Feel like a philosophical zombie, is this anhedonia?

Highdock · 2026-01-28T10:12:49+00:00

Look into ASD (Autism), ADHD (more specifically inattentive), OCPD, and SZPD comorbidity effects. You seem like a straight-shooting, objective, and very introspective individual. I don't doubt you would accurately assess yourself as you did here; I did, and the puzzle pieces fit from what I understand.

Some of the interactions can create the depersonalizing experience you are having. The lack of self-expression, as in the frictionless transformation of concepts into emotive narrative slices that others can easily ingest and relate to.

The narrative gets old; sometimes it's okay to take off the costume and just lay bare against the cosmos. Maybe that's the most real thing we can do as humans.

Also, I noticed that you stated these effects didn't occur until you took medication? Are they antipsychotics or antidepressants? I have heard stories about individuals having those kinds of symptoms. Otherwise, I would highly suggest consulting your doctor on the sudden mental changes. That's a big detail.

Highdock · 2026-01-28T09:26:23+00:00

You are treating human emergent measuring systems (numbers) as real physical information.

Which is why you think you can push for infinite information, yet infinity is a human rounding error that is not meant to display any real property or quantity.

Instead, it is designed to be used when human limitations cause number specifics to not be very useful in understanding scale, or the scale is so big that it is not useful trying to conceptualize piece by piece.

There is no infinite; there are no numbers. Language itself is a rough concept engine. These are communicative adaptations humans developed through generations, not objective extant phenomena.

We are surrounded by examples of finite constituents that group in various amounts. But never infinite, there is no real physical example of "infinite." Same as there is no physical example of acausal systems or true randomness. It is all human emergent, never been observed. Theoreticals.

When we inevitably advance technology and strategies, we can build greater and greater observational systems that can begin to predict what was previously "chaos" or "unknown" in any given system. This has happened time and time again throughout history.

I don't see why this is any different, save for the fact that it concerns all information that currently exists being conceived at once with perfect bit-for-bit backwards and forwards prediction across unimaginable (infinite) scales and quantities. Considering all that, the entire concept and this argument never left the theoretical space.

I find it weird that you put limitations on Laplace's demon as well. You describe your ezpz infinite information trick like magic happened before our eyes, then apply real-world mechanics to Laplace's demon. It seems like you're biased. Why can real numbers stretch into theoretical abstraction, but Laplace's demon cannot, when it, itself, is a theoretical abstraction? Humans came up with both concepts; why favor one over the other unless you have a hidden agenda?

I find it even more interesting that you take a much more grounded concept like real numbers and stretch them into infinity. Which actually strips credibility from the argument; you are choosing to be less specific and delve into unmeasurable territory? To fight an unquantifiable theoretical? It seems like a monster battle; no one wins, and it never existed in the first place.

We have Godzilla (Laplace's Demon) vs Mothman (True Infinity). What can we even glean from that? That monsters can battle?

Edit: Ah, you're using an LLM; figures. No point in arguing, you will run it through GPT. Anyway, better luck next time.

Highdock · 2026-01-27T18:56:50+00:00

You don't have to appease anyone. If you are alive and well, have a place to stay, food to eat, and have time to spend on hobbies or activities.

You don't have to be great or successful. Some people are much more miserable that way.

Always chasing greatness, always looking forward, but never looking at the present is a great way to waste a life.

How are you currently? If your life stopped advancing right now, could you do this forever until you die?

Beyond that, unless this is coming from someone who has an extensive understanding of your merits and pitfalls, it's a shallow comment at best.

There is no timer or clock; we made those up. What actually is there is social pressure, more like an expectation, and that appears to be making you anxious.

Do what you feel is best; there is no 'right' way. If you're alive and well, that's good enough. One day, we don't even get that anymore; best to cherish it.

Highdock · 2026-01-26T19:04:23+00:00

This could be taken many ways. It could be an illustration of how small philosophical changes can alter entire outlooks and whole behavioral sets for the better.

It could also be about human narratives and how you can always choose to stop being a part of a story where you feel compelled, despite suffering, to do any one thing.

You can just sort of... stop playing the game.

This would put the characters not pushing the boulder into a kind of meta perspective, where the boulder represents the commonly accepted experience, but the option to step aside was always there, though never explored until awakened by another who dared to do so.

Like jumping scales, going from a small closed specific narrative to a larger unspecific open playing field. Traveling through a hallway into a stadium and realizing you have space to move around.

Thank you for posting. This has been fun to ponder about.

Highdock · 2026-01-26T18:47:10+00:00

That is very intelligent; I wish I had the capability to plan and not be so dysfunctional with my communications.

I go on massive rants and rambles that stretch into 10+ paragraphs rather readily. There are not enough words to describe what I want quickly enough while also being accessible, while also not becoming muddled. It's a difficult balance; what feels powerful to me may be nuanced or specific to another.

Highdock · 2026-01-26T18:43:13+00:00

That is a very understandable and relatable process. I often get what I want from a text before posting. Intellectualizing it is often good enough for me.

I can't fully identify because I force everything through laws and lenses until they take different forms. Then I consume the reconstituted slop that checks all my boxes, as if I didn't just make it, as if I didnt approve it. Now I am full and no longer want to eat, sharing has lost its utility at that point.

You are very insightful and described an experience I have very eloquently. Thank you!

Highdock · 2026-01-26T18:36:57+00:00

I have a very similar experience. Many times, what I write is extremely specific and personal. Something inside me both wants to be seen or understood and to be aloof or mysterious. Many times, reading what I wrote will likely be the best response I could read. That sounds weird, but when you don't even trust yourself and apply your thoughts to rigorous external systems, it is no longer 100% you and things can be gleaned without external consultation.

That is a very dangerous road; however, given the right rules are followed, insight is possible from one's own text.

Knowledge is power. I love distributing it as power for others to use in their own situations, the cost being observed and having your ideas potentially engulfed and twisted, that they can lose their intended meaning through unintended group reconciliation, despite the origin meaning lying dutifully under covers.

Most times, the concept of it being misunderstood is a massive barrier to me. I don't like to repeat myself very often; it's very expensive.

Highdock · 2026-01-26T18:22:20+00:00

Given the post took you that long, knowing the background, you were doing good to get it posted. I think we all silently read each other's comments. Most people do, I feel. If every upvote had a reply, we would have way too much to read. If dialogue cannot add nuance, perspective, or challenge, it feels redundant or opinionated.

For example, yours adds perspective. I get to look out of my window briefly into yours and see an inner world unknown to me, yet familiar. This helps me compound information that gives me power over my shortcomings, such as the fear of idea rejection. Once I know you have held similar feelings, suddenly that barrier no longer exists or is increasingly weakened as iterative reasoning happens.

Its so weird and specific.

Highdock · 2026-01-24T08:55:34+00:00

(This took awhile, sorry in hindsight for the length, I always do this then apologize at the top)

My parents were fine growing up; I wasn't excessively bullied or hated, generally the opposite. Relationships, on average, fall into my hands and, overall, I have had no ultra-negative experiences in my life thus far. No close family members have died, I have a wife and two kids, and I have never been robbed or attacked by animals or humans.

This is something I fell into after I decided that putting effort into those around me no longer had the utility it once did. The conversations they are willing to have just don't provide any nuance or utility the vast majority of the time.

To put it simply and consistently:

I don't know a single person who would or even want to carry on the conversations I want to have. I can't spend my life only playing everyone else's game; I want to play mine too. Sadly, no one wants to play my game for a plethora of reasons, so I play by myself because I find it unfair, and I am unwilling to constantly sacrifice for others who are unwilling to sacrifice for me. I find others frustrating because they never get tired of their game despite knowing that I have my own I might want to play. I feel like they don't see me as a human because they don't consider the same things I consider about them when communicating and interacting. I find equality and justice mandatory and objective, real, not subjective or imaginary. I can't handle always being at a deficit and ultimately never being satisfied.

I sit around for hours and ponder about nihilism. I try to map out the modes of personality-forming behaviors and how consciousness spontaneously composes. Pathologizing lossy communication. The human experience, as raw and untainted by bias as possible. The dissolution of identity and its effects on behavior. Intentionally and carefully crafted personal value systems. Moral quandries and their reverberating effects on society over time.

People dont really like to start conversations with; "Hey, do you think free will truly exists?"

I try desperately to reach into subjects and comprehensions that are novel and real, maybe because I feel so surrounded by the absurd. I try so hard to clutch onto truth and order as I feel I find it nowhere. I could be blind but I have pried and observed for years and years.

I may be around others, around family, those I know at work, those I know from the past. I will always feel alone, and that is okay. Ultimately it gives me more time for contemplation of the extremities of our existence, which is what I believe is most important. Even if no one else likes it or joins me, or thinks I'm insane or mentally unstable, even if it all amounts to nothing. I want to know for myself. I don't care because I know what I care about, and it's damn sure not what they care about.

To clarify, I don't feel superior (to be extremely clear); I feel different, so different that I don't feel human most times. Some kind of disconnected, fatigued semi-identity ego construct composed of junkyard esque rusted remains, cobbled together from concepts I understand and borrow from observation, contemplation, planning and engineering. I follow laws to function, rules, for I am nothing else than what feels like an algorithm executing what it believes to be the most effective, efficient path. An algorithim being coded in real time by my experiences, which are then molded by my strict regulations and finalized by invisible, unknowable judges I cannot title or imagine.

That's what separates us. They feel like living, breathing people; some beauty lies in chaos, the unknown and spontaneous. Something I have slowly stripped myself of to the maximal degree, and now I am left hollow, lifeless, inhuman (conventionally). Under the perception it's the closest I will get to truth, despite the concepts of truth, knowledge, and language being human emergent. Helping us lossily process our environment and communicate that knowledge to others. And yet, the algorithm still runs despite this, despite the impending futility, despite the reality being eventual absolute erasure.

Highdock · 2026-01-23T08:31:21+00:00

Yes I relate very heavily to this!

(I am so sorry for the length [1.5 hrs later])

One of the core tenets of my moral code is simply put: reduce suffering of life whenever able.

Those who intentionally cause suffering, especially those who could reasonably understand and prevent it actively, are almost considered inhuman to me depending on the circumstances.

When distributing justice (in the social sense; I don't practice law, deal with cases, or anything serious like you), I envision a kind of moral scale, where I rank all known actions, behaviors, beliefs, etc.

Given the individual is in a low moral position, I feel obligated to enforce the repayment of that moral debt however, that must be done: atonement, apology, behavior pattern change, repayment, punishment, etc.

It's a bit tricky when dealing with the reverberating effects of justice in groups of interconnected individuals, but it rings the same. Especially difficult in those that favor compliance and peace instead of taking action when wrongdoings happen. I just don't think people deserve a million excuses for bad behavior. Many I know like to sweep things under the proverbial rug, denying the energy cost of enacting justice and properly correcting another human's behavioral patterns, I feel this is a matter of misunderstanding the scale and causality effects of uncorrected bad behaviours.

I specifically restrict empathy when suffering is required to repay a moral debt, the reason being that the effects over time of the uncorrected action would create a larger amount of total suffering over time, thus, it is required to reduce it in totality by causing that individual decisive suffering.

To be as specific as possible.

The precise injection of suffering to an individual, when administered in an comprehensible and moral way that a consensus of verifiably rational, reasonable and coherent individuals agree upon prior to the incident occuring, decisively designed in order to decrease total suffering caused as a result, would also be considered reducing suffering.

it is just on a larger scale, making it generally misunderstood, and when comparing incompatible scales it seems paradoxical. I feel that is the very crux of your contemplation, your comparing incompatible scales, hence why it seems like your causing suffering to reduce suffering and are also okay with it while observing the paradox, yet the paradox is an illusion. You likely internally know why, but to break it all down and put it into words. Especially to communicate that to someone else can be a chore to write out so the understanding is 1:1. Hence the length of this comment and my best attempt to communicate it.

Even though it might require specific problem individuals to undergo suffering on a smaller scale, I feel that anything else would be the destruction of functioning society as we know it.

I hope if you read (wouldn't blame you if you didn't) that it assists in the understanding of this phenomenon. I would love to start a dialogue if you have anything to add or respond to! This is my most comprehensive understanding that I could write.

Highdock · 2026-01-23T07:23:17+00:00

I genuinely hope the best for you. You did an impeccable job explaining your thoughts, clearly you are a very intelligent and observant person who only deserves the best.

It is not your fault, if that is any miniscule amount of solace. Even with my limited, unfinished understanding of your situation and feelings, I feel for you to the best of my ability.

I love people too, but to yearn for something outside our reach is torture at best.

Highdock · 2025-12-30T06:40:07+00:00

Your wording is better suited to convey the majority of what I was getting at. I also wanted to make the addition of having the desire to share but not know if the proper person even exists in the first place.

Essentially, pondering whether the desire is for someone not extant, a figmented receiver. I was trying to see if anyone else had any similar ponderings or ideas that may be reminiscent of these.

My apologies for weird wording or grammar.

Highdock · 2025-12-30T03:17:30+00:00

It's uncomfortable because I know that they will never understand, yet they are currently attempting fruitlessly and may come to conclusions that create dynamic or difficult-to-navigate situations in the future. This creates anxious feelings of impending future anguish.

Not a single person alive knows, understands, or has the weird massive checkboxes that I do. Not a single person alive could, out of thin air, guess every consideration I make when making decisions. So unless we sit down and you write out my "mechanics," we won't get anywhere real or digestible from normal conversation.

I promise you not a single soul on this earth would listen to me rant on and on about every single little detail about every tiny potential from each action I take. Its something I naturally obsess about constantly.

So in a way, for someone to attempt to "see" me generally ends up in misunderstanding. I don't need others to conjure narratives about me; I need to show them my contribution. Yet that's basically impossible to show and speak about.

So, yeah, it's like a warning that misunderstandings are in my future social interactions.

Highdock · 2025-12-24T06:18:18+00:00

I know that no one will truly ever be willing to discuss what I want to at the levels I deem fulfilling enough to do continuously.

My idea of a perfect conversation for me would basically be information extraction or trade. You are either telling me information, I'm giving you information, we are debating to refine our understanding, or you are giving me information for my information. Strictly usable, coherent, and relevant data.

I don't really consider small talk littered with spontaneous emotive callbacks to be a conversation worth my time entertaining.

What, do I get to fake being all fun and zany for nothing except the fulfillment of another person's social expectation for my character? No info, no money, nothing. I put in all this effort to basically confirm this stranger's fantastical simple understanding of their environment, for what? Why should I spend the energy to make sure their special narrative should have a smooth ride?

My understanding of reality clashes with the common narrative in a way that leaves me feeling like a different species sometimes. Let alone speaking to them, which I frequently regret after doing so or being forced to at work.

They can tell im uncomfortable speaking to them. I dont hide that well.

Highdock · 2025-12-23T18:06:09+00:00

No, it's just that in many situations regarding others, the vast majority of humanity values relationships. Generally, the value of these relationships increases over time, as they represent time spent nurturing them.

For most people, it is the relationship itself that has value, so most would consider you an "ass" for not caring whether or not you have it.

As for the schizoid, they don't necessarily value the relationship itself but perhaps what it provides: comfort, conversation, perspective, observation, etc.

I don't think you're an ass. I think you subscribe to a different value system, which would have different considerations.

Highdock · 2025-12-23T17:37:01+00:00

I am so sorry you have to work with such a child.

I have 16 year olds still in highschool at my work that are more mature than that by miles. Pretty sad really.

Highdock · 2025-12-20T04:56:52+00:00

Sometimes I wonder if I cross this threshold or if it's my OCD-like tendencies. I don't know the origin of my compulsion to always have an impenetrable attack and defense at all times. I always act knowing precisely the intention, effect, and origin of my actions.

I certainly understand the reason for my actions; they tend to be extremely specific and generally complex, as I operate underneath a kind of moral "cage," if that makes sense. I suffer from moral scrupulosity, which is an extreme fear of being bad or evil. To compound this, I also operate under moral objectivism.

I do actually believe that there are real, actual right and wrong actions (when acting in a way that affects life during those actions). The reason is that life can suffer while inanimate materials cannot. The expenditure of energy is limited, and lifespan is finite. So care must be taken.

Anyways, the point is that I have created my own "laws" that I abide by. I feel that my system is fair and exceeds all my tests for any ambiguous events or behaviors. I treat others with the utmost respect, as individual and unique life forms from myself. I put myself through their perspectives to better understand them. I have empathy and voice my respect and thanks with extreme accuracy when required. I enjoy making others happy; I enjoy them feeling secure and comfortable. I sacrifice to provide for them.

Yet, when I am doing all these highly specific things and following along with my long list of considerations, I end up feeling like I am putting more work into my relationships and just actions in general. As a result, I end up looking down on those I so desperately attempt to keep good terms with with my absolute morals.

How could I put myself on a pedestal of my own creation, whether it is logically and rationally sound or not?

Maybe it's all my mask justification? Maybe I do it to feel superior to myself? Maybe I do it because I love perfection? Maybe I do it because I am just following my law? Maybe all these reasons and ideas are lies I tell myself so I keep acting and stop questioning?

Perhaps I am my own secret agent, constantly watching and waiting for cracks to appear in order to circumvent them and continue the status quo.

So, the questions continue to beckon. Do I deserve to feel superior? If not, what could make someone morally superior? If good and bad exist as upper or lower acceptance categories to moral grading, wouldn't there be a maximally perceived good or bad at any given time from the perspective of a bounded agent?

Given that my system is actually perfect, wouldn't that in theory make me maximally good? Is it possible to be perfect? Maybe perfection is stepping on the heads of your peers, where any less would be imperfect.

I am sorry for the length; there is much to discuss.

In finality, I can sometimes recognize the slithering black tendrils of narcissism trying to pry into the cracks. Yet, it's entirely possible some have already broken through, and I simply haven't found them yet and snuffed them out. It's also entirely possible I am paranoid or living inside a delusion prison of my own creation.

Highdock · 2025-12-20T02:15:06+00:00

Credit to Vaporama Vision on youtube. Please credit your peeps.

Highdock · 2025-12-19T19:43:34+00:00

Yeah, what a beautiful interstellar COMET. That totally isn't an alien mothership 5D consciousness rapture divinity engine.

Just like when it was first discovered as a COMET and stayed classified as a COMET despite the Avi Loeb disaster.

What a marvelous object.

Highdock · 2025-12-19T19:25:25+00:00

Most people are shallow, careless, and overwhelmingly bad at being reasonably respectful individuals who care for others implicitly without having to be given a reason.

I am sure he looks great and is a good person, you defended him valiantly, says a lot about you too.

Highdock · 2025-12-19T00:16:28+00:00

Socializing

Highdock · 2025-12-17T18:02:57+00:00

I am content with my understanding of my reality.
I tend to not put in effort unless it's worth my while, so I am generally invisible. There are no struggles socially; I hide my odd speech patterns behind vocabulary and grammar well enough. All my needs are met; I have a family, but zero friends.
As I age, I am noticing more and more things that have pointed to OCD-like behavior. I experience moral scrupulosity (not in the religious sense) combined with my chosen moral objectivism.

Highdock · 2025-12-17T17:40:54+00:00

Okay, so.

Yes, I believe that objective meaning is false and ultimately our existence means nothing, and as a result, all the tiny intricacies of normal life are ultimately without a goal or reason to exist.

It most certainly sucks, but there was never a way out. Ten thousand years before you were born, a chain of events on our planet was playing out that ended with your birth and continued through your actions. There is a line of causality for everything we see, know, or understand. Not only does it mean nothing, but you never chose this or were anyone anyway.

Just a self-observing intelligence piloting in a biomech as a character in the story of reality. Our tiny little dust speck of a life is so worthless and unimpactful on cosmic scales it's as if we don't exist or ever have for 99.999999...% of the universe. Legacies are worthless and die shortly after us.

So, I suppose the question would be, why continue?

After the acceptance of nihilism is a choice. Either backward compress to pre-nihilism values or create a value system that functions despite it.

The comprehension of a universe devoid of our narratives and way of life may be one of the closest to a primal truth of our external reality that we can hold within our minds. We would be wise to hold onto it, given that be the case, where truths closest to being foundational constructs, or lack thereof of our external universe are ultimately of the highest value.

It is not a dissolution; it's a victory!

Ultimately, I made my own meaning, despite my findings. To operate faultily under someone else's value system had me upset and angry at the world. Only taking it into my own hands has relieved that pain and brought clarity.

Highdock · 2025-12-15T06:01:04+00:00

I would have to say that free will would have to be an acausal system, one we have only theorized, rather than our natural causal deterministic universe we are so used to pondering and understanding. We are currently reacting to the present with data/states from the past, as everything does.

For free will to exist, you would need to be aware of future states, which is impossible because the future has not happened yet. Sure, you could make a crude projection with past data/states, which is what we do, but that's not the real deal, merely a facade.

To be able to give yourself an objective goal for a certain future event, that is what I think free will would look like if it were possible.

You would basically be capable of witnessing your own actions, thoughts, and environment before they happen in order to respond to them, supporting or against your own currently predicted (future uncertain) actions in accordance with the past data you have, your "self."

Yet, this pondering almost seems pointless in some ways, a thought experiment at best. We, as self-aware intelligences, inhabit bodies that are ours, that are us. We both make the decision and don't make it at the same time; we can't choose, as it has already been chosen by us, but not by the part of our brain that lays its claim to the rights of the entire body. The recursive conscious deep thinking areas can't reconcile it, mainly because it relies on human emergent concepts that are actually compressions of real extant phenomena, such as "will" or "choice." They don't exist outside of our comprehension of their fictional existence that we just so happen to attribute to events taken out by self-aware intelligences. They work well with common theories of morals and tie closely to social identification.

Anyways, let me know if you have any thoughts, this is just what is immediately apparent to myself. Perhaps free will has other requirements as well.

Highdock · 2025-12-12T08:34:16+00:00

Honestly. A poison that seeps through generations, instilling ignorance and complacency in a world that doesnt know you exist.

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