I have a completely different thought experiment. This one for the affirmation model of psychotherapy. If all you do is affirm your client, how long do you think it will be before AI takes your job. Affirm only would be a cinch for AI. The complexity of actually truly helping a human being needs to be done by a human.
Character AI has a psychologist that does therapy with you as one of its most popular characters. Someone should try it and feed it some of the stories, questions, and doubts Eliza has written about and see how it responds. I wonder if the psychologist AI would just spit out meaningless affirmation or actually ask questions and explore like it does for other issues?
Yeah, the sad thing is psychotherapy is definitely in the crosshairs for serious AI development by people who think it's just a case of knowing all the stuff humans suffer from and what the answers are (or the "How do you feel about that?" nonsense).
Doctor, I'm struggling to form meaningful human relationships.
It strikes me as indicative of our impoverished sense of meaning in modern life that we would take such an idea seriously. How limited an entity must we think we are? The challenge of the Turing test should actually be reversed, ie can we demonstrate, each of us, that we are better than an AI. If people can't do that, it's not because the computers have become sophisticated, it's that society and culture fails to develop sophisticated humans.
Are there other major life decisions where our "community" uses impossible hypotheticals and fantasy thought experiments to make major life changing decisions? Do you do these exercises in pre-marital counseling (I didn't), before buying a house or a car, or before deciding to have a child? Even when you're just asking your stylist about a new haircut, she tells you if it will realistically work with your hair type and how much styling and work is required to get it to look right. She doesn't ask you to imagine living alone on an island and magic buttons.
There are so many curiosity buttons most of us wouldn't mind pushing. Would I like to be a man for a day? Sure, sounds fun. A different century, race, ethnicity, country, profession,, etc ? All would be interesting to explore.
"These thought experiments are packed with ifs and thens. But what if the ‘if’ and ‘then’ exist in different universes, one embodied and therefore limited but habitable, one a realm of sheer fantasy? If I could breathe in outer space, then I could live on the moon. But I can’t breathe in outer space. If I were a clownfish, then I could live at the bottom of the sea. But I’m not a clownfish."
Has the trickster philosopher who conjured queer theory out of thin air, Judith Butler, ever run this thought experiment, I wonder? She's the high priestess of sheer disembodied fantasy and the grand slayer of social constructs. What would happen if the thought experiment brought her into contact with embodied and limited reality?
It's a curious observation that academics like Butler don't seem to consider their own ideas are just social constructs, reinforced by power dynamics. It seems to be another example of the iron law of projection.
Excellent point. Given that applied gender identity ideology has so much in common with religion, Butler et al. must be tuned into received wisdom. She's just another mad charlatan along the lines of Joseph Smith.
"Within online trans communities, your answers to these casual and bizarrely detached questions are meant to spark epiphanies."
The question remains, *why* do so many people want to "spark epiphanies"? Why are they hell-bent on recruiting more to their weird cult in this evangelical way? What is their motivation?
And I know this will be controversial, but anyway. I think a lot of progressives gathering together on social media fall into one of the groups: A people with narcissistic tendencies and B their victims with various vulnerabilities. It’s not like group B is necessarily bunch of the good ones, the kind and pure; they mimic toxic behaviors with well intentions or by internalising intellectualised paradigm, generally act that way because they perceive it as virtuous or they pursue weird identities taking it all at face value. Tho narcissistic tendencies are the driving force - source of demands, fuel for rationalisation that becomes the doctrine. And I think some people conduct this pseudotherapeutic intervention, because they enjoy manipulation (which is what are therapeutic skills used without therapeutic purpose) and holding knowledge about individual not accessible to the individual yet.
What about the hand-maidens who aren't necessarily in the forums but support the cause as true believers?
I have detected, hypothesised the following overlapping flavors: people with trauma backgrounds, progressives who need the world to be progressing otherwise they fall into despair, dark mother types that hide a lust for power behind 'being kind and inclusive', and tribal NPC Leftists who have the beliefs required of them, and would sell their own children if it became the new way to 'own the right'.
Of course many people are influenced by the current hegemony of the times but it strikes me the true believers are another degree complicit.
I noticed that many true believers over time themselves become TQA+ identified. It’s induced in them that they need support they previously provided and they have to be surrounded by people sharing their beliefs to be safe. It cements their belonging to the group. (I acquired belief about being nonbinary asexual at 19 at the start of serious political activism, but it was like already present condition diagnosed in me by someone more immersed rather than something discovered through intense introspection - and I wasn’t fearful about these identities as result.)
I’d add to your typology LGB people who discovered/accepted their same sex attraction later in life. When they fall into rainbow world, they land on pamphlets about protecting trans kids and gender identity and all these new trends in lgbt advocacy. For them, homosexuality is the project, the most important thing about themselves in the moment, the transformation, the self-discovery journey - analogies with transness are strong and clear.
Interesting, yes group belonging a powerful force and that latter group makes sense - also maybe gender non-conforming people generally who may have had a difficult time earlier in their life?
Though of course there's many such people who say thank God they weren't brought up today and are powerful advocates for preventing harm against gay, non-conforming children.
From my point of view, that isn't a controversial point of view, but it is interesting that you have formulated it from the other side, so to speak. Do you mind me asking how you came to step back from the group you were part of?
Real end was my desistance. I developed trans identity too (tho I kept it to myself and close circle until I’m sure; no public announcements) and when I decided it isn’t it, I needed space for processing it without distractions and freedom of thoughts without fear of cancellation. So it was “no hard feelings” breakup.
Previously I had my particular brand of woke and sometimes drama, because I’m too argumentative, and fear that leftbook will destroy my life over something stupig.
Yes, that is a useful comment. I just heard Sasha Ayad of Genspect say something that made a lot of sense to me, (paraphrasing) that the phenomenon of transgender medicine is soooo bizarre and counterintuitive to just about everyone when they hear of it, that we tend to think there has to be a REALLY good reason behind it, and maybe we don't understand yet, but the clever scientists must know what they're doing. I certainly had a bit of that going on.
I think, to be open-minded, we have to allow ourselves to be swayed - at least temporarily - by arguments that seem utterly mad, because that's how a lot of both true and false arguments look when they're outside our understanding (what? particles can be in two places at once? Noooo!), so there were times when trans activists persuaded me of something for a while, until I researched it more.
Open minds is to hope these people come to recognize and learn to cope with their delusion. There is no “trans science”, there is only psychotherapeutic help for delusionary states.
Thank you! Your insight is really helpful. If I may ask a follow-up question, was it that you felt that you had some special knowledge that was being kept from people for whatever reason?
Not really? I was more like the therapist friend - not understanding where it’s going, but facilitating conversations in quasi-therapeutic way to help, contribute something idk meaningful yet socially accepted, be liked, not ghost people sharing something meaningful for them. I’m autistic and tbh despite my best attempts I can’t fully grasp social interactions, so I channeled therapy culture without realising at the time it’s bad model of friendship or of interactions online. To realize that I needed to remove myself from Facebook, from discord and to focus on 1:1 friendships and my normie real life.
Again, thank you. It can be very easy to put a particular gloss on all interactions about topics one doesn't agree with, and to forget that some people are trying their best to help, no matter how mistaken it seems. Seeing things through other eyes is a fascinating experience.
You know, it was a bit of overtone window kinda thing. I thought if I keep my distance from the people clearly aggressive, unreasonable and insane, then the rest of progressives are safe, reasonable and normal. A good model of behavior. I needed distance from all progressives (well, still have progressive friends) to see downsides and different approaches to friendship/social communication.
Maybe because thanks to smartphones, their lives feel meaningless. Instead of role models they have influencers and corporations hell-bent on manipulating them. It's no wonder they seek out "identities" that will make them more popular, or at least promise to.
From that Reddit convo: >>Grab a coin and pick a side for agab, and a side for your identity. Think of it as a "test" and toss it.<<
What?! That ALREADY requires you to make a decision - will you decide they're the same on both sides of the coin (in which case you've decided you're 'cis') or the opposite ('trans')? And the fact you're contemplating it suggests they're going to be opposite! I mean, if someone said you're deciding on what to put on your toast, are you going to grab a coin and think "marmalade" for heads and tails?
>>While it is mid air you'll definitely hope for it to land on a specific face.<<
Fried egg. Sunny side down. No, Marmite! Sheesh.
>>Also in my case I didn't look how it landed since I didn't want a coin to make me feel bad.<<
Yikes - this is the level of oversensitivity of some of these people. Looking at the way a coin landed might send them into a panic attack ... or a moment of feeling bad anyway, which is almost the same thing.
Thought experiments don’t require that they be be possible; they do require plausibility and logic.
“If I could will myself to be a porpoise” has no plausible or logical context. “If I could observe the center of the sun” while impossible, is a plausible observation point.
Better question would be “If you could press a button and understand all your delusions” would you do so?
I have a completely different thought experiment. This one for the affirmation model of psychotherapy. If all you do is affirm your client, how long do you think it will be before AI takes your job. Affirm only would be a cinch for AI. The complexity of actually truly helping a human being needs to be done by a human.
Character AI has a psychologist that does therapy with you as one of its most popular characters. Someone should try it and feed it some of the stories, questions, and doubts Eliza has written about and see how it responds. I wonder if the psychologist AI would just spit out meaningless affirmation or actually ask questions and explore like it does for other issues?
Yeah, the sad thing is psychotherapy is definitely in the crosshairs for serious AI development by people who think it's just a case of knowing all the stuff humans suffer from and what the answers are (or the "How do you feel about that?" nonsense).
Doctor, I'm struggling to form meaningful human relationships.
- Ah, no problem. There's an app for that.
It strikes me as indicative of our impoverished sense of meaning in modern life that we would take such an idea seriously. How limited an entity must we think we are? The challenge of the Turing test should actually be reversed, ie can we demonstrate, each of us, that we are better than an AI. If people can't do that, it's not because the computers have become sophisticated, it's that society and culture fails to develop sophisticated humans.
Are there other major life decisions where our "community" uses impossible hypotheticals and fantasy thought experiments to make major life changing decisions? Do you do these exercises in pre-marital counseling (I didn't), before buying a house or a car, or before deciding to have a child? Even when you're just asking your stylist about a new haircut, she tells you if it will realistically work with your hair type and how much styling and work is required to get it to look right. She doesn't ask you to imagine living alone on an island and magic buttons.
There are so many curiosity buttons most of us wouldn't mind pushing. Would I like to be a man for a day? Sure, sounds fun. A different century, race, ethnicity, country, profession,, etc ? All would be interesting to explore.
I'd like to be my cat for a day and for my cat to be me. He'd have to promise to swap back at the end of the day, though.
Cats' promises, pah! Don't risk it mate!
"These thought experiments are packed with ifs and thens. But what if the ‘if’ and ‘then’ exist in different universes, one embodied and therefore limited but habitable, one a realm of sheer fantasy? If I could breathe in outer space, then I could live on the moon. But I can’t breathe in outer space. If I were a clownfish, then I could live at the bottom of the sea. But I’m not a clownfish."
Has the trickster philosopher who conjured queer theory out of thin air, Judith Butler, ever run this thought experiment, I wonder? She's the high priestess of sheer disembodied fantasy and the grand slayer of social constructs. What would happen if the thought experiment brought her into contact with embodied and limited reality?
It's a curious observation that academics like Butler don't seem to consider their own ideas are just social constructs, reinforced by power dynamics. It seems to be another example of the iron law of projection.
Excellent point. Given that applied gender identity ideology has so much in common with religion, Butler et al. must be tuned into received wisdom. She's just another mad charlatan along the lines of Joseph Smith.
"Within online trans communities, your answers to these casual and bizarrely detached questions are meant to spark epiphanies."
The question remains, *why* do so many people want to "spark epiphanies"? Why are they hell-bent on recruiting more to their weird cult in this evangelical way? What is their motivation?
And I know this will be controversial, but anyway. I think a lot of progressives gathering together on social media fall into one of the groups: A people with narcissistic tendencies and B their victims with various vulnerabilities. It’s not like group B is necessarily bunch of the good ones, the kind and pure; they mimic toxic behaviors with well intentions or by internalising intellectualised paradigm, generally act that way because they perceive it as virtuous or they pursue weird identities taking it all at face value. Tho narcissistic tendencies are the driving force - source of demands, fuel for rationalisation that becomes the doctrine. And I think some people conduct this pseudotherapeutic intervention, because they enjoy manipulation (which is what are therapeutic skills used without therapeutic purpose) and holding knowledge about individual not accessible to the individual yet.
What about the hand-maidens who aren't necessarily in the forums but support the cause as true believers?
I have detected, hypothesised the following overlapping flavors: people with trauma backgrounds, progressives who need the world to be progressing otherwise they fall into despair, dark mother types that hide a lust for power behind 'being kind and inclusive', and tribal NPC Leftists who have the beliefs required of them, and would sell their own children if it became the new way to 'own the right'.
Of course many people are influenced by the current hegemony of the times but it strikes me the true believers are another degree complicit.
I noticed that many true believers over time themselves become TQA+ identified. It’s induced in them that they need support they previously provided and they have to be surrounded by people sharing their beliefs to be safe. It cements their belonging to the group. (I acquired belief about being nonbinary asexual at 19 at the start of serious political activism, but it was like already present condition diagnosed in me by someone more immersed rather than something discovered through intense introspection - and I wasn’t fearful about these identities as result.)
I’d add to your typology LGB people who discovered/accepted their same sex attraction later in life. When they fall into rainbow world, they land on pamphlets about protecting trans kids and gender identity and all these new trends in lgbt advocacy. For them, homosexuality is the project, the most important thing about themselves in the moment, the transformation, the self-discovery journey - analogies with transness are strong and clear.
Interesting, yes group belonging a powerful force and that latter group makes sense - also maybe gender non-conforming people generally who may have had a difficult time earlier in their life?
Though of course there's many such people who say thank God they weren't brought up today and are powerful advocates for preventing harm against gay, non-conforming children.
From my point of view, that isn't a controversial point of view, but it is interesting that you have formulated it from the other side, so to speak. Do you mind me asking how you came to step back from the group you were part of?
Real end was my desistance. I developed trans identity too (tho I kept it to myself and close circle until I’m sure; no public announcements) and when I decided it isn’t it, I needed space for processing it without distractions and freedom of thoughts without fear of cancellation. So it was “no hard feelings” breakup.
Previously I had my particular brand of woke and sometimes drama, because I’m too argumentative, and fear that leftbook will destroy my life over something stupig.
I'm pleased your desistance was relatively painless - some of the stories are really unpleasant.
I thought gender identity is as legit as homosexuality, was scrutinised at the same level and I’m helping
Yes, that is a useful comment. I just heard Sasha Ayad of Genspect say something that made a lot of sense to me, (paraphrasing) that the phenomenon of transgender medicine is soooo bizarre and counterintuitive to just about everyone when they hear of it, that we tend to think there has to be a REALLY good reason behind it, and maybe we don't understand yet, but the clever scientists must know what they're doing. I certainly had a bit of that going on.
I think, to be open-minded, we have to allow ourselves to be swayed - at least temporarily - by arguments that seem utterly mad, because that's how a lot of both true and false arguments look when they're outside our understanding (what? particles can be in two places at once? Noooo!), so there were times when trans activists persuaded me of something for a while, until I researched it more.
Open minds is to hope these people come to recognize and learn to cope with their delusion. There is no “trans science”, there is only psychotherapeutic help for delusionary states.
That's a really good point.
Thank you! Your insight is really helpful. If I may ask a follow-up question, was it that you felt that you had some special knowledge that was being kept from people for whatever reason?
Not really? I was more like the therapist friend - not understanding where it’s going, but facilitating conversations in quasi-therapeutic way to help, contribute something idk meaningful yet socially accepted, be liked, not ghost people sharing something meaningful for them. I’m autistic and tbh despite my best attempts I can’t fully grasp social interactions, so I channeled therapy culture without realising at the time it’s bad model of friendship or of interactions online. To realize that I needed to remove myself from Facebook, from discord and to focus on 1:1 friendships and my normie real life.
Again, thank you. It can be very easy to put a particular gloss on all interactions about topics one doesn't agree with, and to forget that some people are trying their best to help, no matter how mistaken it seems. Seeing things through other eyes is a fascinating experience.
You know, it was a bit of overtone window kinda thing. I thought if I keep my distance from the people clearly aggressive, unreasonable and insane, then the rest of progressives are safe, reasonable and normal. A good model of behavior. I needed distance from all progressives (well, still have progressive friends) to see downsides and different approaches to friendship/social communication.
Maybe because thanks to smartphones, their lives feel meaningless. Instead of role models they have influencers and corporations hell-bent on manipulating them. It's no wonder they seek out "identities" that will make them more popular, or at least promise to.
That's a good point that I tend to underestimate.
From that Reddit convo: >>Grab a coin and pick a side for agab, and a side for your identity. Think of it as a "test" and toss it.<<
What?! That ALREADY requires you to make a decision - will you decide they're the same on both sides of the coin (in which case you've decided you're 'cis') or the opposite ('trans')? And the fact you're contemplating it suggests they're going to be opposite! I mean, if someone said you're deciding on what to put on your toast, are you going to grab a coin and think "marmalade" for heads and tails?
>>While it is mid air you'll definitely hope for it to land on a specific face.<<
Fried egg. Sunny side down. No, Marmite! Sheesh.
>>Also in my case I didn't look how it landed since I didn't want a coin to make me feel bad.<<
Yikes - this is the level of oversensitivity of some of these people. Looking at the way a coin landed might send them into a panic attack ... or a moment of feeling bad anyway, which is almost the same thing.
Who wouldn't want hit that button? I think many people have some grass is greener idea about being the opposite sex.
Spend a fortune on impossibly pointy shoes?
Hell no. :)
Thought experiments don’t require that they be be possible; they do require plausibility and logic.
“If I could will myself to be a porpoise” has no plausible or logical context. “If I could observe the center of the sun” while impossible, is a plausible observation point.
Better question would be “If you could press a button and understand all your delusions” would you do so?
This is one of your best pieces yet