is of much less value without the common sense to
take advantage of that experience.  Simple lack of thought makes anybody
look stupid, but it takes real intelligence to look truely foolish.  It
is not always easy to distinguish between the mark of genius and a
complete fool, because you only find a true genius 1% of the time,
followed by a continuum that shades into foolishness.

I don't have discrete "uninvited" guests who show up and camp out in my
head.  I do have thoughts that show up as snide comments which are not
necessarily what I meant to be thinking.  I'm quite capable of arguing
with myself, or inventing characters, or imagining myself discussing
something with somebody, and I don't always have an organized thought
train that leads to this happening in my imagination.  Unless I'm really
*really* tired and under some sort of seriously weird stress, though,
what happens in my imagination is usually pretty much under my conscious
control.


#27 of 35 by lynne on Thu Oct 9 19:25:50 2003:

I have conversations with real people.  They're just not necessarily always
present for them, so I have to provide their responses as well as my own. :)


#28 of 35 by rcurl on Fri Oct 10 00:32:59 2003:

Re #22: L.L.Bean! (But I got it because a new catalog arrived from them
today....but at least I remembered that that was the store whose name I
could not remember....)


#29 of 35 by aruba on Fri Oct 10 13:45:29 2003:

I experience the same phenomenon with crossword puzzles ar Rane does.  I
figure that when you think about a problem for a little while, a little rut
forms in your brain, so that ideas always get channelled along a certain
path.  If you wait a while, the rut smooths over, and ideas can go in new
and better directions.


#30 of 35 by dah on Fri Oct 10 15:04:13 2003:

Honestly, you have no idea.


#31 of 35 by rcurl on Fri Oct 10 19:34:48 2003:

Re #29: or perhaps after you form that rut, the "answers" swirling around
the brain fall into it if they fit. That is (to make it clearer) the
question "receptor" is formed and eventually picks up the answer "ligand".




#32 of 35 by tsty on Sat Oct 11 04:45:47 2003:

rcurl, remmers, aruba, mdw adn i share similar mind-space. it;s quite
startling for hte first few occurrances. expected after a while.


#33 of 35 by dah on Sat Oct 11 16:57:20 2003:

Oh.  I don't think it's at all unusual.  Usually, the grand extrapolations
happen after sleep, when I do it. happened just this morning.


#34 of 35 by tsty on Tue Nov 4 06:36:25 2003:

but, dah, you are on grex, with grexers ... it wouldn't be statistically
unusual for us.


#35 of 35 by willcome on Thu Nov 27 08:06:09 2003:

whore.


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