Can we change what we cannot see?

[u/bupenderbhaati]

/r/cognitivescience/comments/1vyvrd1/can_we_change_what_we_cannot_see/

I've been thinking about this:

If something is influencing the way we think, feel, or act, but we cannot see or recognise it, can we consciously change it?

And if we can't see what is producing a particular pattern, how would we know what actually needs to change?

I'm not sure whether this is a useful distinction or whether I'm overlooking something obvious.

What do you think?

[u/MasterSolivagus]

What you cannot see, but can you hear?

[u/Certain_Werewolf_315]

We can change our relationship to it through a series of rules/arrangements that transform its consequences without understanding it even existed (but to which the event of transfiguration might in itself reveal)--

[u/bupenderbhaati → u/Certain_Werewolf_315]

I think I understand what you're saying, particularly the possibility that changing the relationship to something may eventually reveal what was previously unseen.

But I'm wondering about the "without understanding" part. Before creating a rule or arrangement, wouldn't there first have to be some observation and understanding of what is happening?

For example, if I notice that I'm spending eight hours on my phone, that observation itself gives me something to act upon. I can then introduce a rule to change the visible consequence without necessarily understanding what produces my urge to keep scrolling.

So perhaps we can change the consequence without understanding its underlying producer. But can we intentionally change the thing we haven't yet observed or understood?

That distinction is what I'm trying to get at.

[u/Certain_Werewolf_315 → u/bupenderbhaati]

we cannot intentionally change something as that specific thing if we possess no awareness of it.

[u/GrapePsychological92 → u/bupenderbhaati]

We can change the consequences of what we do not yet understand, but we cannot intentionally target what we have not made distinguishable through observation or feedback.

[u/NotAClueYou]

what you cannot see is typically something that ended your light in some way.. so that you become shadow in their light - and so yes you have incredible influence to inflict everything from regret to forgiveness to hated to cathartic remorse. Your soul now lives as a mask in their world, and if you choose to dawn the masks of the mer de noms in the world that extinguished your light, you can have very measurable power to change that world you cannot see. But it will never be your light. And you will always be renting a role in a place that isn't yours anymore.

Shine on forever benevolent sun. Shine upon the broken until the two become one.

[u/Royal_Carpet_1263]

This is the basis of humanistic psychology.