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What is it like to be a bat?

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180 points adityaathalye | 2 comments | 03 Sep 25 17:48 UTC | HN request time: 0.526s | source
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adityaathalye ◴[03 Sep 25 18:33 UTC] No.45119024[source]▶
“I want to stay as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all kinds of things you can't see from the center.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

In this sense, I think one has to aaaaaalmost be a bat in order to know what it is to be it. A fine thread trailing back to the human.

The imago-machines of Arkady Martine's "A Memory Called Empire" come to mind. Once integrated with another's imago, one is not quite the same self, not even the sum of two, but a new person entirely containing a whole line of selves selves melded into that which was one. Now one truly contains multitudes.

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jm__87 ◴[03 Sep 25 19:25 UTC] No.45119544[source]▶
None of us have even experienced the full range of what humans can experience, so even we don't fully know what it is like to be any given person, we only know what it is like to be ourselves. It is kind of amazing when you think about it.
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adityaathalye ◴[03 Sep 25 19:28 UTC] No.45119569[source]▶
https://www.galactanet.com/oneoff/theegg.html

Andy Weir's The Egg makes regular HackerNews appearances.

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1. cl3misch ◴[03 Sep 25 21:51 UTC] No.45120770[source]▶
That's almost exactly the beginning of Logic's story album "Everybody" which I have listened to so often that I can almost recite it. Despite years on HN I have never seen The Egg though. That blew my mind a bit, thanks!
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2. AIorNot ◴[03 Sep 25 23:28 UTC] No.45121513[source]▶
You guys are aware of Advaita and neo Advaita right? It basically has been the perrinal philosophy underlying all subjective spiritual experiences from Sufism to Gnostics to Buddhism and the Tao

Of course it could all be claptrap that humans want to believe in but I find it to be pretty powerful and I think it is true

(Warning: Gets into spiritual stuff)

https://youtu.be/R-IIzAblVlg?si=t9RqXgF_wwJPcv_g