I understand the steps I took to get here, and yet I’m horrified by my conclusion

[feotakahari]

I don’t deny multiples’ lived experience. Let’s start with that. Each headmate is a person.

Some multiples have visitors. People come from other worlds, hang out in the headspace, and go away again. Even if I don’t believe their worlds are real, the visitors are apparently real enough while they’re present.

Reality shifters believe the worlds they visit and the people they talk to are real. That seems like the equal and opposite of having a visitor in your headspace. Perhaps the people the shifters talk to are real for the duration of the conversation, whatever “real” means in this context.

Other shifters are horrified whenever a shifter goes to a world and tortures someone there. They say that’s like torturing someone in real life. What if they’re actually right?

Comments

[wingedcatgirl]

Oh, that's what reality shifting is. We keep hearing about that xth-hand and being like "huh what's that about" and then getting distracted by something shiny before we can look into it.

[ilzolende]

I think without denying multiples' lived experiences, you can say that headmates are people of unusually low (uptime × compute)? It seems possible that a multiple is capable of experiencing somewhat more joy or sorrow than a typical singlet, but it's still fundamentally bounded by brain capabilities. Probably the bounds on the brain's capability for joy or sorrow or whatnot can be estimated by looking at people on drugs or with mental illnesses that increase emotional range.

Also, like, ignoring effects on the person being hurt, hurting people is actually often bad for the person doing it.

[lb_lee]

Wait, so reality shifters are like... astral travelers or whatever? Yeah, I'd say going and torturing people wherever you are is a bad thing, regardless of whether I believe in them or not. (Then again, these days I feel uncomfortable with video games where you can torment people. I KNOW they're not real, I KNOW they're just pixels, but some part of my brain goes, "but that's how other people see me...")

[feotakahari]

It’s mostly traveling to fictional universes. I couldn’t find a neutral source on it, so here’s one that’s anti:

https://hyperallergic.com/615655/reality-shifting-tiktok/

[lb_lee]

OHHHHHH this old shit. Draven was calling it "bilocating" back in the early '00s, IIRC. Same thing, new wrapper. Thanks for the explanation, I thought it was maybe something like this. Astral plane/headspace/other world traveling, okay.

And yeah, I about stand by what I said. Even if said entity being tortured isn't real... I mean, it says something about the shifter, that they'd be willing to torture someone. Belief is immaterial; the behavior still says something awful. So I don't think your logic path is messed up at all; it makes perfect sense to me! (Says the crazy person.)

--Rogan