handoflixue comments on Overcoming suffering: Emotional acceptance - Less Wrong

38 Post author: Kaj_Sotala 29 May 2011 10:57AM

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Comment author: handoflixue 01 May 2012 10:04:49PM 0 points [-]

There doesn't seem to be an obvious way to undo that.

blinks I've built emotions by observing that others have them and seeking to emulate it. The clearest example for me is that I didn't use to have any real empathy/sympathy responses - people's emotions were as meaningful to me as the state of a toy; it bothered me insomuch as it might mean my toy was broken, that's it. These days I have a fairly robust sense of empathy, but I can still turn it on and off fairly easily, and I don't let it interfere with exploration of more useful responses.

I've also done experiments with removing entire emotions for ~24 hours, setting specific external triggers that will snap me back (and making sure at least one person knows some of what I've done, so they can try to talk me out of it if I've accidentally wireheaded myself in to a state where I want to stay wireheaded)