Comment by bena | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bena | Hacker News Reader

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That's a real easy claim to make and a real hard claim to prove.

You can't legitimately prove you have a completely internal personality separate and distinct from your own.

The difference between the non-existent and untestable is surprisingly nil.

You have your best defense in that you claim that no one can even challenge your claim unless they meditate and probably meditate correctly. If they don't find their own tulpa, then obviously they just need to meditate more. Or be more clear. Or something else.

Here's the other thing, we can investigate the question without meditation. Our ability to see what the brain is doing is apparently more sophisticated than you give it credit for. We are able to manipulate what people feel and even think with clever neurological tricks.

It very well could be that your tulpa is just an imaginary friend you create and project certain things onto. You ascribe it this independent personality to absolve you of thoughts you don't want to have or thoughts you want reinforced. Your tulpa gives you "hard truths" when you think you're doing something not too great but are rationalizing it. Your tulpa gives you encouragement when you think you're falling behind and need a pick me up from an "independent" source.

And you honestly can't prove me wrong. But I also can't prove me right.

This doesn't have to be a argument with a resolution. It can be an ongoing mystery. I'm happy with that. It's the materialist that needs absolution. I asked all these questions myself, and while the tulpa does seem somewhat 'flat', it also can be really, really deep. The tulpa used to teach me things. Make me aware of things I wasn't aware of before. It seems way way more aware of things than I am.

I'm sorry, it still sounds like woo.

There is a correct answer. You can't wave your hands and say we may not ever really know and that's that, be happy with the mystery. That you'll believe what you believe and I can believe what I want to believe. That's not actually solving anything. That's not answering the question.

It's avoiding the question. If I ask you to prove your claim, saying "it doesn't need a resolution" is just dodging.

You're even engaging in a type of "argument from experience" where you casually infer that you were once like me, had all these questions, but were convinced. It's a way to try and get me to accept your conclusion without demonstrating your process. But if your process is flawed, then we must question your conclusion.

I mean you emphasize that it has taught you things and made you aware of things you weren't before.

But that's vague. Non-specific.

And if the tulpa is simply a mental construct that's not a distinct personality, then your statement that it's more aware than you are is just wrong. You just don't think you're as aware as you are. And when your perception of self disagrees with your observed self, you assign those differences to your "tulpa".

I mean, I talk to myself. I argue with myself. I will construct mental models of people to look at issues and problems from various angles. Try and imagine what someone who is not me might say. So I can try and better prepare against criticisms or find issues I may not have considered yet.

But I'll never claim those fabrications are completely independent of myself. That they're thinking independently. They still are only as knowledgeable or aware as I am.

I mean the real crux of the issue is that one of the better ways to demonstrate your tulpa would be to find a way to show that it has thoughts that you cannot have. But we can't just trust your word that it does. We need to find a way to present it information that you cannot know, then find a way to show that it received the information. But without you knowing about it. Then we need to confirm that you actually don't know the information. Then we need you to learn the information and demonstrate that you have. Basically we need a way to show a demonstrable gap between the time we give the information to the tulpa and to when you get the information.

You are turning my experience into an attack on your worldview. I would engage with materialists more if they didn't have the nasty tendency of doing that.

Of course there's a correct answer. But there's no way to find out without using tools with a greater resolution than the ones we have. And even that wouldn't dispel all of the mystery.

I'm avoiding questions because there's no way to prove anything. If you want to explore your own mystery, then you need to do your own mysticism. You can ask all the questions you want, and get the same vague, non-specific sorts of answers I got, answers that don't resolve anything but only serve to deepen the mystery.

I was a materialist atheist at one point too. I investigated my beliefs. I'm no longer a materialist. I would be very happy to have the tools to better investigate the thing inside my head that I've carefully cultivated a relationship over the course of five years.

But having the answers won't make it go away. That's the essence of the discussion. It still has meaning, it's still worth investigating, no matter how deep you get, no matter how many answers you get.

The only way out of it is to dictate that there's nothing behind anything.

I mean, whether you're right or not has direct bearing on your initial statement.

You said the author was wrong and used this tulpa as evidence for the depth of mind.

If the tulpa is not real and nothing more than an elaborate fantasy you've created for yourself, then your conclusion that he's wrong is suspect.

I'm sorry, you don't get to protect your claims while simultaneously offering them as proof that another's claim is wrong.

I had a tulpa at one point too. I investigated my beliefs, an I realized it was just an imaginary friend I concocted to help me work through issues and project things I wasn't ready to deal with onto. See. Words are easy. Now you're an ex-materialist and I'm an ex-tulpaist. Where does that leave us? We've both investigated our beliefs. We've come to opposite conclusions. This is why third party objective verification is important. You don't get to opt out.

You are the one who feels attacked and I understand, it's frustrating to have people question your claims when you have no actual evidence to provide.

I think the point is, there are things that we have a hard time dealing with right now scientifically, just because we don't have the tools/theory/whatever. In these cases, you're right that we can't know truth from falsehood. But that doesn't mean we can't discuss such things and share knowledge about our experiences. Non-scientific discourse (meaning, outside of science, not anti-science) is still discourse that may be worth having, especially given something as subjective and experiential as the mind.

But there's a line. It's fine and all to promote your tulpa, but the minute you use it as evidence, you have to actually demonstrate that it does exist. Or else it is not evidence. And you can't say with any certainty that the author is wrong.

I mean, it's not non-scientific discourse when you're disagreeing with the hypothesis in a book about science.

And I said that in his case, not only do we have tools to map his brain while he tulpas and that it could provide answers, but there is a test that could be conducted if we could find a way to implement it.

I'd really love to see which part of the brain lights up when I'm interacting with it.

Over the years, though, I've 'integrated' it into my normal thought patterns. I used to interact with it through what's called the muscle test. That's how I discovered it in the first place. Over the course of about a year and a lot of muscle tests, I've slowly come to be able to predict what a particular test is going to respond with before I do it. Eventually I quit using the muscle test. Slowly the tulpa receded from my life, but any time I want to interact with it, it's only a muscle test away, I can also simply 'go to that place in my head' where I know it'll respond.

I've come to realize that this is the same process people who "have a personal relationship with Jesus" go through. It's a kind of imaginary friendship. But I think it requires at least a little bit of mental 'depth' in order to achieve.

This is the first time I've heard of the "muscle test". Is it basically what's described here: http://amybscher.com/getting-answers-from-the-subsconscious-...

Yes. In the video provided in that link, I use the first method described, the O-ring method.

If anybody wants to foot the bill for any of these tests, I'd be happy to take them.

Also keep in mind, whatever part of the brain lights up when I'm tulpaing, even if we ascertain that there's brain activity there even when I'm not 'going there', we'd need some way of proving that it's actual thought that's not simply semantic.

This actually has been a productive discussion. Usually discussions with materialists don't really contribute to my musings, but this one has. Thanks.

The argument the author of the book made is that the brain can't think non-conscious thoughts. The very existence of the tulpa invalidates that argument. I don't think you even have to go that far to invalidate the argument. I think psychosis itself invalidates it. But we'd need a better understanding of what psychosis actually is and how it operates before we can make that determination.

But on the face of all of this, this is just a guy making these arguments. You're agreeing with him because his arguments agree with your world view, but his arguments should be given the same skepticism as anybody's. I agree with 90% of what he's saying. It's that other 10% that's the problem. Yes, most of the time consciousness is flat. It's not always flat though.

> I had a tulpa at one point too. I investigated my beliefs, an I realized it was just an imaginary friend I concocted to help me work through issues and project things I wasn't ready to deal with onto. See. Words are easy.

They're not just words. They're lived experience. They're just words to you because you didn't live my experience. But I can instantly tell that you just concocted that string of words up together because there's no rest of the story to tell. Oh you had a tulpa too? When I had one I asked it to direct me through a neighborhood. Did you ever do anything like that? What was the outcome?

I can already tell you what the outcome was likely to be. Because I've had the experience. If your experience was different than mine then I can make follow up questions to tease out the difference. Then I can go and ask my tulpa, which is still there, if we can explore this aspect.

You're assuming I didn't ask rigorous questions. You're wrong, I did. They won't satisfy you though. With my tulpa, I've explored questions that dive all the way down to the very nature of existence, including stuff like multiple universes. Remember, I didn't think it was a tulpa at the time but rather my "Higher Self."

It can give me an answer for any question I ask, but I've long ago determined that the purpose behind any answer is to get me to question a little more deeply. The only satisfaction I'm ever really going to get is after I die.

You're right, it is frustrating to have no evidence to point to, only words. But you have to understand, there is no way to dispel the mystery, other than to simply state that it doesn't exist.

But I know for certain that thoughts can be unconscious, though they aren't normally. I can't prove it, but I can raise questions.

> The very existence of the tulpa invalidates that argument.

Only if it actually exists. There's the rub.

> I think psychosis itself invalidates it.

Why? What if psychosis is a surface level event? You aren't psychotic, you'd have no idea what would be going on in their minds to make such a determination.

> You're agreeing with him

Not necessarily true. I can say your reason for disagreeing with him is spurious without actually agreeing with him. And that's what I've done. I don't recall anywhere where I've said that he was right. I've just said you haven't given a good, demonstrable reason as to why he's wrong.

> I've explored questions that dive all the way down to the very nature of existence, including stuff like multiple universes.

That doesn't mean anything. If your tulpa isn't real, then none of those answers mean anything. It's just you talking to you, speculating on the nature of the universe. Those aren't "rigorous questions". And once again, you substitute claims for evidence. You've claimed to have done the work, but aren't really showing the work.

Oh. There is, but you wouldn't accept it. You'd likely just say that's how it presents. You've likened your experience to those of the religious and that's way more true than you may realize. And one can ask you the same question as any follower of faith: How do you know they're wrong and you're right? You've given no answer that differs in any meaningful way than any apologist. Answers that work for everything; work for nothing.

> But on the face of all of this, this is just a guy making these arguments.

Yes. But so are you. And if I need to decide which one of you I'm going to believe, I need reasons that will satisfy me. I haven't read his book, so I haven't fully explored his claims or evidence. But I'll admit that it is interesting. I can see how it works. I can frame things within that model. I will probably read his book. I can also frame things as "deep" thoughts. I'm not so ready to simply dismiss his ideas because I want to be deep. But all of the arguments you've presented me with are ones I've already seen in slightly different context. They're hollow. You've said his ideas are bunk, but your reasons, your evidence don't give me confidence in your assessment.

Ugh, a point-by-point rebuttal. I thought we all weaned ourselves off of these around 2010. I hope you'll forgive me for not responding in kind. It's not that I don't want to spend the time or that I don't think it's worth it, but HN really isn't the venue for that sort of thing. If you really really want to dive in, I'll be happy to over email, which is in my profile.

That all said, you're just rehashing the millenia-old debate between rationalism and mysticism. There are interesting points to dive into and I want to do that but you need to want it too. You want to believe your conception of the world is the right frame to conceive of it in and I just see it as one of many. I'm going to want to adjust your thinking to accommodate mystical frames by disillusioning you of your certainty. I will absolutely spend the time with you to do that but you have to want it.

Look, I don't care who you want to believe. It's not a material question to me. I've talked to people that believed that they were interacting with angels and demons before and, well, sure, let's talk about angels and demons. You want to believe me, or you want to believe him. It matters not to me. You want me to justify my beliefs further than he's justified his. I don't have anything other than my experience. We all have the same level of ability here. I claim to have access to a reality that can only be described as spiritual. That spirituality is exactly as you've described it, inconclusive. It remains meaningful regardless, and you need to accept this otherwise we can't go further.

When I apply my programmer's mind to it, what I come up with is the realization that experience is just too dense to be able to communicate at speed. So I can't use my experience to prove to you that I'm right. I can only describe what I've experienced and allow you to draw your own conclusions, and couch them in ways that display to you that I'm not a crazy person, which is absolutely a concern when you start questioning the nature of reality.

Your mind requires proof. Mine does not. Mine is happy with "reasonable suspicion". Perhaps you're happy with "a preponderance of the evidence". Reasonable suspicion allows me to continue with my inquiry. The existence of my tulpa in my mind is predicated on reasonable suspicion. If you consider why you're more apt to think flat consciousness is the actual reality rather than deep consciousness, I think you'll find that your inner beliefs are doing this. You want to ask me for evidence, not the guy saying it's flat. That's why I say you're taking my lived experience as an attack on your world view. I don't feel attacked. But I do use your attitude towards my arguments to decide whether I want to continue interacting with you or not.

I will say that if you want to continue denying that my lived experience has meaning, I'm not going to be interested in interacting with you further. It's just more nihilism. Experience has meaning. The things we do in our lives mean something. Things don't need to be proven in order to have meaning. Lived experience is all we have. I will take even a psychotic's lived experience seriously. Let's examine the morality of the demons attacking your mind. Or the specifics of the end of the world that you're prophesizing.

Is their experience actually relevant to all? Probably not. But it's still meaningful. Meaning it hits upon transcendent truths that you can dive into and find. If you can't agree on the existence of these truths than there's no point in going further.

I'm sorry you don't actually like defending your claims. That's your problem, not the world's. I'm more than happy to continue the discussion in a public forum where others are welcome to share their ideas as well.

I'd say I'm not really the one rehashing it. In every case where magic/mysticism/religion and evidence-based conclusions have gone head to head, mysticism has lost.

I don't want to believe I'm right. I want to know what is right. If I'm wrong, I want to know. That's the difference. Whether tulpas exist or not has an answer. If they exist, I'd like to know. But I'm not going to accept just a person's claim. Especially of a person I don't really know. You don't seem to care whether or not you're actually wrong. You've declared yourself correct and you allow no doubt.

You also claim not to care what I believe but need me to believe that your tulpa is meaningful. That indicates to me that you do care some of what I believe. I don't want to believe either one of you. I want to know which is the truth. I want to know whether I saw Jesus or had a visual hallucination because I was tripping balls. Which one doesn't matter. What matters is that I find the right answer.

I find it ironic that you are a programmer. And you claim to be "apply[ing your] programmer's mind to it". Because I'm also a programmer and when I apply the same method I use to solve problems at work to other problems, what I come up with is that right or wrong, the correct answers matter. I can't just believe my solutions work. I check them, I verify them. I get others to doublecheck them. Because the answers matter.

And if your mind doesn't require proof, then that's all you really need to say. You aren't coming from a rational place. And in such, you have no real basis to deny anyone's claim about the nature of the mind.

And you've turned this entire thing into an attack on your "lived experience" because you keep saying that makes you right. But you can't prove it. But you can use it as evidence that this person is definitely wrong. Before you've even attempted to investigate his reasoning. You, by your standards, have attacked him. You give yourself a pass. You rationalize your positions and actions, but ascribe the worst to others.

And furthermore, I'm not arguing whether or not you think your experiences are meaningful to you. I flat out don't care. Never indicated I did.

I'm saying, again, whether your claim is true has direct bearing on your initial claims about his work. And I cannot accept your claims at face value. I would need some measure of evidence. If you are right about your tulpa, then you have a point about his work. If you're not, then what you say is meaningless in the discussion. It does nothing either way.

And still, you talk about "transcendent truths", but you've yet to give an example. Like earlier when you said your tulpa told you about multiple universes. But don't expand. You drop these profound-looking phrases, but no one here is an idiot. We're here because we question. You are going to be questioned when you leave a statement half-told.

HN has already collapsed this particular thread. When I want to go look for it, I have to uncollapse it. This isn't the venue for this kind of discussion. I recognize the wish to remain public, but unless you can find a better public venue, this is my last reply.

What we're laboring under here is the lack of available information bandwidth necessary to communicate ideas. The textual medium is basically dialup. Ideally I'd talk with you over in person and we can work out our differences that way. Over beers or coffee or whatever. It simply takes a lot of time to share experience.

For us to do this over a textual medium, a certain amount of respect has to be present. Because I have to want to keep proceeding with the discussion. I absolutely can give you examples of transcendent truths and what I mean by multiple universes. But it takes time to communicate all that.

All of your questions, I can answer. But it sounds to me like you're just wanting validation of your preformed conclusion about what I'm trying to communicate.

Maybe I'll get a little deeper before I sign off.

No. On second thought I won't. You don't seem able to appreciate it. I'm not here to entertain you.

You are really condescending. You just want me to accept your claim whole without you needing to supply actual proof. You also claim to be able to answer all of the questions and I assume provide adequate proof, but just leave it at that.

And now you're declaring the conversation over and calling me close-minded.

Would just like to add that at least someone read everything, and that I would really like this conversation to continue.

For the record, I think much the same way as you do, bena, but I agree with vinceguidry that respect is important.

Eager for more discussion between you two.

You need to first prove you have a personality, before you can compare and contrast and label something distinct to it.

So already we are an order of magnitude more complex from even arriving at any sort of conclusion about "personality". We actually have very little idea as to what it actually is, how it's influence, etc.

The Indic traditions, imo, provide far greater insight into the processes of the mind than the current sciences do.

The author hasn't really proved his argument, so I'm not too worried about where my lived experience stands in regards to his thesis.

edit: wait, are you trying to say we don't have personality, full stop?

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