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Oh wow! I just recently stumbled on this in my personal meditation practice. I noticed that it's almost like there's a game loop that periodically hits the Cart

Oh wow! I just recently stumbled on this in my personal meditation practice. I noticed that it's almost like there's a game loop that periodically hits the CartesianSelfAssertion function. Or something. Everyone I've tried to talk to so far has just given blank stares, so it's kind to nice to run across someone with similar experience. Thanks for sharing.

Baeocystin 8y ago
I've always felt it more akin to garbage collection triggered by hitting a resource limit. (not being sarcastic)
- xelxebar 8y ago
  Would you mind elaborating a bit? This is something I've recently been trying to get more intimately familiar with and new metaphors are a really helpful rubric.
  - Baeocystin 8y ago
    With the caveat that I think stretching the metaphor too much further would exceed its utility, my point is only that awareness is not a smooth process, but occurs in fits and starts, slightly delayed from actual reality- it takes time for a brain to assemble meaning from its sensorium. Different parts of the brain can work semi-independently, while other parts are strictly single-use. And 'resetting' one's mental machinery after this kind of interference takes a measurable amount of time, much like the triggering of garbage collection. The Stroop Effect is a good demonstration of this kind of cognitive collision. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGpzftQf8oI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGpzftQf8oI https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroop_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroop_effect
justinpombrio 8y ago
> I noticed that it's almost like there's a game loop that periodically hits the CartesianSelfAssertion function. Or something. Could you go into a bit more detail? What does CartesianSelfAssertion feel like? How often is it called---on the order of 40ms per OP, or less frequently? Do you notice this only during/after meditation?
- xelxebar 8y ago
  > Could you go into a bit more detail? I'm not super lucid on it yet. Just recently encountered the experience and still getting a feel for what it is, but I'll try to share what I can. > What does CartesianSelfAssertion feel like? A bit disorienting, actually. Though that could just be a function of it's current novelty for me. It has aspects of feeling like waking up, or remembering something crucial, or turning a corner and finally finding your keys. To philosiphize a bit, I'm tempted to say it's like recurively having a realization, "Oh! This is the real deal... Oh wait, that was just a dream, THIS is the real deal... Wait, no, THIS is it..." which seems quite utterly silly. And completely independent of all that, I also feel like I'm spinning clockwise, or at least at the center of some spinning thought-sensation storm. And the angle of 30 degrees is in the mix as well for some reason. I have no idea what to make of either of these. Then there's also a part of me that wonders if all the above is just nonsense, because it just sounds so tripped out. lol > How often is it called---on the order of 40ms per OP, or less frequently? Honestly, timing the interval never really occurred to me until reading the OP's comment. In my limited experience, there's definitely some bit of flexibility. In extreme cases I've even been able to halt the process altogether for tens of seconds or so, but modulo doing weird stuff, my gut feeling is to say somewhere on the order of 100ms---40ms definitely doesn't clash with my experience. > Do you notice this only during/after meditation? It's been most blatant in some of my more recent meditation sessions. Durning the normal course of the day it's mostly way in the background, though I can also sort of "consciously access" that awareness space to some level. Though the mathematician in me feels like "conscious access of sub-awareness processes" should be a contradiction.
  - psandersen 8y ago
    Thanks for sharing, I can definitely relate. Good to know others have the same experience. I've also been trying to think how this can be used to design AGI, the goal being a machine that is able to recursively reason about it reasoning about itself etc... it would be logical if this was in discrete blocks that contained some representation of the previous state so as to avoid just going in circles. Maybe this is part of the reason why we so easily get distracted when observing ourselves observing ourselves - without some noise the mind would just endlessly go meta without any insight.
mbrock 8y ago
That’s a nice way to put it. Descartes wrote “I exist, that’s certain—but how often?”

Baeocystin 8y ago

I've always felt it more akin to garbage collection triggered by hitting a resource limit. (not being sarcastic)

xelxebar 8y ago
Would you mind elaborating a bit? This is something I've recently been trying to get more intimately familiar with and new metaphors are a really helpful rubric.
- Baeocystin 8y ago
  With the caveat that I think stretching the metaphor too much further would exceed its utility, my point is only that awareness is not a smooth process, but occurs in fits and starts, slightly delayed from actual reality- it takes time for a brain to assemble meaning from its sensorium. Different parts of the brain can work semi-independently, while other parts are strictly single-use. And 'resetting' one's mental machinery after this kind of interference takes a measurable amount of time, much like the triggering of garbage collection. The Stroop Effect is a good demonstration of this kind of cognitive collision. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGpzftQf8oI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGpzftQf8oI https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroop_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroop_effect

justinpombrio 8y ago

> I noticed that it's almost like there's a game loop that periodically hits the CartesianSelfAssertion function. Or something. Could you go into a bit more detail? What does CartesianSelfAssertion feel like? How often is it called---on the order of 40ms per OP, or less frequently? Do you notice this only during/after meditation?

xelxebar 8y ago
> Could you go into a bit more detail? I'm not super lucid on it yet. Just recently encountered the experience and still getting a feel for what it is, but I'll try to share what I can. > What does CartesianSelfAssertion feel like? A bit disorienting, actually. Though that could just be a function of it's current novelty for me. It has aspects of feeling like waking up, or remembering something crucial, or turning a corner and finally finding your keys. To philosiphize a bit, I'm tempted to say it's like recurively having a realization, "Oh! This is the real deal... Oh wait, that was just a dream, THIS is the real deal... Wait, no, THIS is it..." which seems quite utterly silly. And completely independent of all that, I also feel like I'm spinning clockwise, or at least at the center of some spinning thought-sensation storm. And the angle of 30 degrees is in the mix as well for some reason. I have no idea what to make of either of these. Then there's also a part of me that wonders if all the above is just nonsense, because it just sounds so tripped out. lol > How often is it called---on the order of 40ms per OP, or less frequently? Honestly, timing the interval never really occurred to me until reading the OP's comment. In my limited experience, there's definitely some bit of flexibility. In extreme cases I've even been able to halt the process altogether for tens of seconds or so, but modulo doing weird stuff, my gut feeling is to say somewhere on the order of 100ms---40ms definitely doesn't clash with my experience. > Do you notice this only during/after meditation? It's been most blatant in some of my more recent meditation sessions. Durning the normal course of the day it's mostly way in the background, though I can also sort of "consciously access" that awareness space to some level. Though the mathematician in me feels like "conscious access of sub-awareness processes" should be a contradiction.
- psandersen 8y ago
  Thanks for sharing, I can definitely relate. Good to know others have the same experience. I've also been trying to think how this can be used to design AGI, the goal being a machine that is able to recursively reason about it reasoning about itself etc... it would be logical if this was in discrete blocks that contained some representation of the previous state so as to avoid just going in circles. Maybe this is part of the reason why we so easily get distracted when observing ourselves observing ourselves - without some noise the mind would just endlessly go meta without any insight.

mbrock 8y ago

That’s a nice way to put it. Descartes wrote “I exist, that’s certain—but how often?”