Do you craft/choose your thoughts before you have them?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I learned to filter my thoughts a half century ago. Ayaan only hears 1% or so, and that much seems to scare her.

I've found it wiser to simply not talk about my ideas with people in RL. Makes for healthier relationships.

There's no way I could verbalize as fast as shit goes through my head. So I have to filter to that extent. Then there's the "WTF factor" to consider.

I'm curious as to how you voted...

I'm (one of) the rarely votes. It's not so much "choosing" as "what I allow to get out." Subtle difference, but it matters to me.

[FBM]

I'm wondering who voted 'almost always'. I'd like to see the explanation.

[GrahamH]

Early nervous systems developed the ability to...not think about getting the book while I'm walking over)

(Accidental juxtaposition, btw, but oddly fitting.)

I don't see a problem with the model you describe, insofar as it is a model and largely speculative. My OP is more aimed at your subjective experience, though, sans theory. Do you have the feeling of being the architect of your ideas?

I consider 'my subconscious' as part of me, and 'my thoughts' to be formed outside 'my subjective experience', so the whole me is 'architect of my thoughts'. I tend not to think of myself as a little spark of consciousness 'observing my experiences and intending things' (as some seem to think of it).

I voted No.

[AshtonBlack]

I believe we are a composite of processes, as has been mentioned.
A decision to act can be reached subconsciously, with external and internal stimuli. "Muscle Memory" is the example already mentioned.
But we can also, suspend or delay an action whilst we more consciously make an imaginative model for the outcome of various actions. Personally, I think this process is variable from person to person and based on memories and experience of similar, or familiar situations and potential leaps of imagination. So I answered, yes (sometimes.)

[GrahamH]

I believe we are a composite of processes, as has been mentioned.
A decision to act can be reached subconsciously, with external and internal stimuli. "Muscle Memory" is the example already mentioned.
But we can also, suspend or delay an action whilst we more consciously make an imaginative model for the outcome of various actions. Personally, I think this process is variable from person to person and based on memories and experience of similar, or familiar situations and potential leaps of imagination. So I answered, yes.

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

Sometimes you "see" connections without being aware of the process, the links are made too fast for you to notice them.

[GrahamH]

If...and I do mean if...we get our sense of selfhood/identity from the interplay of various parts of the brain, then does that mean that a person's self/identity isn't a singular thing, but a composite?

Like a body is a composite? Probably.

[GrahamH]

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

Sometimes you "see" connections without being aware of the process, the links are made too fast for you to notice them.

I agree, we recognise 'good ideas'. The interesting thing is, how do those good ideas form? What is the process? Is it somehow deliberate and purposeful, or randomly chaotic?
I suspect the latter, coincidence and maybe slightly random conjunctions of ideas sort of bumping into each other and the ones that are recognised as salient are routed to an attentional system where 'we become aware of an idea'. This would be a process similar to the creative processes of evolution, which recombine existing patterns to make new patterns and discard the ones that don't work.

[SpeedOfSound]

Early nervous systems developed the ability to...not think about getting the book while I'm walking over)

(Accidental juxtaposition, btw, but oddly fitting.)

I don't see a problem with the model you describe, insofar as it is a model and largely speculative. My OP is more aimed at your subjective experience, though, sans theory. Do you have the feeling of being the architect of your ideas?

Not as speculative as some people are still thinking. A great deal is known about all of this and one of the reasons you will find me being harsh with those of the idealist orientation is that they insist that we are still in the dark ages on brain science. They are misinformed and love to keep spouting nonsense to support their cause.

My subjective experience is tainted with having spent the last 5 years studying the science. It is habit to me now to introspect with knowledge and tease apart the pieces of what I feel and what I am conscious of.

My thoughts feel deliberate in that they have this hidden intent that directs them. But they spring from some source that is completely automatic. Still I can stop a line and steer them intentionally.

An example of the moral aspect of this is found in situations where a very good looking young woman or teen walks by. Being an old guy and having raised sons with many young friends I have developed an automatic shut off valve that kills any thoughts right out of the gate. But they still jolt me and I can feel that. I am not responsible for being human and still alive but I am completely responsible for what happens in the moments following the jolt.

In that area and many others, such as whining about life, I have developed on purpose thought directors. They are now beneath and automatic. Anyone who has not carefully developed these overseers and is given to impulse is not a moral person. Our historical choices make us moral. The sum of our moral value as human beings is in the choices we have made about which thoughts to allow free reign and which to nip.

The unconscious directors were once conscious and intentionally placed. We often miss that in these modern liberal discussions of morality. The sum of our value is in our history not just our impulsive present.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

Sometimes you "see" connections without being aware of the process, the links are made too fast for you to notice them.

I agree, we recognise 'good ideas'. The interesting thing is, how do those good ideas form? What is the process? Is it somehow deliberate and purposeful, or randomly chaotic?
I suspect the latter, coincidence and maybe slightly random conjunctions of ideas sort of bumping into each other and the ones that are recognised as salient are routed to an attentional system where 'we become aware of an idea'. This would be a process similar to the creative processes of evolution, which recombine existing patterns to make new patterns and discard the ones that don't work.

Depends on how well your "connectivity spotting" works. If you've the talent for spotting that A and B together would be greater than the sum of the parts then you get "good ideas". If you don't get good ideas you tend to ignore those "links" or try to use them and fail a lot.

[FBM]

If...and I do mean if...we get our sense of selfhood/identity from the interplay of various parts of the brain, then does that mean that a person's self/identity isn't a singular thing, but a composite?

Like a body is a composite? Probably.

Yes. And as a composite, how can the 'self' be considered to be a singular thing, except perhaps, as an abstraction or an emergent property? As far as I can tell, neither abstractions nor emergent properties have ontological priority on the level of matter or phenomena. Do you conceive of your 'self' as a transient mental construct and nothing more?

[FBM]

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

Sometimes you "see" connections without being aware of the process, the links are made too fast for you to notice them.

I agree, we recognise 'good ideas'. The interesting thing is, how do those good ideas form? What is the process? Is it somehow deliberate and purposeful, or randomly chaotic?
I suspect the latter, coincidence and maybe slightly random conjunctions of ideas sort of bumping into each other and the ones that are recognised as salient are routed to an attentional system where 'we become aware of an idea'. This would be a process similar to the creative processes of evolution, which recombine existing patterns to make new patterns and discard the ones that don't work.

More of a stochastic process, perhaps?

[AshtonBlack]

I believe we are a composite of processes, as has been mentioned.
A decision to act can be reached subconsciously, with external and internal stimuli. "Muscle Memory" is the example already mentioned.
But we can also, suspend or delay an action whilst we more consciously make an imaginative model for the outcome of various actions. Personally, I think this process is variable from person to person and based on memories and experience of similar, or familiar situations and potential leaps of imagination. So I answered, yes.

How do you think 'leaps of imagination' work? What do you think goes on there?

Good question indeed. Subconscious pattern seeking is one way. By "leap of imagination" I meant imagining a situation that has never actually happened (in our experience), and being able to extract possible outcomes of a given action within that situation.

[FBM]

Not as speculative as some people are still thinking...Anyone who has not carefully developed these overseers and is given to impulse is not a moral person. Our historical choices make us moral. The sum of our moral value as human beings is in the choices we have made about which thoughts to allow free reign and which to nip...

Cool. I'm old enough to have consciously implanted a number of those automatic switch-offs myself. Let me just clarify the latter part of your post that I didn't elide. It's similar to an earlier comment by someone else that I didn't have time to respond to. You don't mean to say that a person "who has not carefully developed these overseers" is free from moral confines, right? That is, they are still bound by conventional morality, regardless of their failure to cultivate moral behavior? Earlier, someone made a comment that seemed to suggest that a person who had not cultivated moral behavior would not be a moral agent at all, which makes me

[fordo]

my mind seems mostly void of anything, i guess the continuation of vital functions, such as breathing, etc is all it wishes/can handle for now, i would like to make it function better but dont know where to start, (dont know wtf that smilie is really for but had to use it...)