wedrifid comments on Being Wrong about Your Own Subjective Experience - Less Wrong

37 Post author: lukeprog 24 April 2011 08:24PM

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Comment author: wedrifid 25 April 2011 01:45:50PM *  5 points [-]

Dreaming in color - I don't even see where you're going with this. Some people do, some don't. It changes over time. Where's the error? Are there people who think they dream in color but don't, or vice versa? How is this relevant?

Dream in colour? With, like, pictures? I think I mostly dream in concepts. With occasional pictures included for effect now and again.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 25 April 2011 02:29:21PM 2 points [-]

Can you describe a mostly concept dream?

I always have visuals in color going on in dreams. I'm not sure that I hear sounds. I get some kinesthesia. Sometimes I get concepts in the sense of "just knowing" the backstory for something in a dream. I only remember taste/smell happening once.

I've read that no one dreams of landing a real punch, which I assume means a plausible amount of tactile/kinesthetic input.

Comment author: wedrifid 25 April 2011 03:20:32PM 0 points [-]

Can you describe a mostly concept dream?

Like playing a MUD or being absorbed in a good book. The story, scenario and actions are just there in the brain without necessary requiring an actual visual intermediary.

Comment author: Kaj_Sotala 26 April 2011 06:37:10PM *  0 points [-]

Note that for many people, reading books is a very visual experience. One of my friends is an eidetic imaginer. If she reads a book, she actually sees the events in almost the same vividness as if she was witnessing them for real. (I don't know about MUDs, but I don't see why they should be any different.) So "like playing a MUD or being absorbed in a good book" isn't necessarily a very useful way of describing this.

Comment author: wedrifid 26 April 2011 07:02:23PM 1 point [-]

So "like playing a MUD or being absorbed in a good book" isn't necessarily a very useful way of describing this.

Not very useful, merely the most useful way that is practical in a brief sentence. Not all inferential differences can be crossed in a few words. The second sentence comes closer, an essay would have gone further and a neuroscience textbook further still. But for those with particularly different default styles of thought actually grasping in detail the entirely different forms of experience would take extensive mental training - when possible at all. It is hard to explain to a blind guy what it is like to see when you are deaf and dumb yourself.

Comment author: wedrifid 26 April 2011 07:09:46PM 2 points [-]

Actually, now I'm curious. I wonder if any blind guys have ever hooked up with deaf chicks (or vice versa or vice vice). If I were in one of the groups I would definitely set out to do it at least once, even if only briefly. The two major communication lines cut off but two brains there that would, I expect, learn to cross that chasm regardless.

Comment author: Alicorn 26 April 2011 07:23:22PM *  0 points [-]

The solution that came to mind was typing (with a text-to-speech or text-to-braille solution for the blind person). If the deaf person could read lips and speak understandable English (and some can), they could just talk.

Comment author: wedrifid 27 April 2011 04:41:04AM 1 point [-]

The solution that came to mind was typing (with a text-to-speech or text-to-braille solution for the blind person).

That seems to be the obvious solution. The part that makes me intrigued, however is how the increased overhead of verbal communication would encourage a heavily intuitive physical language to emerge. Even more fascinating would be if the participants started their interacting as children. I would expect a full physically mediated grammar to evolve.

If the deaf person could read lips and speak understandable English (and some can), they could just talk.

I distinctly remember typing 'deaf and dumb'. I must have edited that out while making the phrasing fit.