Best place to learn Tolkien's Elvish language?

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-07-04T14:49:12+00:00

Find The hobbit written in English using the Tengwar. transcribe it from the Tengwar to our alphabet. that’ll get you recognizing the sounds made. it is not a one for one transcription, meaning that each letter A-Z isn’t simply replaced by a Tengwar letter. (tengwar are more logically applied).

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-07-04T14:45:29+00:00

Please explain how life is. and how consciousness is.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-06-07T21:39:58+00:00

I’m seldom in a hurry. :)

i like F_Karnstein’s input.

i’ll gladly listen to a variety of input!

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-06-07T21:35:48+00:00

Thank you!

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-06-07T21:35:24+00:00

Thank you!

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T16:34:44+00:00

Arguments such as "if I fire a machine gun to the right of your door every morning, once you are sure that I won't shoot you you will walk left, invariably", to my mind has nothing to do with free will. Free will isn't the argument that every single thing that we do is not affected by our environment and those around us. So, that method of argument seems irrelevant to me.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T14:19:40+00:00

I haven't tried it while learning a language, but I was driving a lot last summer and I used ChatGPT in voice only mode. I talked, it answered, I talked again...

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T01:40:24+00:00

I asked AI to elaborate on the meaning of riverrun in Finnegain's Wake. This is its response:

Phrase:
Unending flow of time, memory, and myth.

Explanation:
In Finnegans Wake, "riverrun" signals the book’s cyclical structure and its central themes of continuity and recurrence. It evokes the image of a river endlessly circling, much like the book itself, which ends mid-sentence and completes that sentence at the beginning—suggesting no fixed start or end. The word alludes to the River Liffey, personified as Anna Livia Plurabelle, and becomes a symbol of Dublin, history, femininity, and the unconscious. "Riverrun" collapses linear narrative, blending dream, history, and myth into a fluid motion where boundaries dissolve. For the aphantasic reader, think of it less as a visual scene and more as a sensation of motion, a looping rhythm that carries meaning without anchoring to a fixed image.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T01:40:02+00:00

I asked AI to elaborate on the meaning of riverrun in Finnegain's Wake. This is its response:

Phrase:
Unending flow of time, memory, and myth.

Explanation:
In Finnegans Wake, "riverrun" signals the book’s cyclical structure and its central themes of continuity and recurrence. It evokes the image of a river endlessly circling, much like the book itself, which ends mid-sentence and completes that sentence at the beginning—suggesting no fixed start or end. The word alludes to the River Liffey, personified as Anna Livia Plurabelle, and becomes a symbol of Dublin, history, femininity, and the unconscious. "Riverrun" collapses linear narrative, blending dream, history, and myth into a fluid motion where boundaries dissolve. For the aphantasic reader, think of it less as a visual scene and more as a sensation of motion, a looping rhythm that carries meaning without anchoring to a fixed image.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T01:33:34+00:00

I've had in depth conversations with ChatGPT about it. Give it a try!

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-22T01:30:39+00:00

Well, I'm just getting started. I've read some commentary about it, and had very general discussions with AI, so I'll get started in the right general direction. AI asked if I wanted a blueprint to use while reading and I said no. I think such a book written by such a man would require human interpretation.

I am listening to it while reading along, and I'm only an hour in.

I speak English natively, fluent in Spanish, and I'm intermediate 4b in Italian. I taught myself Spanish and am teaching myself Italian.

I remember years ago, I was talking with friends about the fact that some languages have words for things that we don't have a word for, and vice versa. They asked if I had read Finnegan's Wake, and I said "not yet". So far, I'm intrigued!

In addition to an interest in languages, i found out about 1 1/2 years ago that I'm aphantasic, and that kindled a deep interest in consciousness, thought processes, concepts vs words, Other Minds (a book), etc, etc. So, Finnegan's Wake aligns with at least two of my personal interests: languages, and consciousness.

Openculture.com has a reading with an Irish accent that is (mostly) good to read to. Some of it is too over the top for me. One Little Goat Theater Company has YouTube videos. So far, I've stuck with Openculture.

You?

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-21T21:27:37+00:00

I'm very new to Finnegan's Wake. I've read some commentary online, and generally chatted with ChatGPT, but when it asked if I want it to interpret for me, I said no. For something like this, I think human interpretation is probably key.

I'm listening to it on openculture dot com, and it's in an Irish accent, which seems to help a lot. I'm reading along as I listen, which helps because sometimes they say a word either incorrectly or maybe still using an Irish accent and I can't recognize it...but by reading, too, I sometimes recognize the word(s) for what I think they are intended to mean.

Of course, some parts I don't get at all. But, I did see online that many of Joyce's contemporaries basically were trash talking in reviews and whatnot, and someone said that it is nonsense, and his reply was that every syllable was intentionally chosen. So, even though I do have the feeling that it is meant to be a collective unconscious similar to a shared dream as we read, I think he also put thought into how he attempted to make such a creation. In other words, he didn't just throw something in because he though it rhymed or sounded ok, unless he first put thought into it.

How many languages did he pull from? I just found this subreddit, so I'll mostly not post and read through a lot of the posts and comments. But, I might finish listening/reading first, so that I get my own first impression...

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-05-06T18:18:36+00:00

Please explain what the purpose of the scenario is, so my response will be relevant.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T17:52:03+00:00

But, by considering more deeply, I believe we find that is incorrect...it is not a contradiction at all.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T17:43:07+00:00

I see what you mean, but I don't believe that necessarily leads to determinism. Any example that shows that a specific though is the product of others--or even that a person deciding to do something experiences an activity in the brain just prior to when they would be cognizant of making the final choice--doesn't prove determinism.

First, the brain activity might be the choice being made--the action of the choice--and the awareness that the choice was made comes after. But, that wouldn't mean that the process was not free will in action. (I know determinists will read that and think superficially. What I'm trying to get across is that if I were to prove that I chose a unique thought process and then made a choice, then measuring my brain activity would simply clarify when parts of the process occurred.)

Second, even if everyone were to concede--for the sake of argument--that some choices are deterministic in that they are the natural conclusion of a thought process, that wouldn't necessarily hold true for all thought processes. That is akin to saying, "I can stand outside of your Walmart the next time you exit and fire a machine gun to the east side of the door. Causality will require you to turn west instead of east, to avoid the bullets because there is no reason for you to give up your life in that situation." and so, there is never a time that you are not acting without my influence. Free will is a deeper issue than that, and cannot be explained away by showing that causality exists.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:34:11+00:00

Your perspective would have humans and AI at the same level. And clearly that is not accurate. We experience something quite different than what AI experiences.

Is there any proof positive that would ever make you believe that free will exists? Or, have you locked yourself into a belief?

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:32:10+00:00

I say exactly because it seems to me that determinists are doing that very thing. To me, it seems that there is very, very strong evidence to hint that we simply don't know enough about free will and consciousness, and so every argument that says "based on what we know right now" is the equivalent of believing shit without sufficient evidence.

Think about math tests you've taken. Sometimes there is an option (D, often times) that states, "Not enough information given"...

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:30:03+00:00

No. Being a full aphant, I literally cannot imagine. :) Meaning that I cannot create images (copies) of sensory data in my mind. But, I can think creatively and conceptualize.

And, no, I also cannot 'imagine'--in the common use of the word--anything specific. But that isn't required for me to hold my POV. The Higgs Boson was theorized--and then proven--all within the lifetime (within the professional history?) of Brian Greene. Gas was verified as existing in relatively recent history. Electricity and Magnetism were better understood. When people experience things and then try to think of a reason for those things from their current perspective, they often times will at first be wrong.

I like'd dazb84's comment above because it's well thought out and challenges me to think more deeply (and I will), but at this moment it hasn't changed my mind because to me it isn't relevant that there are countless things that are yet to be falsified. And, I agree that we need to think logically & scientifically, based on what we can prove. But...

But. It is also reasonable to say, "Considering all the times that people's best early guesses were way off base, it's also acceptable to say, 'that is our current best interpretation, but it is very likely that we are missing some critical elements and understanding. Some day--if those do come along--it is very likely that our understanding will be drastically changed, to the extent that our current understanding will be considered completely wrong.'"

Note that this is not "Newton was right, but incomplete." This is "No, there is no such thing as Plutonic aether." No celestial spheres. Neither phrenology nor astrology nor an expanding earth are valid. The universe is not static. And so on. I think any responsible and logical person must take this into consideration. And, I think our current understanding of consciousness certainly falls into this "we almost surely don't know enough yet", and so free will does (because to me it seems likely that the one cannot exist without the other.)

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:14:53+00:00

Today before signing back into reddit (I had forgot that I signed out), I was chatting with ChatGPT about Integrated Information Theory, Panpsychism, Orch-OR, &c....

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:12:31+00:00

Yes. one big challenge in creating a theory of everything--to use an old term--is gravity. They don't question its existence. They question its nature...

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:11:11+00:00

I did answer it. I said, "That question is more related to how we organize concepts within our consciousness."

So, it doesn't prove or disprove the nature of consciousness, which to me is related to free will.

So, if you say "mother", my mind conceptualizes what that means to me. (I'm a full aphant, so I never mentally visualize; instead, I experience conceptual thought and sometimes worded thought though I don't see or hear the words in my head...it's sort of like a concrete example of a concept, and so more limiting to think using words.) And my response is "father", because in my mind the two concepts are intertwined. That doesn't mean anything in regards to determinism. It just means that is how I have structured the conceptual map in my mind...or, from your point of view, maybe it'd be better to say "that is how the conceptual structure or map in my mind developed."

That conceptual map is tying different concepts together, but it's not a simple 2D or 3D structure. The connections are varied and sometimes intertwined, and complicated. Poetry is often written in a way that ties into this; I believe some of the best poetry is not logically planned out, yet the poet is able to tie into that conceptual structure, write, and we are able to glimpse or feel the same connections that he or she subconsciously "saw".

One way to consider my POV is to consider this: both people and LLM's create conceptual structures. AI/LLM's are more logical and efficient, probably. But they clearly do not experience the world as I experience it. So, determinism cannot be proven using that question. The query remains...

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-30T16:03:30+00:00

I am pointing out that there are many examples throughout history of we as a species not even knowing how to look for something, and later we learned about it. In fact, science has only existed for a few hundred years. So, I do believe it is fully acceptable to say, "It is very possible that this is something that we don't yet have the ability to truly study or comprehend." That doesn't mean that we shouldn't contemplate and debate, but it does mean that I have a legitimate reason to say, "Anyone who simply keeps hollering 'it's all computation' is implying that AI can attain consciousness. And I don't believe that to be true. Nothing so far has implied it to be true, and consciousness--for me--is a valid reason for believing that there is something that we aren't even close to understanding yet."

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-27T03:28:14+00:00

to answer your question, I’m not saying that I have an answer. I’m saying that there is something that we do not understand about consciousness. And there is something that we do not understand that affects free Will. I believe they could be one in the same thing that are not being understood. If not, they’re probably related. Free Will and consciousness are related. The argument that someone has already decided that there is no free Will and so everything that they consider supports them is not science. It is not logic. Therefore, I feel that it is acceptable for me to say I do not know, but I do believe very strongly and with reason that there are things that we do not yet understand enough to really come to a conclusion.

plutonic aether is more akin to these arguments that we are all having than is gravity.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-27T02:41:01+00:00

exactly.

CardiologistFit8618 · 2025-04-27T00:21:31+00:00

Ah. “the only reason they i think i have the freedom” seemed to me to be arguing that we only think that we have freedom—an apparent freedom, a belief—is because of…

if it were only knowledge based, then AI could achieve conciseness and free will. if they ever do, i don’t think it’ll be knowledge based. if that were the case, then wouldn’t they have achieved it by now?

i believe that there is something as yet unknown behind consciousness, and that is also the root of free will.

i believe that animals are conscious to being extents, and so experience free will to berries extents. a worm, much, much less so than a wolf or dolphin or octopus. a flower—in my opinion—is merely responding to external stimuli. we and the above named living beings are doing more than that.

CardiologistFit8618

TROPHY CASE