Ok. Let’s take this in baby steps.
You wrote: “Intimacy has to do with …knowing about the subjective experience of another person. I asked: “But what is it to know the subjective experience of another ?” Best to start there. I made the mistake of presupposing your answer to that question, and may have got us off the track. If to be intimate with somebody I have to share their subjective experience, and subjective experiences is private, how exactly do I do that? I dunno. My pain is pretty public right now. I look like I am sucking on a tennis ball. Damned dentist has gone on a weekend skiing bender and left his phone off the hook. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Russ Abbott Sent: Saturday, February 20, 2016 10:54 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy Hi Nick, Thanks for the reply -- and sorry about the tooth. I wasn't intending to re-open the question of subjective experience in general -- and certainly not about whether we can be sure about understanding someone else's. It just struck me that intimacy as I understand that term depends on an assumption of subjective experience, and I wondered whether that ruled out intimacy in your view. Now that I read what you've written, I'm not even sure that I understood your position on subjective experience. I hope that the (subjective experience of) pain from the tooth recedes. -- Russ On Sat, Feb 20, 2016 at 8:11 PM Nick Thompson <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Hi, Russ, You wrote: Intimacy is … not about just about knowing something about someone that isn't generally known, e.g., where the person went to elementary school or her mother's maiden. Intimacy has to do with the kinds of things that are known, in particular with knowing about the subjective experience of another person. At least that's how I would describe it -- and that's why I raised the question. Oh, I don’t have a lot of trouble agreeing with the first part of this statement. Some unknowns are inherently more intimate than others. But what is it to know the subjective experience of another ? You ask me about my experience, and I tell you? Do you have to trust my account? Well, if you ask me, I assert that I, for one, DON’T. One answer to this quandary is to simply assert that Russ Abbot has subjective experience and Nick Thompson does not! Perhaps ,N.T. is the victim of a form of autism that deprives him of that self-conscious that for you defines the human condition. And there’s an end to it, eh? At this point, one of my most dedicated opponents in this discussion, a former graduate student, always say, “So it’s OK to kill you eat you, right?” I am going to invoke the academic Scoundrel’s Defense here, and attach a link to another paper <http://www.clarku.edu/faculty/nthompson/1-websitestuff/Texts/1990-1994/The_many_perils_of_ejective_anthropomorphism.pdf> . “Ejective anthropomorphism” is the idea that we come to know animal mental states by seeing an isomorphism between some feature of an animals behavior and some behavior of our own and then, since we know infallibly the internal causes of our behavior, inferring the internal causes of the animal’s. The whole argument hangs, of course, on the notion that we know why we do things by some special direct knowledge… “privileged access”. The article is a bit of a slog, but if skim judiciously until you get to the section on “privileged access”, 67, then you might have enough energy to read the argument against that notion and be convinced. Russ, I think in our correspondence before you have perhaps taken the position that it simply is the case that each of us has a private consciousness. That is a position taken by another FRIAMMER and I find it, oddly, the most winning argument. “I choose to start here!” Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Russ Abbott Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 10:33 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy Intimacy is not necessarily about sex, but it is also not about just about knowing something about someone that isn't generally known, e.g., where the person went to elementary school or her mother's maiden name. It's more than just being able to answer the sorts of questions web sites ask as a way to establish one's identity. Intimacy has to do with the kinds of things that are known, in particular with knowing about the subjective experience of another person. At least that's how I would describe it -- and that's why I raised the question. On Fri, Feb 19, 2016 at 3:39 PM Nick Thompson <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Dear John and Russ, Well, you question is an example of itself. Who is best qualified to explain the basis of Nick's denial of subjectivity? Is this a question about etiology: I.e., the causal history of Nick's coming to deny subjectivity? Or is it a question of what rational arguments Nick might make for his denial of subjectivity. Note that there is nothing particularly private about either of those forms of the question. FRIAM could get to work on answering them and Nick could stand aside and wonder at the quality and perspicacity of your answers. My own most recent and condensed and approachable attempt to answer both versions of the question can be found in the manuscript that is attached. I can’t find cc of the published vsn at the moment. I will think about the intimacy issue. I think it’s about having some others who know things about you that are not generally known. I would argue that when you get into bed with somebody naked, it’s a metaphor. But then, I am old. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ -----Original Message----- From: Friam [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of John Kennison Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 2:30 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy One thing I wonder about (or perhaps have forgotten) in this discussion and Nick's denial is what the denial is based on. Is the absence of subjectivity supposed to be a scientific fact? If so, we should be discussing the experimental foundations of this fact. I have read of some experiments which seem to indicate that subjectiviity is not exactly what we (or what I) used to think it is --but which do not seem to disprove subjectivity. --John ________________________________________ From: Friam [[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] on behalf of Russ Abbott [[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 3:27 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy We've had discussions on and off about subjectivity -- with me getting frustrated at Nick's denial thereof (if I understood him correctly). It occurred to me recently that intimacy is defined -- as I understand it -- in terms of subjectivity, i.e., the sharing of one's (most private) subjective experiences with another. I'm wondering what Nick thinks about this and whether anyone else has something to say about it. In particular, if there is no such thing as subjective experience, does that imply in your view that the same goes for intimacy? ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe <http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ From: Friam [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of Russ Abbott Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 10:33 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy Intimacy is not necessarily about sex, but it is also not about just about knowing something about someone that isn't generally known, e.g., where the person went to elementary school or her mother's maiden name. It's more than just being able to answer the sorts of questions web sites ask as a way to establish one's identity. Intimacy has to do with the kinds of things that are known, in particular with knowing about the subjective experience of another person. At least that's how I would describe it -- and that's why I raised the question. On Fri, Feb 19, 2016 at 3:39 PM Nick Thompson <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > wrote: Dear John and Russ, Well, you question is an example of it self. Who is best qualified to explain the basis of Nick's denial of subjectivity? Is this a question about aetiology: I.e., the causal history of Nick's coming to deny subjectivity? Or is it a question of what rational arguments Nick might make for his denial of subjectivity. Note that there is nothing particularly private about either of those forms of the question. FRIAM could get to work on answering them and Nick could stand aside and wonder at the quality and perspicacity of your answers. My own most recent and condensed and approachable attempt to answer both versions of the question can be found in the manuscript that is attached. I can’t find cc of the published vsn at the moment. I will think about the intimacy issue. I think it’s about having some others who know things about you that are not generally known. I would argue that when you get into bed with somebody naked, it’s a metaphor. But then, I am old. Nick Nicholas S. Thompson Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology Clark University http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/ -----Original Message----- From: Friam [mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] On Behalf Of John Kennison Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 2:30 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> > Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy One thing I wonder about (or perhaps have forgotten) in this discussion and Nick's denial is what the denial is based on. Is the absence of subjectivity supposed to be a scientific fact? If so, we should be discussing the experimental foundations of this fact. I have read of some experiments which seem to indicate that subjectiviity is not exactly what we (or what I) used to think it is --but which do not seem to disprove subjectivity. --John ________________________________________ From: Friam [[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] on behalf of Russ Abbott [[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> ] Sent: Friday, February 19, 2016 3:27 PM To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group Subject: [FRIAM] Subjectivity and intimacy We've had discussions on and off about subjectivity -- with me getting frustrated at Nick's denial thereof (if I understood him correctly). It occurred to me recently that intimacy is defined -- as I understand it -- in terms of subjectivity, i.e., the sharing of one's (most private) subjective experiences with another. I'm wondering what Nick thinks about this and whether anyone else has something to say about it. In particular, if there is no such thing as subjective experience, does that imply in your view that the same goes for intimacy? ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe <http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College to unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
