Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!cmcl2!nrl-cmf!ames!lll-lcc!pyramid!thirdi!sarge From: sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) Newsgroups: sci.psychology Subject: Re: Emotion Message-ID: <366@thirdi.UUCP> Date: 24 Mar 88 06:35:50 GMT References: <44@gollum.Columbia.NCR.COM> <2100@phred.UUCP> <2103@phred.UUCP> <962@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu> <355@thirdi.UUCP> <8803222016.AA27059@ai.toronto.edu> Reply-To: sarge@thirdi.UUCP (Sarge Gerbode) Distribution: na Organization: Institute for Research in Metapsychology Lines: 50 Keywords: emotion drives physiology consciousness In article <8803222016.AA27059@ai.toronto.edu> tjhorton@ai.toronto.edu ("Timothy J. Horton") writes: >>What would qualify as an "unconscious experience"? >Process, and/or processing constraint, perhaps. >These would probably be experienced INdirectly. >Much like the way a computer might come to know >that it's swapping processes in and out so much >that it's not getting anything done (thrashing). >There's no "thrashing" sensor in a 68000, but >there are ways of calculating such things from >the observable quantities. >I think the "unconscious experience" idea referred >to such indirectly observable "stuff". OK. So something unconscious would be something that is not yet known. And unconscious emotion, on this scheme, would be an internal physiological state that was not yet known but could be inferred. But in this case, it's not "unconscious *experience*", is it? It's the "experience" part that's difficult. A better formulation of "unconscious experience" (to answer my own question), might be like the "ground" in a figure-ground diagram. One is aware of the ground, in some sense, since it contributes to the perception of the figure, yet one's attention is not focused on it. These are instances of what I would call "simple unawareness". Another type of "unconscious experience" is "directed unawareness" or repression, where one is pointedly unaware of something (like an uncomfortable emotion). Yet here there's a paradox, because to know where *not* to direct one's attention, one must know *exactly* what not to look at. So one has to be aware of the thing in order to be directly unaware of it. Like not thinking of a pink elephant. >>"Absolute knowledge means never having to change your mind." >Got some? Please e-mail. I'll summarize and post. :-) It's simple: The only piece of absolute knowledge I have is that there is no absolute knowledge. Socrates would be proud of me! -- "Absolute knowledge means never having to change your mind." Sarge Gerbode Institute for Research in Metapsychology 950 Guinda St. Palo Alto, CA 94301 UUCP: pyramid!thirdi!sarge