in my own musings on Consciousness, i’ve similarly been curious abt the possibility of axing certain “isms” but keeping others, like physicalism, albeit with some caveats
(warning, blatant speculation in attached image)

Next: machine learning. I explored encoding vs. decoding (in theory, only implemented decoding). What does it mean if one works and the other doesn’t, on the same data? This helped me clarify what kinds of hypotheses each method supports and the limits of model-driven inference.

we dont have to reconcile all possible metaphysical/ontological commitments in advance to make progress, we can move forward productively if we accept and try to release our grip from the objective/subjective divide

this forces a show of hand, whereby the ultimate metaphysical frontier is in fact epistemology

Tapping the sign

11/ 📢 Bonus content!

In our Supplementary Materials, we show how you can 'see through someone else's eyes' by directly using their report to an abstract image to generate a synthetic one.

5/ Cool GenAI spoiler (read the paper!) :

By averaging responses from high- and low-symptom participants, we generated new synthetic images using AI.

The results? Distinct themes emerge! 🤯

3/ Our Approach: Latent Space Cartography

We used text embeddings to analyze people's descriptions of ambiguous images (e.g., Rorschach, Thematic Apperception Test).

The goal? Map subjective experience in a structured way—like a cognitive atlas of perception and mental health.