[-empyre-] Welcome to May: Boredom: Labor, Use and Time

[B. Bogart]

Hello Murat,

John and Emilie, I would like to hear what you think about what I write
near the bottom of this message in regards to fantasy in relation to
mind wandering (and perhaps meditation).

Murat, It's interesting you bring up the notion of the usefulness of
prediction in the context of problem solving. The system / model as I
have conceived it is exactly the opposite; the only 'task' it has is to
'understand' (at least learn structures from) images fed to it. We could
probably flesh this out on a future theme explicitly on dreaming,
machine perception, or AI.

The Dreaming Machine project is really about how perception and
prediction can be considered as generative (or perhaps even creative)
without explicit task-oriented behaviour or evaluation.

You write:
> I think pornographic product is relatively simple and by itself not 
> quite interesting. What makes it a potent form is the experience of 
> watching it. What is happening in the watcher's mind that makes the 
> experience of a simple, repetitive, often mechanical form so 
> alluring?

As a construction, pornography is certainly is constrained. Assuming a
viewer repeats the viewing, then the already formulaic plot would become
even more inane.

I would agree with you that the experience is much more than the
stimulus. Under my conception, watching pornography involves
interpreting images in the context of one's experience, not in
isolation. This interpretation requires recognition, where the acts, the
actors, sets, etc. are linked with the viewer's most similar
experiences, thus calling up memories of previous pornographic films,
previous lovers, etc. Once these memories are reconstructed, they are
reconstructed in a context of prediction where there is a sense of what
happened before or after.

In the case of a highly boring film, the current state of the system
(set of recalled memories) inspired by the film initiate a predictive
chain. This chain is not a perfect recall of a series of moments, but a
composite sequence of events constructed from structure learned over
many experiences. The chain begins with memories associated with the
film depictions, but as the chain (mind wandering) unfolds, it diverges
from the initial state and the ongoing simulation could become a fantasy.

Note, I expect there is a degree of intentional control at this point. A
viewer must choose to direct the fantasy in the direction of desire.
This simply constrains the predictions to sequences of events the viewer
considers desirable. I think this degree of control is the difference
between fantasy and mind wandering, the latter of which is most
correlated with a lack of intentional control. Depending on the
concentration of the viewer (no longer attending to the film), the
simulation may diverge away from fantasy, perhaps by being reminded of
some task or insight. I expect that the control needed to keep the
fantasy on track to be the same kind of control needed in meditation,
where the unconscious and spontaneous predictive chains (mind wandering
simulations) are constrained, perhaps to the point of being suppressed
entirely.

If a pornographic film is highly arousing (in the sense of being highly
unpredictable) due to novelty at some degree of abstraction, then it
would likely hold the attention of the viewer, who may not mind wander.
They would still be considering images in the context of their own
experience, and still think of their own previous experiences. The
difference would be film would still be attended to.

The boring / non-boring binary above is quite simplistic. I imagine that
we spend much of our time shifting between attending to our internal
simulations and attending to external stimuli. An exciting pornographic
film may hold our attention for a time, but not constantly. While we
watch we learn, and thus we get better at predicting what is likely to
happen next as we watch. I expect we are constantly oscillating between
attending to external stimuli and internal simulations.

This gets back a previous message where I describe boring and arousal
are two sides of a continuum, but a continuum where we constantly move
between being more aroused and being more bored. A lack of boredom is a
surplus of arousal and vice versa. At the same time scale keeps sliding:
The more we habituate to arousal, the more arousal is required to keep
us from boredom. The more we habituate to boredom, the less arousal is
required to keep us from boredom.

Pleasure is a positive arousal, and thus requires a ground of boredom to
occur. For the same reason, fear as a negative arousal requires a
baseline of boredom.

What do others' think about the relation between fantasy, meditation and
mind wandering?

Ben

On 15-05-11 04:45 PM, Murat Nemet-Nejat wrote:
> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
> 
> 
> 
> Your predictive models are are built, as far as I can see, on 
> statistical analyses which is perfectly fine as far as practical 
> applications are concerned, for instance creating artificial 
> intelligence that solves problems or what products a specific group 
> of persons will purchase. In other words, the model may be very 
> useful if control or economic production is concerned. But I am after
> something else --possibly, as you say, veering off topic. My issues
> are metaphysical or poetical
> 
> For instance, relating to the issue of pornography here. The 
> discussion, it seems to me, is focused on pornography as an object, 
> how it is constructed, what aspects of it creates boredom, etc. I 
> think pornographic product is relatively simple and by itself not 
> quite interesting. What makes it a potent form is the experience of 
> watching it. What is happening in the watcher's mind that makes the 
> experience of a simple, repetitive, often mechanical form so 
> alluring? I think not enough attention is paid to this point here. 
> That was the reason of my focus on "dardreaming" as a "contra" 
> process.
> 
> Ciao, Murat
> 
> On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 6:13 PM, B. Bogart <ben at ekran.org 
> <mailto:ben at ekran.org>> wrote:
> 
> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space---------------------- Hello 
> Murat,
> 
> I would define predictability as the ability to narrow the infinity 
> of potential occurrences to a smaller number by learning what 
> contexts tend to lead to what kinds of events. Abstraction (as 
> defined in an earlier message) defines the level of flexibility of a
>  representation (emphasizing a category over an individual instance 
> entails abstraction). We may not be able to predict exactly what will
> happen, but we can narrow the possibilities to what is likely to
> happen.
> 
> Even though I do argue for mind wandering as a result of learned 
> predictions, that does not necessarily mean that the resulting mind 
> wandering itself is predictable. In the computational implementation
>  I wrote for the PhD, the predictive model uses feedback to predict 
> itself (output -> input). The error inherent in any predictive model
>  tend to accumulate due to the feedback, and thus the predictive 
> chain may diverge significantly from the initial context. In short, 
> mind wandering itself can still be unpredictable, even when it is 
> dependent on learned predictions.
> 
> I don't follow your points on cause and effect:
>> Yes, _once the mind has wandered_ to a certain place, one maybe
>> can explain why it has done so. But the explanation occurs after
>> the occuring, not before. One may say that the effect 
>> precedes/makes/conceives the cause.
> 
> I think we could easily veering off topic discussing the fine details
> of conceiving mind wandering as simulation informed by predictions
> learned from external stimuli.
> 
> Ben
> 
> 
> On 15-05-11 11:53 AM, Murat Nemet-Nejat wrote:
>> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> "I would say that all learned behaviour is predictable behaviour, 
>> and thus most behaviour is actually predictable (again at some 
>> level of abstraction). Mind wandering is an escape from the 
>> predictability of external reality, rather than an escape from 
>> one's own predictable behaviour. I may go so far to say that by our
>> ability to internalize learned behaviours our minds are most often
>> already disengaged from our predictable behaviours. The 
>> predictability of these behaviours means we do not need to 
>> (constantly) consciously invest in them. e.g. walking is a 
>> predictable behaviour that rarely requires conscious 
>> intervention."
>> 
>> Ben, once you extend the idea of predictability (in the sense of 
>> the directions of the mind's wandering--like a bumble bee), the 
>> concept of predictability becomes almost meaningless. What does "at
>> some level of abstraction" mean? Yes, _once the mind has wandered_
>> to a certain place, one maybe can explain why it has done so. But
>> the explanation occurs after the occuring, not before. One may say
>> that the effect precedes/makes/conceives the cause. A similar thing
>> occurs in the development of the meanings of words etymologically,
>> as in an etymological dictionary. Very often one can see how an old
>> meaning jumped metaphorically or by accident or by mishearing, by
>> happenstance, etc. to gain the new meaning. _But one can not
>> predict it before it happens._ The inherent potentialities of
>> meanings in a given word is basically infinite--as wide as the
>> mind's ability to imagine or, _as importantly_, make mistakes. The
>> situation is somewhat similar to the position of particles of light
>> before they cross a screen, where _each_ will land on the other
>> side. Words are significant in our discussions here because they
>> are closest physical reflectors of human thought human has.
>> 
>> Ben, I think the idea of "cause" (a trace of Newtonian physics)
>> may lead one to all sorts of cul-de-sacs. Am I misunderstanding
>> what you are saying.
>> 
>> Because of my focus on this inherent openness the mind may have 
>> that I doubt whether boredom _(assuming it is related to repetition
>> of looped behavior) _can co-exist with pornography as a pleasurable
>> experience. As I suggested in my last post, transgression (breaking
>> of totemic or social rules) is the power center of pornography. To
>> the extent to a film becomes mechanical, repetitive, the
>> viewer's/reader's mind may join with it if it reinforces this
>> expectation (as may happen in a de Sade text or an authentically
>> amateur (clumsily shot, gauchely acted out, etc.?) film or the mind
>> may wander from it (if it doesn't turn the film off) into its own
>> fantasy.
>> 
>> Ciao, Murat
>> 
>> On Mon, May 11, 2015 at 2:12 PM, B. Bogart <ben at ekran.org 
>> <mailto:ben at ekran.org> <mailto:ben at ekran.org 
>> <mailto:ben at ekran.org>>> wrote:
>> 
>> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space---------------------- Hello 
>> Murat, (and Emilie)
>> 
>> You ask:
>>> Ben, on what basis are you assuming daydreaming is (always?) 
>>> "informed by predictive models of reality." What makes you say 
>>> that? The assumption seems arbitrary (or an apriori assumption) 
>>> to me.
>> 
>> This is the basis of my PhD. The most complete description of the 
>> argument is available in this unpublished paper:
>> 
> http://www.researchgate.net/publication/271386560_Unpublished_Draft_of_An_Integrative_Theory_and_Computational_Model_of_Visual_Mentation
>
>
>
> 
> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> Note, the theory has not been empirically validated.
>> 
>> In my thinking, prediction is central to perception. We constrain 
>> recognition by learning contexts in which certain stimuli are 
>> likely to occur. Would you argue that perception is a task? I
>> would certainly argue that perception is augmented by the
>> particular goals in play at a time, but that does not necessarily
>> mean that all perception is task-oriented.
>> 
>> You go on to write that it could be argued that "daydreaming is a 
>> mental act that tries to escape predictive behavior or task driven 
>> behavior."
>> 
>> I would say that all learned behaviour is predictable behaviour, 
>> and thus most behaviour is actually predictable (again at some 
>> level of abstraction). Mind wandering is an escape from the 
>> predictability of external reality, rather than an escape from 
>> one's own predictable behaviour. I may go so far to say that by our
>> ability to internalize learned behaviours our minds are most often
>> already disengaged from our predictable behaviours. The 
>> predictability of these behaviours means we do not need to 
>> (constantly) consciously invest in them. e.g. walking is a 
>> predictable behaviour that rarely requires conscious intervention.
>> 
>> You further write:
>>> In that way, in daydreaming the mind is never bored. Boredom
>>> sets in when daydreaming ceases. May not daydreaming be an
>>> alternate mode of focus, the mind's rebellion so to speak,
>>> contra "organized" stimuli?"
>> 
>> One of the interesting things about mind wandering, is that it's 
>> difficult to realize we are doing it. In fact, some studies have 
>> shown the Default Network is most engaged when we are not aware of 
>> mind wandering, but in fact are absolutely not attending to 
>> external stimulus. In short, we are often mind wandering without 
>> realizing we are mind wandering. This is because the areas of the 
>> brain that allow us to reflect on our own states of mind (parts of
>>  the prefrontal cortex) are diminished in mind wandering (and 
>> dreaming). All this to say that I think it's unlikely that boredom
>>  would not involve mind wandering, it's more likely we don't 
>> realize how pervasive mind wandering is.
>> 
>> I'm trying to get my head around what a non-task oriented, not
>> mind wandering, boring mind-state could be. Perhaps deep meditation
>>  could be a state of mind that is neither task positive nor 
>> negative? Any thoughts on this Emilie? Is meditation a task 
>> oriented activity? I would expect that the suppression of mind 
>> wandering would require a lot of mental control, the same kind of 
>> control used in task-oriented behaviour.
>> 
>> Mind wandering could certainly be considered a rebellion where the 
>> internal asserts itself over the external. Could you elaborate on 
>> what you mean by "contra 'organized' stimuli?"
>> 
>> Regards, B. _______________________________________________ empyre 
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