Phenomenology

We have a form of "privileged access" - a direct, first-person doorway to our own mental contents that no external observer possesses. But even if it feels like we are watching our minds work in real time, our introspective access is severely limited:

• We see the output, not the process - Your mind generates the result of a thought, and then invents a plausible-sounding reason after the fact to explain why you thought it.
• Your conscious awareness is just the thin, shiny surface of a massive cognitive ocean. The actual search algorithm, brain-state modulation, and network firing are completely hidden from you.
• You are the audience for your brain's finalized outputs. You have privileged access to the movie playing on the mental screen, but you are sitting in the audience completely blind to the projector, the editing room, and the director working behind the scenes.

What it "Feels Like" to Think

• I've spent a lot of time thinking about thinking, but it is very hard to say what it feels like to think.
• I try to introspect while doing various activities, physical and intellectual and it is very hard to pin down what is happening in my head.
• At best, I feel I can say that I am trying to give attention to one thing or another, but also that other "things" - other needs or pieces of information - are also working to grab my attention.

Word Puzzles

I do the NYT crossword, Wordle, Spelling Bee, and Connections every day.

The NYT Crossword

• I have been doing the NYT crossword in the app nearly every day for ten years.
• I have a pretty wide vocabulary and I have lived long enough in America (1 year and then 5 years) and am familiar enough with US culture that I am surprised if I cannot find the right answer to a clue in the course of the day. I normally complete the grid. My average solve time goes from around 6 min on a Monday to 32 min on a Sunday.
• How do I find the answer to a clue?
  • I read the clue and either I have the answer or I don't.
  • I look at the number of squares and that may trigger an answer
  • If any of the letters are present (or become present), then that may trigger an answer
  • I work through the grid completing what I can of the across clues and then the down clues. If I don't have an answer I move to the next clue.
  • Sometimes, particularly for a proper noun, I might feel like the answer is on the tip of my tongue, but I can't get it. I move on.
  • I don't try. I'm not sure what trying would feel like. I either have the answer or I don't have it. I keep running through the remaining clues and slowly they fall into place, thanks to additional available letters.
  • My work seems to be simply to direct attention. To the puzzle in the first place, then to one clue after another, then to hold attention for longer over the final clues if they are difficult.
  • My mind produces cultural, geographical, historical, and general information as appropriate.
  • I don't count the number of boxes and I rarely make a mistake in choosing a word of the correct length

Wordle

• Wordle is a simple game - just find the five-letter word of the day. Get a green square when the letter is correct and in the right place. Get a yellow square when the letter is correct but in the wrong place. Get the word in up to six tries.
• I've been doing it daily for nearly five years and have a 99% solve rate. I start with "TEARS".
• The challenge with Wordle is to find words that fit with the letters you have already guessed. I almost never deliberately guess a word that could not work with my existing clues.
• Wordle does not let you guess a word unless it is in its dictionary. The solving experience thus begins with some 12,000 possible english 5-letter words (of which, apparently, some 2,300 are identified as valid solutions) but rapidly filters out possible words due to the clues from previous attempts
• I spend a lot of time looking at the previous guesses and the blank line waiting for my next guess. Unlike the crossword, there is no "next clue" to go to. You are stuck until you find a valid word to enter.
• Here I feel that there is some conscious thought that goes into solving. I know that certain sequences of letters go more commonly together than others and so I am trying to find words that fit the clues I have into these sequences. I have to find a valid answer to enter and I force my mind to propose words based on the restrictions provided by previous clues
• Probably in about half the cases the solve is quick - say in under 3 minutes. In maybe 95% of cases I can solve in under 6 minutes. I suspect that I get frustrated at about this point and will turn to another puzzle and come back after that. Often a fresh perspective then makes the solve very quick. In very rare situations I am still stuck and have to come back later in the day. Only at this point will I consider entering a word I know is wrong in order to unlock further clues. I've never not entered six guesses and have failed 100/1,683 days.

Connections

• Based on/ripped off from Victoria Coren-Mitchell's "Only Connect" show, Connections makes you group sixteen words or phrases into four groups of four. There are yellow, green, blue, and purple sets in increasing level of difficulty of connection.
• I've been doing it for just over two years and have a 91% win rate.
• I start by looking at all sixteen squares and often one or more sets will suggest themselves.

• On the day I'm writing this, the solution was (in the order in which I got them):
  • Yellow: "Road Less Traveled" - Alley, Backstreet, Byway, Lane
  • Purple: "Starting with Synonyms for 'Pester'" - Bug Fix, Nag Champa, Needless, Tea Set
  • Blue: "'Y' is the Only Vowel" - Fly By, Myrrh, Nsync, Rhythm
  • Green: "Shades of Green" - Forest, Hunter, Mint, Sage
• This is by far (for me) the hardest of the daily NYT word puzzles, because of the varying natures of the connections you are required to identify. The connection can be of meaning, some property of the word or phrase, some sub-component of it or some second order connection, such as the greens above.
• Here again, my main work seems to be directly attention, choosing a word to examine, until a context, a membership of some category suggests itself. Then by turning to other words, seeing if they also have potential membership of the same category.
• This is a different challenge because here you're not providing answers, but rather organizing answers to four unknown questions.

Spelling Bee

• Generate as many words as possible from the seven letters provided - each letter can be used multliple times in a single word. Your words must have four or more letters and must include the central letter. The more words you find, the more you move up the ranks, with "Amazing" and "Genius" being the top two official ranks and "Queen Bee" reserved for anyone finding every word listed as valid for a given day. Each day there is one or more "pangrams", ie words using all the letters
• I've been doing this for nearly three years and 97% of my days are ranked as "Amazing" or "Genius". I've never gotten "Queen Bee".
• Here it just seems to be a case of "seeing" the words. Maybe 30% of the time I start off by "seeing" the pangram first. Commonly I'll reel off the first 10 or 20 words without effort.
• Then it tends to be a case of choosing a letter as a starting letter and working from there or thinking about common sequences of letters.
• If "ED" or "ING" or "S" are available, then any word found can be extended with one or all of them.
• Other than that it tends to be a case of simply directly attention to a letter and then letting that attention flow to potential next letters and so on.

Category:Concepts