Change of plans

[sareth]

Fast post before I go keel over.

First, if any of you are expecting me to, oh, say, HAVE A LIFE for the next two years... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA no.

ANYWAY...

Remember that big long plan I had discussing an ethnographic approach to four micronations online?

When I first broached the basic concept to my adviser, he loved it. When I then detailed out

Comments

[xepel]

I like!

Sometimes I wonder if I create my avatars, or if my avatars create me...

[sareth]

Heh. I hear you.

I've heard people talk about finding their avatars or characters having minds of their own... I plan to document it in accordance with scholarly theory! What could be better?

[alakuriel]

That is going to be an *awesome* paper - I wanna see when it's done!^^

And you're not crazy or anything, either. Well, unless I am too. >.> My characters have always had their own thoughts on things at random moments in real life, and they often differ from my own. They can result in some really odd thoughts, too... >.>

[sareth]

Oh, indeed! And that's the point I want to get at. If our characters really were just extensions of ourselves, they would believe and act as we do, unless we were deliberately thinking our way through ways to be different in every decision being made. For the avatars or characters to pop up and do something we would not without our thinking our way into that difference, something must be going on.

[alakuriel]

An awesome something, too. Life would be a lot more boring without our characters up there distracting us and arguing with us and each other.^^

[sareth]

Oh, that can certainly make life exciting... *laughs*

[kamahawk]

"Some think that the self is a creation made up by the language we use, as we can't even realize we ourselves exist without using the language we know."

I will put money on this being objectively false. Unless we are using a really frunkt up defenition of "self". In fact, the more I think about this the more blantantly wrong it feels.

Good luck with that!

[saxon_rau]

Proving almost anything about "self" objectively I mean. . .

On the other hand, language as a frame of reference for interactions with others allows them a subjective definition of "other" that maps to our own subjective definition of "self" so in that sense it is a filter and an enabler.

Re: Good luck with that!

[sareth]

The basic idea in several of the theories is that how a people communicate has a huge impact on how a person's sense of self develops. For example, a society which reacts to disappointment by breaking eye contact with the person doing the disappointing will result in a self that has a strong need for bonding... Or that's the theory at least.

[sareth]

Look up "Michael Hecht" and the "Communication Theory of Identity" if you want to read up on it. I'm not certain I agree with it, but I'm also not certain I disagree. It's certainly an interesting way to think...

[meganeko_mausuu]

Ah, so you finally became one of the club. There are several of us who hear our characters' voices in our heads on a regular basis. I'll be very interested to see where your research goes with this.

[sareth]

Codifying "the club" will be interesting. I'm looking forward to it.

[sareth]

And Fire Marshal permission to allow that many to gather in there...

[sareth]

1. Well, no... but it was intended to be.

2. I am expecting that people will come in three categories.

Those that simply extend themselves into SL and don't note significant difference.

Those that deliberately create a different person to be in SL, but the choices are all deliberate.

Those that discover that their avatar "has a mind of his/her own." It's this third group that interests me, because really, how do you explain that?

[sareth]

True. But now I have to prove it scientifically. XD