Some Cynicism for Your Weekend

emillionth wrote:

muaddib wrote:When you have it, you know it.

You can get that from certain drugs. And when you do, it says something about your brain, but nothing about your relationships.

That's an extreme case, of course, but still: subjective things are subjective.

It's a good point, but you can also get those feelings without drugs You're right though, it is subjective, which makes it harder to pin down.

emillionth wrote:

muaddib wrote:If you want an operational definition though, how about the comfort that you're part of something bigger than yourself? It's not that you can't have negative feelings for other reasons, but the people and world outside you are a source of emotional vitality....

Now, what is interesting is that if you were to require "losing yourself" in your relationships, then it would be tautological. You wouldn't connect until you knocked all your walls down, and the Mongols could pillage you the next day.

I think that "losing yourself" is actually an inherent part of it, and most people are just fine with it, because they don't perceive it as a threat.

Yes, that's the possibility I was considering when I first posted, and it really is either/or (thus the cynicism).

That's partly why I came to the alternative of feeling you're "part of something bigger than yourself." It's still subjective, but in theory, I guess you could still have boundaries and feel connected to something outside yourself. It would be less like the Mongols waiting outside the city gates, and more like being a member of the UN. An independent country still has its own borders, laws, and military, but that doesn't mean you aren't genuinely part of the WHO or UNICEF (well, unless you're the US and everything is a free-for-all )

Philonoe wrote:For me, how to say - boundaries can be thick . In the sense that there is some space in it. It doesn't mean that they are impervious.

There is me, the others, and in the middle, some space.

I had difficulties (still have) with boundaries, in the sense that there lacked (or sometimes lacks) space between me and others.
So everytime a boundary is crossed it hurts (hurted) me.

On the other side, impervious boundaries are painful because one is lonely inside.

For me (i speak for myself) good boundaries are thick and porous. This space is where one can communicate with others.

That's actually a really good point. I guess like on other threads, the key is to be granular, figure out ways to handle things on a case-by-case basis. So build some drawbridges into your walls and have ways to let the right people in....

Which sounds kind of obvious in retrospect, but I really didn't think of it that way. Thank you for pointing that out.

naps wrote:

muaddib wrote:I need more data... I crave more data!

Touche, a part of me had a feeling someone would make a Star Trek joke as I wrote that.

I'm still not sure I can work with it though because this is actually the same Data repeated 20 times

muaddib wrote:It would be less like the Mongols waiting outside the city gates, and more like being a member of the UN. An independent country still has its own borders, laws, and military, but that doesn't mean you aren't genuinely part of the WHO or UNICEF

That's not "connection". That's "being polite to avoid confrontation". In some ways it's pretty much of the opposite of "connection". It's... literally diplomacy. When you need diplomacy in a personal relationship, that's an unambiguous sign that the relationship isn't working.

muaddib wrote: Touche, a part of me had a feeling someone would make a Star Trek joke as I wrote that.

I'm still not sure I can work with it though because this is actually the same Data repeated 20 times

It seemed like the thing to do.

I thought the mosaic look was nicely creepy.

muaddib wrote:That's actually a really good point. I guess like on other threads, the key is to be granular, figure out ways to handle things on a case-by-case basis. So build some drawbridges into your walls and have ways to let the right people in....

Which sounds kind of obvious in retrospect, but I really didn't think of it that way. Thank you for pointing that out.

Well, there is that and

Pretty much, consider the following premises:
Compassion and empathy are really just the "good" side of poor psychological boundaries.

this.

What i mean (for myself) is that connecting to people is related, for me, with strong psychological boundaries. Or maybe it's - how do you call that - my theory of mind?

This is no mere assertion that "caring means you may get hurt." What if it's genuinely impossible to really connect with people and not be at the mercy of terminally destructive, social toxicity? If the average person feels differently, it's just because the average person's relationships don't fall on the really crappy end of the bell-curve.

What do you think?

Well, i'm not sure where the average person's relationship falls

But yeah, connecting is opening door to some danger.

What are you afraid of? Social toxicity has plenty of different sides...

emillionth wrote:

muaddib wrote:It would be less like the Mongols waiting outside the city gates, and more like being a member of the UN. An independent country still has its own borders, laws, and military, but that doesn't mean you aren't genuinely part of the WHO or UNICEF

That's not "connection". That's "being polite to avoid confrontation". In some ways it's pretty much of the opposite of "connection". It's... literally diplomacy. When you need diplomacy in a personal relationship, that's an unambiguous sign that the relationship isn't working.

Well, I suppose if you're talking about the Security Council, yes. But that's part of why I chose to mention departments like the WHO; my understanding is that they're almost entirely voluntary and meant to be cooperative. Also, like Philonoe suggested with ways of making your boundaries porous, they provide mechanisms for bridging differences.

More generally though, I think your take is interesting because while always avoiding confrontation isn't good, I'd be just as worried about a relationship without any diplomacy. That would essentially be a relationship without filters. But unless you're mental clones of each other, isn't that a recipe for relationship conflict that just keeps spiraling down? To resolve conflicts short of total war, doesn't someone eventually have to put on the brakes and de-escalate?

naps wrote:

muaddib wrote: Touche, a part of me had a feeling someone would make a Star Trek joke as I wrote that.

I'm still not sure I can work with it though because this is actually the same Data repeated 20 times

It seemed like the thing to do.

I thought the mosaic look was nicely creepy.

Oh, you nailed it. It's the kind of thing you would change a friend's desktop background to as a prank, especially if they were high and paranoid.

Philonoe wrote:But yeah, connecting is opening door to some danger.

What are you afraid of? Social toxicity has plenty of different sides...

That is actually a really good question. Perhaps if you dig deep enough it's still about fear, but my best guess is that I'm really not afraid, just sort of angry by default. It's like I somehow don't see the average person as a threat at all, but I see them as an enemy anyways.

So if anything, maybe I'm not afraid of letting someone in and hurting me so much as letting out myself, hurting someone else, and things escalating from there. I'd probably wind up surrounded and dead like Cesare Borgia. Though I guess if you're going to wind up dead in the mud somewhere, it's hard to go out with more flair than the Duke of Valentinois.

muaddib wrote:To resolve conflicts short of total war, doesn't someone eventually have to put on the brakes and de-escalate?

In that case, though, it's temporary, not the nature of the relationship itself. But it is the nature of the UN. It mediates things.