[MD] Many Avatars, Many Selves

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Ian]
I'll hope Arlo's "you body is irrelevant" remark was a little extreme 
for emphasis, in his context ;-)

[Arlo]
Emphasis = "context". The physiological host of any self is 
irrelevant to me in structuring my interactions with them in this 
forum. However, as I said several time, should my goal switch to 
mating, the physiological host assumes great value for me. In all 
cases, my accepting or rejecting another's "self" as it is presented 
to me has to do with what has value or meaning for me.

Marsha seems to wonder why I am harping on gender, and I do because I 
think it is a great way to disentangle "self" from "body", and a 
great way to realize that any "body" can (and does!) host multiple 
"selves". And it works as a good example because it forces people who 
say one thing to have to actually explain their conceptual framework 
in real world scenarios.

My main point, which Marsha seems to also feel I've gotten away from, 
is that "Arlo" is an avatar. "Ian" is an avatar. "Marsha" is an 
avatar. They are functionally NO different from the avatars 
inhabiting online worlds such as Second Life. Indeed, I think Krimel 
was spot on in saying that the MOQ Discuss List is every much an 
"online social world" populated by avatars as Second Life.

Conventionally, we want to say the "Arlo" who inhabits MD is "real", 
while the "Aenea" who inhabits World of Warcraft is "unreal", but 
this works only a very superficial level, and on one where we have to 
bury our heads in the sand over key issues of identity. I ask, WHAT 
makes "Arlo" real and "Aenea" unreal. And I submit that if you think 
about that, you'll eventually see that the only thing that makes this 
distinction is that you believe one is real and you believe one is 
pretend based on socially-contrived "things" that fluctuate greatly 
from person to person.

Part of this social-contrivance is the enforced notion of "one body, 
one mind, one soul". It is a socially enforced "line of continuity" 
that has usurped its socially-valuable role of providing us with 
sought after social ends and has blinded us into thinking it is some 
external, dogmatic rule. And I think it becomes evidently hollow when 
we consider the identity-history of the author we so admire (along 
with the other questions, scenarios which I've been presenting).

[Ian]
As soon as we move away from things entirely literal and objective, 
as we must in this MoQish context, then we must rely on "patterns" of 
behaviour (and intent) built-up over time; behaviors that must 
include analogy, simulation, thought-experiments, mind-games, and 
other rhetorical tricks in order to be "creative".

[Arlo]
This reminds me of Bob's talk about Chris' murder in ZMM.

"What had to be seen was that the Chris I missed so badly was not an 
object but a pattern, and that although the pattern included the 
flesh and blood of Chris, that was not all there was to it. The 
pattern was larger than Chris and myself, and related us in ways that 
neither of us understood completely and neither of us was in complete 
control of." (ZMM)

In this case, the "flesh and blood Chris" was a very significant part 
of Bob's life. And for ages of human history, most (if not nearly 
all) social relations between people included this "flesh and blood" 
aspect prominently. Sure, there were pen pals. And sure, there were 
books. But the majority of the people "who we knew" we interected 
with organically, and that included a "flesh and blood" copresence.

I submit, what about "here"? If my body were to die, and "Arlo" would 
no longer be here, reconsider the above description by Bob. The 
pattern "Arlo" which you know doesn't really included a "flesh and 
blood Arlo", does it? The pattern you would miss (well, maybe one or 
two of you would miss) would be exclusively non-organic. That pattern 
that relates us has nothing to do with my (or your) corporeal host.

This is, I think, the disentanglement that online worlds allow us to 
see. Our "selves" inhabit social worlds that have very little to do 
with the physiological world (although still something, certainly not 
"nothing") and this allows us to see the "patterns" which we call 
self without the illusion that the "flesh and blood" component is 
such a large part of that.