[Ian]
I'll hope Arlo's "you body is irrelevant" remark was a little extreme
for emphasis, in his context ;-)
[Arlo]
Emphasis = "context". The physiological host of any self is
irrelevant to me in structuring my interactions with them in this
forum. However, as I said several time, should my goal switch to
mating, the physiological host assumes great value for me. In all
cases, my accepting or rejecting another's "self" as it is presented
to me has to do with what has value or meaning for me.
Marsha seems to wonder why I am harping on gender, and I do because I
think it is a great way to disentangle "self" from "body", and a
great way to realize that any "body" can (and does!) host multiple
"selves". And it works as a good example because it forces people who
say one thing to have to actually explain their conceptual framework
in real world scenarios.
My main point, which Marsha seems to also feel I've gotten away from,
is that "Arlo" is an avatar. "Ian" is an avatar. "Marsha" is an
avatar. They are functionally NO different from the avatars
inhabiting online worlds such as Second Life. Indeed, I think Krimel
was spot on in saying that the MOQ Discuss List is every much an
"online social world" populated by avatars as Second Life.
Conventionally, we want to say the "Arlo" who inhabits MD is "real",
while the "Aenea" who inhabits World of Warcraft is "unreal", but
this works only a very superficial level, and on one where we have to
bury our heads in the sand over key issues of identity. I ask, WHAT
makes "Arlo" real and "Aenea" unreal. And I submit that if you think
about that, you'll eventually see that the only thing that makes this
distinction is that you believe one is real and you believe one is
pretend based on socially-contrived "things" that fluctuate greatly
from person to person.
Part of this social-contrivance is the enforced notion of "one body,
one mind, one soul". It is a socially enforced "line of continuity"
that has usurped its socially-valuable role of providing us with
sought after social ends and has blinded us into thinking it is some
external, dogmatic rule. And I think it becomes evidently hollow when
we consider the identity-history of the author we so admire (along
with the other questions, scenarios which I've been presenting).
[Ian]
As soon as we move away from things entirely literal and objective,
as we must in this MoQish context, then we must rely on "patterns" of
behaviour (and intent) built-up over time; behaviors that must
include analogy, simulation, thought-experiments, mind-games, and
other rhetorical tricks in order to be "creative".
[Arlo]
This reminds me of Bob's talk about Chris' murder in ZMM.
"What had to be seen was that the Chris I missed so badly was not an
object but a pattern, and that although the pattern included the
flesh and blood of Chris, that was not all there was to it. The
pattern was larger than Chris and myself, and related us in ways that
neither of us understood completely and neither of us was in complete
control of." (ZMM)
In this case, the "flesh and blood Chris" was a very significant part
of Bob's life. And for ages of human history, most (if not nearly
all) social relations between people included this "flesh and blood"
aspect prominently. Sure, there were pen pals. And sure, there were
books. But the majority of the people "who we knew" we interected
with organically, and that included a "flesh and blood" copresence.
I submit, what about "here"? If my body were to die, and "Arlo" would
no longer be here, reconsider the above description by Bob. The
pattern "Arlo" which you know doesn't really included a "flesh and
blood Arlo", does it? The pattern you would miss (well, maybe one or
two of you would miss) would be exclusively non-organic. That pattern
that relates us has nothing to do with my (or your) corporeal host.
This is, I think, the disentanglement that online worlds allow us to
see. Our "selves" inhabit social worlds that have very little to do
with the physiological world (although still something, certainly not
"nothing") and this allows us to see the "patterns" which we call
self without the illusion that the "flesh and blood" component is
such a large part of that.
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