Social-Media/Gaming Building Blocks: The Digital Game Board of “The Now”

Social-Media/Gaming Building Blocks: The Digital Game Board of “The Now”

Here I discuss Digital gameplay at it's most basic level.  The fact that my focus is on digital has no material bearing on the validity of the observations and statements, but I will say that it is far easier to gather empirical metrics from online gaming than it is from speculating on the metrics for "traditional gaming, played in privacy, on cardboard"(I.e. just because little Johnny received the board game version of Monopoly for his Birthday, does not mean that he ever opened the box.....)

Social-Media/Gaming Building Blocks: The Digital Game Board of “The Now”

 

 

 

 

On the Seeming Necessity to Write Very Long Passages when Discussing Very Complicated Things

On the Necessity to Write Very Long Passages when Discussing Very Complicated Things

Here is a Test, or possibly a Game concerning our subject at hand. 

There is only one objective:  Establish whether or not the following outline of statements contains any Truth.

The Orbital Discussion of Truth

The Orbital Discussion of Truth

 First let me say that by “Orbital” I don’t mean “lofty”, but I think things will become clearer somewhere further down on this page.

It happens from time to time, after writing a piece, as a contribution to a debate group to which I belong, that I will pause, and try to remember everything that I have ever read, from every famous author, from every age in in written history, and then attempt to articulate some semblance of a cohesive argument that seeks to make a point, defend a thesis, address another member's comment, etc.  And then, during moments like this one, i take a moment to consider the following:

Truth

Truth may be where we find it, but that does not mean that we will, but if we do, it certainly does not guarantee that anyone will validate what we believe we have found.

Truth

Truth may be where we find it, but that does not mean that we will, but if we do, it certainly does not guarantee that anyone will validate what we believe we have found.

If we mean to propose that a Truth may be contained somewhere within the essence of an a posteriori synthetic proposition (Descartes + Kant + Aristotle)….the discernment of an essence (Descartes) may rely upon the a posteriori knowledge of the “truth seeker (Kant), whereas this“knowledge” is the combination of and intellectual organization of sensory and cognitive contributions (Aristotle), then possibly Aquinas said it best: (to paraphrase) “Truth exists wherever it is found”. Which in my view does not mean that anyone can blindly stumble upon, and then recognize Truth after tripping over it, instead, I believe that many things which are readily available to be found, are not, because when they are “found”, the “finder” is not equipped to recognize the “finding” (and this is where we need our full team of philosophical explorers: Descartes + Kant + Aristotle). If we are satisfied with this logic, we might go on to say that a newly “found” Truth, although presenting itself, may remain undiscovered. Hidden in plain sight I suppose. This may be an argument for Truth seekers to travel in small groups. But I think more practically, I will remain by what I said in an earlier post: that Truth is often highly individualized.

Linguistic Fuzziness

Linguistic Fuzziness

It’s the Infusion of Meaning into words, phrases and sentences that may not carry as cleanly as the literal words and phrases.  Like the fuzz on the surface of a tennis ball causes the ball to carry differently than a ball that is identical, except has a smooth surface.

Linguitsic Fuzziness

It’s the Infusion of Meaning into words, phrases and sentences that may not carry as cleanly as the literal words and phrases.  Like the fuzz on the surface of a tennis ball causes the ball to carry differently than a ball that is identical, except has a smooth surface.

I imagine a tennis ball that is entirely smooth white rubber.  It is a clean, non-porous material, and is constructed from simple compounds that are “atomic level” ingredients.  It’s just a plain, white, rubber ball.  In language, maybe the equivalent is “blue dog eats chicken”.  Pretty simple compounds, not much room for misinterpretation. Blue. Dog. Eats. Chicken. This phrase does not need to make sense any more than a “smooth, white, rubber, ball”.  It only gets complicated when we project additional information into the compound because for some reason or other, we believe, based on a priori knowledge, that we think it belongs there.  This projection of additional information, may or may not correspond to the meaning that was “infused” (or not) by the speaker of these words.  It is this layer of potentially ambiguity that I think of as the fuzzy green stuff found on the outside of a new tennis ball.  The base compounds are underneath, but are layered over with a “fuzziness”, which is what we will always come into contact with first. As the ball moves from A to B, this fuzziness can cause, or be used to cause, behaviors that would/could not exist if it were just a “smooth, white, rubber, ball”.  A tennis ball left outside for long enough will eventually lose its fuzziness. And just be a ball.  The context has “worn off”.  The same is true in communication.

In my example I was attempting to demonstrate that “meaning” is a layer of communication which sits above words, phrases, sentences, etc.  Simple statements can be understood by different people, with different backgrounds to mean very different things.  I was saying that I think someone’s background, and current state, can be evaluated by questions that have no definitive right or wrong answers, and in some cases, can cause total confusion because the question is understood, but how to answer it is not, and can through the interviewees brain into something of a loop.  It’s in some ways a more conversational style of word-association.

So yes I understand that Linguistic Semantics is the Title of this Group, and that it is also a field of study, but I am also saying that it a mechanism for evaluation, and therefore potentially the basic structure for Psychological evaluation tools.  Not that LS needs to be used that way, just that it can be.

My Blade Runner citation seemed an appropriate example of how the meaning of a construct of words and phrases can be understood, or not, and the resulting reactions to the realization (or not) of the meaning, can be used to begin to “frame in” the Psych profile of the interviewee.

Expression through language will always have a “sender”, and generally have a “receiver”.  It is one thing to understand what was meant by the Sender, it is another to understand the meaning perceived by the Receiver.

Linguistic Semantics as a method of Evaluation

Linguistic Semantics as a method of Evaluation:

Same Words, Same Contexts: Different People, Different Reactions, Different Meanings

 

"You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down; you flip the tortoise over on its back. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that?"**

Entology and Entropy; Together Again at Last, Possibly.

Entology and Entropy; Together Again at Last, Possibly.

Poor Descartes (Med 1st Philosophy, etc.), understands so completely that in order to establish just one simple truth about anything that he perceives either Cognitively and/or Sensorially in the real world, he must throw down an anchor and stop the maelstrom of uncertainties, doubts, and humilities from sinking his faith-tainted vessel and keep it from disappearing into the murkiness of the all that we don’t know, as he makes his philosophical voyage across the expanses of the finite to the infinite.  He “knows” that he needs to somehow establish something to be True, by way of a process of reason, that he can feel ok about, given his strong tendencies towards belief in things that are extremely difficult( if not impossible) to prove.  He comes to something of a conclusion that other potential truths must be referenced against an unquestionable Truth. 

The Quantum Evaluation of Truth?

We tackled the Quantum Evaluation of Morality not too long ago, so seems like I ought to bring things back around to the middle about now.

The difference between Truth and Untruth is simply a function of the distance in conscious space covered during a period of time in which the consideration is manifested in ones’ awareness as they travel at some semantic velocity along a trajectory established by the a priori knowledge of actions and consequences. It is uncertain therefore where in a continuum of conscious space and time one will be, when an established point in time is selected for an evaluation of relative Truth and Untruth. And it could be supposed that until the wave form collapse of all possibilities occurs, one could be both simultaneously Truthful and Untruthful, but with no quantifiable degree of certainty.

On the Unlimited Imperfections of Language: "Language. Unlimited? Possibly. Perfect? Not Likely."

Language. Unlimited? Possibly.  Perfect? Not Likely.

Imagine trying to draw a perfectly smooth circle out of straight lines, or little tiny squares.  This is in fact what a computer does.  Unsophisticated computers produce circles that have jagged edges, like a saw blade.  Very fancy computers seem to produce flawless curves and thus perfect circles.  But, zoom in close enough on the edge of that “perfect” circle, and you will find the same saw tooth edging that was readily visible on the unsophisticated computer. 

Un-Rapt

"Un-Rapt":  “Considerations of Sensorially Perceived Immersion in Selectively Irrelevant Contexts and the Cognitive Auto-response that Catalyzes the Restoration of a Preferred Bio-Psycho-Social State Generally Identified by a Reconciled Singularity of Cognitive and Sensory Perceptions.”

On Linguistic Semantics

*** Let me preface this post by saying that it is my latest response to an ongoing discussion around Linguistic Semantics.  So if it appears to not have an entirely proper introduction or conclusion, that is because it comes from the middle of a discussion.  At some point I will add the beginng, and the ending, but I think this abstraction as some value on its own. ***

 

 

On Linguistic Semantics: Context

The Context in which the speaker infuses his chosen vocabulary with some amount of unspoken Qualifications, which may or may not be perceived correctly or even at all by the listener.

Semantics is a qualitative, literary arsenal of obfuscations or clarifications ( case dependent of course), used either offensively, defensively, or haphazardly, depending mostly upon who you are, where you are, what comprises the sum of your life experiences, the accuracy and comprehensiveness of your experiential recall, and most importantly, your desire and ability to partake in the arts of “Crowd-Sourced Meta-Cognition.”