About sharing an experience
March 11th 2010 10:10
It was a British TV show, and there was a female celebrity, and... I can't remember... either she was talking about relationships and whether she needed anyone, or she'd recently lost someone and was discussing what was missing.
In any case, she gave this example: -- If you do have someone around, and you see a fox in the garden, then you can call the other person and say to them, "Look -- a fox in the garden!"
In my memory I've taken this to illustrate an impulse to share experiences -- particularly meaningful experiences, or experiences that are also in some sense ephemeral -- "you had to be there" to understand...
So why share experiences? What rationality lies behind the impulse?
Here's some speculations...
Perhaps it's about preserving something important -- in this case using another's brain as your backup drive.
Or it's about testing and self-validation -- seeing if the other person agrees with you that this is interesting or important. For people are obsessed with such issues -- whether their taste is on track, whether their appearance, physique, IQ are up to scratch, whether their behaviour and desires are normal...
Or testing the other person -- seeing how they react to this thing that means something to you.
Or it's about creating a bond, furthering a relationship. And as to why shared experience unites... well, that's a question for another time. But, on a purely practical level, the more experiences you have in common with someone, the more accurate your guesses of what they're thinking about, and the greater your understanding of how they're thinking, thought being influenced by memory and training, and the faster you can communicate, and the larger the pool of references you can allude to.
Or the experience itself is somehow enhanced or made more valuable when shared, if only because you've got someone else with whom to discuss it.
Or perhaps it's some sort of Darwinian urge -- to share knowledge, to increase the survival chances of the species...
A Midas myth... One version has it that Midas is cursed by Apollo with the ears of an ass. Midas conceals his shame, but his barber feels the need to tell. He can't contain himself. So he whispers the secret into the reeds of the river.
But when some pipes are made of those reeds, they proclaim to everyone who hears them: "King Midas has donkey's ears"...
Why was the barber impelled to speak?
More questions for another time...
What is the temptation to tell a secret? And what is the pleasure? Something to do with the exercise of power? Or the lure of the forbidden? Or relief of duty -- the feeling that you no longer have to take trouble to protect the secret? Or the desire to initiate someone to help you protect the secret, and to lessen the responsibility? Or the desire to normalize yourself, bring someone else into your condition, so that you're unalone?
Or perhaps the lure of truth, the urge to make all things open?
Guilt is a weight, as you accuse yourself, and worry over consequences (legal, afterlife, karmic consequences)... There's all sorts of reasons it weighs on you -- for instance, evolutionary reasons, and reasons of virtue indoctrination... But why is secret guilt more of a weight? -- Because you have additional worries over being found out? Because you feel you will be found out, and are waiting for the axe to fall? Because you think you ought to be found out?
Why in general does confession, or sharing a secret, bring relief?
And why does grief lessen when shared?
In any case, she gave this example: -- If you do have someone around, and you see a fox in the garden, then you can call the other person and say to them, "Look -- a fox in the garden!"
In my memory I've taken this to illustrate an impulse to share experiences -- particularly meaningful experiences, or experiences that are also in some sense ephemeral -- "you had to be there" to understand...
***
So why share experiences? What rationality lies behind the impulse?
Here's some speculations...
Perhaps it's about preserving something important -- in this case using another's brain as your backup drive.
Or it's about testing and self-validation -- seeing if the other person agrees with you that this is interesting or important. For people are obsessed with such issues -- whether their taste is on track, whether their appearance, physique, IQ are up to scratch, whether their behaviour and desires are normal...
Or testing the other person -- seeing how they react to this thing that means something to you.
Or it's about creating a bond, furthering a relationship. And as to why shared experience unites... well, that's a question for another time. But, on a purely practical level, the more experiences you have in common with someone, the more accurate your guesses of what they're thinking about, and the greater your understanding of how they're thinking, thought being influenced by memory and training, and the faster you can communicate, and the larger the pool of references you can allude to.
Or the experience itself is somehow enhanced or made more valuable when shared, if only because you've got someone else with whom to discuss it.
Or perhaps it's some sort of Darwinian urge -- to share knowledge, to increase the survival chances of the species...
***
A Midas myth... One version has it that Midas is cursed by Apollo with the ears of an ass. Midas conceals his shame, but his barber feels the need to tell. He can't contain himself. So he whispers the secret into the reeds of the river.
But when some pipes are made of those reeds, they proclaim to everyone who hears them: "King Midas has donkey's ears"...
Why was the barber impelled to speak?
***
More questions for another time...
What is the temptation to tell a secret? And what is the pleasure? Something to do with the exercise of power? Or the lure of the forbidden? Or relief of duty -- the feeling that you no longer have to take trouble to protect the secret? Or the desire to initiate someone to help you protect the secret, and to lessen the responsibility? Or the desire to normalize yourself, bring someone else into your condition, so that you're unalone?
Or perhaps the lure of truth, the urge to make all things open?
Guilt is a weight, as you accuse yourself, and worry over consequences (legal, afterlife, karmic consequences)... There's all sorts of reasons it weighs on you -- for instance, evolutionary reasons, and reasons of virtue indoctrination... But why is secret guilt more of a weight? -- Because you have additional worries over being found out? Because you feel you will be found out, and are waiting for the axe to fall? Because you think you ought to be found out?
Why in general does confession, or sharing a secret, bring relief?
And why does grief lessen when shared?
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