In fact, you can do good and important work while also gradually coming to terms with your emotions, trying to get more grounded, and noticing when you’re making decisions driven by visceral fear and taking steps to fix that.
I agree.
I think we’re focusing on different spots. I’m not sure if we actually disagree.
The all-or-nothing is with respect to recognizing the illusion. If someone can’t even get far enough to notice that their disregulated nervous system is driving an illusion, then what they do is much more likely to create harm than good.
That part I totally stand by.
There’s something of a strawman here in framing what I’m saying as “you need to do the trauma processing first and only then do useful work”. I don’t think you intended it. Just letting you know, it totally lands for me as a strawman.
I am saying that there is some trauma processing (for a person with a system like I’m describing) that absolutely is essential first. But not all of it. I don’t know if that’s possible, or even a coherent idea.
I don’t understand how specifically you think the process of recognizing the illusion is related to the process of healing traumas. But I also object to ideas like “you need to orient towards your fear as an illusion first and only then do useful work”, for roughly the same reasons (in particular, the way it’s all-or-nothing). So I’ll edit my original comment to clarify that this is a more central/less strawmanny objection.
I don’t understand how you think the process of recognizing the illusion is related to the process of healing traumas.
Okay. I’m not sure what to tell you. This lands for me like “I don’t understand how you think turning on the burner is related to the process of cooking the soup.” Um… it just is? I already described the mechanisms, so I think the communication gap is somewhere I don’t see.
I also object to ideas like “you need to orient towards your fear as an illusion first and only then do useful work”…
I never meant to say or even imply that the fear is an illusion.
I was saying that the fear fuels an illusion. And anyone living in such an illusion needs to see through it before they can participate in non-illusion.
You can view that as all-or-nothing and therefore objectionable if you like. That’s note quite what I mean, but it’s not totally wrong. And in this spot I do think there’s an “all-or-nothing” truth: If you don’t see through an illusion you’re in, you can’t consciously participate in reality. That lands as almost tautological to me.
I’ll edit my original comment to clarify that this is a more central/less strawmanny objection.
Okay. I’m not sure what to tell you. This lands for me like “I don’t understand how you think turning on the burner is related to the process of cooking the soup.” Um… it just is? I already described the mechanisms, so I think the communication gap is somewhere I don’t see.
I think you interpreted this as incredulity, whereas I meant it as “I don’t understand the specific links” (e.g. is recognizing the illusion most of the work, or only a small part? What stops you from healing traumas without recognizing the illusion? etc). I’ve edited to clarify.
Oh, no, I didn’t take it as incredulity at all. I’m just honestly not sure why what I’d already said didn’t already explain the relationship between trauma healing and seeing through the illusion.
I guess I can just say it again in shortened form?
For the person design I’m talking about…
There’s a pain inside.
There’s also a kind of mental/emotional program built around the instruction “Distract from the pain.”
Because they can’t actually escape the pain, they project it outward through the mind. Which is to say, they create an illusion powered by the pain.
This causes them to think every glimmer of the pain they do notice is about the external thing.
The antidote is to look directly at the inner pain & dismantle the “Distract from the pain” program.
In practice this requires integrating the pain into consciousness. This is one way of talking about “healing trauma”.
Once that happens, the program doesn’t have a power source anymore.
If that doesn’t happen and the person insists on focusing on doing things in the world, everything they do will be at least partly in service to distraction rather than solving any real problem.
And on the inside they cannot tell the difference between those two without facing the inner pain.
So seeing through the illusion isn’t cognitive basically at all. To me it’s the same thing as trauma processing, for all practical purposes.
Does that clarify anything for you?
What stops you from healing traumas without recognizing the illusion?
Oh, nothing. If you just go around healing traumas willy-nilly, then you might not ever see through any particular illusion like this one if it’s running in you.
Kind of like, generically working on trauma processing in general might or might not help an alcoholic quit drinking. There’s some reason for hope, but it’s possible to get lost in loops of navel-gazing, especially if they never ever even admit to themselves that they have a problem.
But if it’s targeted, the addiction basically doesn’t stand a chance.
I’m not trying to say “Just work on traumas and be Fully Healed™ before working on AI risk.”
I agree.
I think we’re focusing on different spots. I’m not sure if we actually disagree.
The all-or-nothing is with respect to recognizing the illusion. If someone can’t even get far enough to notice that their disregulated nervous system is driving an illusion, then what they do is much more likely to create harm than good.
That part I totally stand by.
There’s something of a strawman here in framing what I’m saying as “you need to do the trauma processing first and only then do useful work”. I don’t think you intended it. Just letting you know, it totally lands for me as a strawman.
I am saying that there is some trauma processing (for a person with a system like I’m describing) that absolutely is essential first. But not all of it. I don’t know if that’s possible, or even a coherent idea.
I don’t understand how specifically you think the process of recognizing the illusion is related to the process of healing traumas. But I also object to ideas like “you need to orient towards your fear as an illusion first and only then do useful work”, for roughly the same reasons (in particular, the way it’s all-or-nothing). So I’ll edit my original comment to clarify that this is a more central/less strawmanny objection.
Okay. I’m not sure what to tell you. This lands for me like “I don’t understand how you think turning on the burner is related to the process of cooking the soup.” Um… it just is? I already described the mechanisms, so I think the communication gap is somewhere I don’t see.
I never meant to say or even imply that the fear is an illusion.
I was saying that the fear fuels an illusion. And anyone living in such an illusion needs to see through it before they can participate in non-illusion.
You can view that as all-or-nothing and therefore objectionable if you like. That’s note quite what I mean, but it’s not totally wrong. And in this spot I do think there’s an “all-or-nothing” truth: If you don’t see through an illusion you’re in, you can’t consciously participate in reality. That lands as almost tautological to me.
I didn’t need you to do that. But thanks.
I think you interpreted this as incredulity, whereas I meant it as “I don’t understand the specific links” (e.g. is recognizing the illusion most of the work, or only a small part? What stops you from healing traumas without recognizing the illusion? etc). I’ve edited to clarify.
Oh, no, I didn’t take it as incredulity at all. I’m just honestly not sure why what I’d already said didn’t already explain the relationship between trauma healing and seeing through the illusion.
I guess I can just say it again in shortened form?
For the person design I’m talking about…
There’s a pain inside.
There’s also a kind of mental/emotional program built around the instruction “Distract from the pain.”
Because they can’t actually escape the pain, they project it outward through the mind. Which is to say, they create an illusion powered by the pain.
This causes them to think every glimmer of the pain they do notice is about the external thing.
The antidote is to look directly at the inner pain & dismantle the “Distract from the pain” program.
In practice this requires integrating the pain into consciousness. This is one way of talking about “healing trauma”.
Once that happens, the program doesn’t have a power source anymore.
If that doesn’t happen and the person insists on focusing on doing things in the world, everything they do will be at least partly in service to distraction rather than solving any real problem.
And on the inside they cannot tell the difference between those two without facing the inner pain.
So seeing through the illusion isn’t cognitive basically at all. To me it’s the same thing as trauma processing, for all practical purposes.
Does that clarify anything for you?
Oh, nothing. If you just go around healing traumas willy-nilly, then you might not ever see through any particular illusion like this one if it’s running in you.
Kind of like, generically working on trauma processing in general might or might not help an alcoholic quit drinking. There’s some reason for hope, but it’s possible to get lost in loops of navel-gazing, especially if they never ever even admit to themselves that they have a problem.
But if it’s targeted, the addiction basically doesn’t stand a chance.
I’m not trying to say “Just work on traumas and be Fully Healed™ before working on AI risk.”
I’m saying something much, much more precise.