Dear forum visitor,
It looks as though you have not registered for a forum account, or are not signed in. In order to participate in current discussions or create new threads, you will need to register for a forum account by clicking on the link below.
ajqtrz
Chef - loquacious Old Dog
From the thread: Gaming Disorder, a “Footnote” from Lord Draconian caught my attention. He said:
"Footnote: I like discussion and debate, I'll even on occasion tell someone they are blatantly wrong (especially where provable math is involved), but at the core of my belief is the one and single truth that we all live our lives within the boundaries of our own locked room. (A sum of our genetics and experience) From this room we have a unique perspective and interpretation of things that is only ours and no one else can ever have nor understand. This makes me above all attempt to abstain from critical judgment even when I really want to. Where I consistently fall short on this is when others are handing out judgment, triggers my eye for an eye reflex if you will, I judge them back, but somewhere along the way I remember they really don't have a choice either. No one does"
What interests me in this is his statement “at the core of my belief is the one and single truth that we all live our lives within the boundaries of our own locked room. (A sum of our genetics and experience) From this room we have a unique perspective and interpretation of things that is only ours and no one else can ever have nor understand.” (emphasis added).
The perspective that we each live in our own “locked room” focuses our attention of the interior experience of reality and the confluence of all our sense streams into a usable vision of that reality. In other words, we receive a stream of sensations from our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin and out of those streams we develop an understanding of the “outer” world and how to function in it. The claim that that “no one else can ever have nor understand” that world is questionable upon the following grounds.
First, to make that world known and understood to oneself is only possible above the most basic nature, by encoding. In other words, to know what you know you must encode that knowledge with symbols. The set of symbols you use are your native language and the act of encoding your experience actually solidifies and to some degree distorts that experience. We only become aware of what we know, past the basic instinctual level, by using the language we have received and used. The choice of a particular set of words to “remember” something entails choosing those words and as the choice is made the experience becomes interpreted an is remembered as such. So if somebody slaps me and I perceive the slap as an affront if asked what happened I will call the actions an affront (though I will probably use stronger and more colorful language in doing so). In the end it may take a lot of work for me to change my mind later and reassign the words I use to describe the event, if I realize the slap was to get me out of some stupor I was in and therefore not an “affront” at all. The play between our memories and our linguistic descriptions of what we remember is constant and on-going with the influence of each on the other pretty constant as well.
Second. Because it is done via the language we use, our knowledge of what we know is bounded by the limits of that language. Some languages are better able to express some things than others and some things cannot be fully expressed in one language as they can in another. Every language begins with categorization and the use of the language both categorizes and clarifies at the point of categorization. In the end we can know to a great degree what the other person knows exactly because the vehicle of knowledge (i.e. the way we know what we know) is a shared medium. There is, of course, no way to absolutely know what the other person is feeling, but language gives us a way to get almost completely there with what they are thinking.
Third, this process of coming to understand the other person’s thoughts on a subject is a negotiation. A negotiation with the other party and also, at the same time, with ourselves. As we speak we are constantly anticipating what we are saying and the degree of veracity in our words as well as with how the other person will perceive what we are saying. In both cases, as we communicate we adjust any cognitive dissonance we encounter and in the process we often reshape or reencode the very thought we are having and change it in sometime striking but more often subtle ways. In other words, in the process of discussion we are influenced by our own descriptions and often come to understand the event being described differently than when we first began. This is the psychological basis of talk therapy as well as a lot of counseling.
Fourth, while it is true that we negotiate the meaning of our communication and use a common language, the writer of the above quote may have meant an extreme case of understanding and have been envisioning perfect correlation between the two persons, the speaker and the hearer. Perfect correlation may or may not occur but it is not necessary to have complete correlation of meaning. I may envision a large red ball, four feet in diameter when you say to me, “get the large red ball.” But when I go to get the large red ball and there is a three foot red ball there, I still pick it up and bring it along since it fits within the range of meanings of “large red ball.” Perfect and complete understanding is not a necessary condition for understanding.
Finally, the concept of living in a “locked room” is an old one going back many centuries and is, in its philosophic consideration, quite useful. It is true that we experience all of life “within” our own minds. But the room we are in has windows and we can communicate with those across the way in their own “locked room.” Which is a good thing since it would really be difficult to get anything done if the window of a shared language was not there.
AJ
"Footnote: I like discussion and debate, I'll even on occasion tell someone they are blatantly wrong (especially where provable math is involved), but at the core of my belief is the one and single truth that we all live our lives within the boundaries of our own locked room. (A sum of our genetics and experience) From this room we have a unique perspective and interpretation of things that is only ours and no one else can ever have nor understand. This makes me above all attempt to abstain from critical judgment even when I really want to. Where I consistently fall short on this is when others are handing out judgment, triggers my eye for an eye reflex if you will, I judge them back, but somewhere along the way I remember they really don't have a choice either. No one does"
What interests me in this is his statement “at the core of my belief is the one and single truth that we all live our lives within the boundaries of our own locked room. (A sum of our genetics and experience) From this room we have a unique perspective and interpretation of things that is only ours and no one else can ever have nor understand.” (emphasis added).
The perspective that we each live in our own “locked room” focuses our attention of the interior experience of reality and the confluence of all our sense streams into a usable vision of that reality. In other words, we receive a stream of sensations from our eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and skin and out of those streams we develop an understanding of the “outer” world and how to function in it. The claim that that “no one else can ever have nor understand” that world is questionable upon the following grounds.
First, to make that world known and understood to oneself is only possible above the most basic nature, by encoding. In other words, to know what you know you must encode that knowledge with symbols. The set of symbols you use are your native language and the act of encoding your experience actually solidifies and to some degree distorts that experience. We only become aware of what we know, past the basic instinctual level, by using the language we have received and used. The choice of a particular set of words to “remember” something entails choosing those words and as the choice is made the experience becomes interpreted an is remembered as such. So if somebody slaps me and I perceive the slap as an affront if asked what happened I will call the actions an affront (though I will probably use stronger and more colorful language in doing so). In the end it may take a lot of work for me to change my mind later and reassign the words I use to describe the event, if I realize the slap was to get me out of some stupor I was in and therefore not an “affront” at all. The play between our memories and our linguistic descriptions of what we remember is constant and on-going with the influence of each on the other pretty constant as well.
Second. Because it is done via the language we use, our knowledge of what we know is bounded by the limits of that language. Some languages are better able to express some things than others and some things cannot be fully expressed in one language as they can in another. Every language begins with categorization and the use of the language both categorizes and clarifies at the point of categorization. In the end we can know to a great degree what the other person knows exactly because the vehicle of knowledge (i.e. the way we know what we know) is a shared medium. There is, of course, no way to absolutely know what the other person is feeling, but language gives us a way to get almost completely there with what they are thinking.
Third, this process of coming to understand the other person’s thoughts on a subject is a negotiation. A negotiation with the other party and also, at the same time, with ourselves. As we speak we are constantly anticipating what we are saying and the degree of veracity in our words as well as with how the other person will perceive what we are saying. In both cases, as we communicate we adjust any cognitive dissonance we encounter and in the process we often reshape or reencode the very thought we are having and change it in sometime striking but more often subtle ways. In other words, in the process of discussion we are influenced by our own descriptions and often come to understand the event being described differently than when we first began. This is the psychological basis of talk therapy as well as a lot of counseling.
Fourth, while it is true that we negotiate the meaning of our communication and use a common language, the writer of the above quote may have meant an extreme case of understanding and have been envisioning perfect correlation between the two persons, the speaker and the hearer. Perfect correlation may or may not occur but it is not necessary to have complete correlation of meaning. I may envision a large red ball, four feet in diameter when you say to me, “get the large red ball.” But when I go to get the large red ball and there is a three foot red ball there, I still pick it up and bring it along since it fits within the range of meanings of “large red ball.” Perfect and complete understanding is not a necessary condition for understanding.
Finally, the concept of living in a “locked room” is an old one going back many centuries and is, in its philosophic consideration, quite useful. It is true that we experience all of life “within” our own minds. But the room we are in has windows and we can communicate with those across the way in their own “locked room.” Which is a good thing since it would really be difficult to get anything done if the window of a shared language was not there.
AJ