Over the last few years, I've been studying this phenomena and found that it's one entryway connecting to dozens of other subjects and leading into the story of the whole of human experience back to, well, the beginning of humans.
Now that sounds quite audacious, does it not? How could some rando on the Internet have stumbled into such knowledge? It used to surprise me too, enough to make me think I must be mistaken. But no, it no longer surprises me and I can point out why, right here in this post.
Take a look up and down the quite lengthy replies on this post: some interesting anecdotes, and lots of the usual nonsense of course, but the ones that attempted to engage with it on an "intellectual" basis just speculated and made naked assertions. It's what my old calculus teacher used to refer to as "fiat" and "hand-waving".
That is, almost no one attempted to actually investigate this idea, to explore it, most importantly to associate it with other phenomena. There were two exceptions:
Zap mentioned hylics. That's correct. People have recognized this phenomena for millennia, and collecting the knowledge others have gained is one of the simplest ways to gain knowledge yourself.
Vlad referred us to a podcast episode about NPCs. That's key: "inner monologue" and "NPCs" are manifestations of a single phenomenon. It seems like that crystalline thought is not clearly recognized, though.
The fact that this fact is not well known nor researched makes me very suspicious. We can't win if most people aren't really even people.
As to the second sentence, it's dead wrong. People are exactly as they have always been, it's just that we must recognize that we were quite gravely mistaken in our unconscious assumptions as to how they were. Oh, and I believe we can win, but not if we stubbornly and arrogantly persist in that ignorance.
As to the first sentence, I've had precisely the same thought. But look again at this thread: did anyone write anything like I just have? I didn't say anything particularly brilliant, but I have thought about it a lot. So when I look at how far I got on the subject, maybe it really shouldn't be much of a surprise to me or anyone else.
Final note: If anyone has read this far and is thinking, "What an arrogant jerk! Who cares what this a-hole has to say?", well, stop and think for a moment before typing your biting and witty reply. It will just reinforce my case, won't it?
Over the last few years, I've been studying this phenomena and found that it's one entryway connecting to dozens of other subjects and leading into the story of the whole of human experience back to, well, the beginning of humans.
Now that sounds quite audacious, does it not? How could some rando on the Internet have stumbled into such knowledge? It used to surprise me too, enough to make me think I must be mistaken. But no, it no longer surprises me and I can point out why, right here in this post.
Take a look up and down the quite lengthy replies on this post: some interesting anecdotes, and lots of the usual nonsense of course, but the ones that attempted to engage with it on an "intellectual" basis just speculated and made naked assertions. It's what my old calculus teacher used to refer to as "fiat" and "hand-waving".
That is, almost no one attempted to actually investigate this idea, to explore it, most importantly to associate it with other phenomena. There were two exceptions:
Zap mentioned hylics. That's correct. People have recognized this phenomena for millennia, and collecting the knowledge others have gained is one of the simplest ways to gain knowledge yourself.
Vlad referred us to a podcast episode about NPCs. That's key: "inner monologue" and "NPCs" are manifestations of a single phenomenon. It seems like that crystalline thought is not clearly recognized, though.
As to the second sentence, it's dead wrong. People are exactly as they have always been, it's just that we must recognize that we were quite gravely mistaken in our unconscious assumptions as to how they were. Oh, and I believe we can win, but not if we stubbornly and arrogantly persist in that ignorance.
As to the first sentence, I've had precisely the same thought. But look again at this thread: did anyone write anything like I just have? I didn't say anything particularly brilliant, but I have thought about it a lot. So when I look at how far I got on the subject, maybe it really shouldn't be much of a surprise to me or anyone else.
Final note: If anyone has read this far and is thinking, "What an arrogant jerk! Who cares what this a-hole has to say?", well, stop and think for a moment before typing your biting and witty reply. It will just reinforce my case, won't it?
Ahh, get it off your chest anyway.