[FRIAM] generics, object history, & essentialism (was Self-Consciousness, experience and metaphysics)

[glen]

The paper seems (to me) to suggest the opposite, that children may exhibit more non-obvious thought than adults. The discussions of "generics" and "object history" are more enlightening than the discussion of essentialism. A predictive processing oriented conjecture might be that cognitive inference is less "bounded" (as in the computer science or math concept of binding variables to concrete values aka "definit") in children, giving their cognitive structure more wiggle room, more ability to pretend and simulate stories for things like dolls or arbitrary objects. But as you either a) present them with definite articles like "the elephants" as opposed to just "elephants" or b) as you fill out their memories with their own concrete experiences as they develop, the constraints tighten up and any pretense or generative simulation has to percolate into finer-grained cracks bound by the realities they've experienced.

Under this conjecture, people more susceptible to bias, conspiracy thinking, or creative pursuits (like sci-fi/fantasy) may be more child-like than people who "stick to the facts", whether those facts are experience-based or assertions by trusted sources (cf Gellmann amnesia <https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Gell-Mann_Amnesia_effect>). It also may speak to one's ability/tendency to anthropomorphize non-human animals or artifacts like computers and cars. And tying back to the entheogens, perhaps part of the therapeutic effect of Ψ in end-of-life attitudes may be a "freeing up" of those learned bindings/constraints, allowing the sufferer to pretend/imagine more and more widely ... to become more child-like in their cognitive play.


On 7/24/24 11:29, Jochen Fromm wrote:
> Nice link. IMHO the most interesting things in culture happen at the transition between the primitive cultures studied in anthropology and the modern societies studied in sociology.
> 
> 
> One could argue that self-awareness also happens at such a point: it is the transition moment between the "here-and-now" world of the child and the detached "non-obvious" reality of grown-ups.
> 
> 
> -J.
> 
> 
> 
> -------- Original message --------
> From: Roger Critchlow <rec at elf.org>
> Date: 7/24/24 7:58 PM (GMT+01:00)
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Self-Consciousness, experience and metaphysics
> 
> Andrew Gelman's blog had a post this morning about his sister's research into the acquisition of reasoning.
> 
> https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2024/07/24/this-ones-important-looking-beyond-the-obvious-essentialism-and-abstraction-as-central-to-our-reasoning-and-beliefs/ <https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2024/07/24/this-ones-important-looking-beyond-the-obvious-essentialism-and-abstraction-as-central-to-our-reasoning-and-beliefs/>
> 
> Children begin organizing their experience with concepts that have no material existence very early in life.  Perhaps as soon as they start talking to each other about WTF is going on.  Not in the research, but I expect they talk to their pets about this, too.
> 
> -- rec --
> 
> On Wed, Jul 24, 2024 at 11:31 AM Jochen Fromm <jofr at cas-group.net <mailto:jofr at cas-group.net>> wrote:
> 
>     Nick,
> 
>     Looking for self-awareness in animals before language emerged feels to me like searching for culture in anthropology before civilizations appeared.
> 
> 
>     People in anthropology study human societies, cultures and their development, but sadly mostly in the time before it gets interesting (when religions, writing systems and civilizations emerged in ancient Egypt and ancient Mesopotamia). They examine for instance primitive hunter gatherer groups in Africa or ancient tribes in the Amazon region.
> 
> 
>     Looking for examples of particular experiences with animals that show signs of self-awareness (and not only respond to the world around them, but also respond to their own responding to the world around them) feels similar to me: it is like focusing on a fascinating phenomenon but at a place before it gets interesting.
> 
> 
>     If this comment bends the thread too much then please ignore it :-)
> 
> 
>     J.
> 
> 
> 
>     -------- Original message --------
>     From: Nicholas Thompson <thompnickson2 at gmail.com <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com>>
>     Date: 7/23/24 6:57 PM (GMT+01:00)
>     To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <friam at redfish.com <mailto:friam at redfish.com>>, Prof David West <profwest at fastmail.fm <mailto:profwest at fastmail.fm>>
>     Subject: [FRIAM] Self-Consciousness, experience and metaphysics
> 
>     David's last post so effectively blurs the lines between these two that I am going to give up, for the moment, on my attempt to keep them straight.
> 
>     Intuition tells me that Dave's post falls on one side of the line, and Glen's on the other,  but I have to go shopping.   I am still hoping to hear examples of particular experiences with animals, computers, spouses, etc., that confirm your sense that they are not  only responding to the world around them, but also responding to their own responding to the world around them.
> 
>     Back to this later when stocked up
> 
>     In the meantime, Please, you-all, don't dick with this thread, don't fork it and do, if you are responding to a particular comment, speak to that person, don't just fling your wisdom out into the ether.
> 
>     I never thought you guys would turn me into a thread-Nazi.
> 


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