With spunk, Soul emphatically stated:
"I will make this point one last time ... What I'm doubting is the specific claim that the 'curiosity' aspect can be there, prior to one being metaconscious of the of whispering."
I'll try to match your tone as that might speak your language:
I am only going to say this one more time, dear Soul, I never claimed in my original post that the curiosity formed subconsciously (although, we can easily think of examples in our won life when it could). I simple said that WHILE reading and thinking, the curiosity was impinging. I will not ask you again to notice that I never was making the claim you say you'll never bring up
I made a list of dissociated experience and asked you if they seemed like they could be dissociated experiences.
You objected to 'curiosity.'
And we have come to see that you actually agree that curiosity fits my examples of possible dissociated experiences, but you want to make it clear that you WOULD disagree if I was pushing the idea that we can form dissociated states of curiosity while focusing on something else.
"Another example: while metacognitively focused on some conversation about vacations, the percept of a distant train whistle might be registered at some subliminal level, and the conversation could unwittingly switch to an anecdote about trains, without ever recognizing the subliminal influence. However, to state that some curiosity about the destination of the train is also subliminally registered, is an extrapolation which as far as I know BK has never specifically claimed or addressed, and so I'm not sure he would concur with such a claim, or how we can know that he definitely would concur without asking him. There is no other point I'm trying to contest."
Great example. You and I are talking about vacations. I hear a train whistle which doesn't enter into my meta-consciousness. Because of my childhood visits to Watseka Illinois, I associate trains with a sad nostalgia for better days long past. As we talk, I find myself wondering if I should finally go to Germany (where my grandparents are from) and my mood has become less enthusiastic.
I understand that you are saying that in your opinion the sad longing could NOT start influencing my thinking about vacations without me switching over to it meta-cognitively and noticing, "I'm feeling nostalgic now,". I seriously disagree and think you run into a recursive problem if such states have to be meta-conscious before they can infringe. But, as I keep saying, nothing about my point was directed at that question.
Some people have certainly had the experience of reading a great patch of dialog in a book and realizing that it has caused them to be in a great state of curiosity for the last ten minutes. The idea that hearing a fascinating conversation in the background as you study couldn't elicit curiosity seems very strange to me. But I will say that if somebody strenuously objects to a background conversation making you feel irritated or curious or sad or delighted...my hypothesis is that this assumption is due to the the kind of unit-based thinking I'm talking about.
I don't expect you to carry this on, my dear Soul. You've made it absolutely clear that all you object to is the notion that unconsciously hearing a background conversation could cause a curiosity to impinge on meta-consciousness. Noted. I'm glad that doesn't relate directly to my point but I'm also glad it came up because it is a really cool point itself.