So do you run from the room when the Slime appears on the screen?

I'm pretty sure that people would actually scream, gasp, and duck during some of the old films at things like when a train would appear to move towards the camera or when the guy fires the shot at the camera. We have just simply become used to film as a medium.

If you're into the film, you do feel actual fear when the Slime appears. There is no difference between that you playact the expression of fear and that you do feel it, or, rather, the difference blurs. You really do suspend disbelief whilst engaging in media.

You think you feel the same kind and magnitude of fear watching a film-slime as you would a real-slime?

You could. If the slime film was really good and you caught it at the right time in the right theater the simulation of the experience could be equivalent to actually having the experience itself.

How would that be a pleasurable movie experience for you?

And "could be" implies that this is a pretty atypical scenario. So, it doesn't really apply to the majority of people most of the time when engaging fiction. So what are the majority of movie goers experiencing most of the time when they watch The Slime?

Because it's like the slime was really there. Like, when I play Baulder's Gate: Dark Alliance and I have to fight the slime in the dungeon, I do really feel like I am there fighting the slime with magic. Your disbelief can only ever become so suspended as it is only so possible to create the semblance of really being there with any simulation, but it does get suspended. You do partially believe.

The Slime isn't the greatest example because it comes from a camp film. I would analyze the experience of seeing something like Inception where you are supposed to immersed in the media. You can only ever become so convinced that you are engaged with the media as if it is really happening, but I would contend that the people who got into Inception really temporarily believed that they were in a deam state.

Why do people cry during films if there isn't some element to where you actually believe that the film is happening? — thewonder

Because you can empathize with the idea of something, with things you imagine to be the case.

So, when playing Baldur's Gate, do you cry out in pain when the slime hurts your characters?
Or when your beserker goes beserk, do you run around on a rampage?

I wince and am piqued by a righteous anger. Like I said, you can only ever suspend your disbelief to a certain extent, but it does get suspended.

Like I said, you can only ever suspend your disbelief to a certain extent, but it does get suspended. — thewonder

So then, getting back to the OP, might it be that believers so much want their belief that it becomes to them as real?

Do you mean something like that Christians don't really believe in God, but, rather, that they believe in the desire for there to be a God? That's a fairly interesting interpretation. I could agree, but don't know that I do at the moment.

Do you mean something like that Christians don't really believe in God, but, rather, that they believe in the desire for there to be a God? — thewonder

No, they believe because they so much want it that they suspend other thinking, unknowingly, as a kind of being in denial. Every time they look to their thoughts, 'God is' appears because their brain wires so often fired together that they became wired together.

Interesting. So you would see ideology as a rewiring of the brain, then?

Interesting. So you would see ideology as a rewiring of the brain, then? — thewonder

Yes, one can totally become what sees a lot. Be careful not to play too many video games, and especially don't get hooked on watching Wrestling Shows!

They had a WWF event on at work a while ago. It was a totally surreal experience. I understand the theatrics, but wrestling is just so incredibly bizzare. I can't believe that that was ever as much of a cult phenomenon as it actually was.

I wince and am piqued by a righteous anger. Like I said, you can only ever suspend your disbelief to a certain extent, but it does get suspended. — thewonder

So, then, like I said, it's not full or actual belief. It's some kind of semi, quasi, pretend belief.

Well, okay then.

might it be that believers so much want their belief that it becomes to them as real? — PoeticUniverse

It might be, yes, that's surely one possibility. I'm not sure how common it is, though. :chin:

No, they believe because they so much want it that they suspend other thinking, unknowingly, as a kind of being in denial. — PoeticUniverse

Oh, then no, if that's what you meant.

it's not full or actual belief. It's some kind of semi, quasi, pretend belief. — Artemis

If you come upon someone meditating, or even asleep, and you jar them from that state, they are distracted, and lose it. The state they were in was genuine, not in any sense delusional, but not maintainable under all conditions.

Does that help?

When we hear or watch any narrative, our brains go wholly into perceiving mode, turning off the systems for acting or planning to act, and with them go our systems for assessing reality.

[...]

Only when we stop perceiving to think about what we have seen or heard, only then do we assess its truth-value. If we are really "into" the fiction – "transported", in the psychologists' term – we are, as Immanuel Kant pointed out long ago, "disinterested". We respond aesthetically, without purpose. We don't judge the truth of what we're perceiving, even though if we stop being transported and think about it, we know quite well it's a fiction. — Wikipedia

For all practical purposes, we do believe. If the detailed psychology seems to differ, what does it matter? The thing we're discussing is an informal thing people do for pleasure. Interrogating those who claim belief seems to indicate a misunderstanding of the whole thing. :chin:

The state they were in was genuine, not in any sense delusional, but not maintainable under all conditions. — Pattern-chaser

That still doesn't explain why while in that state you wouldn't feel and react the exact same way you would irl if faced with the same creatures/situation/damage/whatever, if your belief is real/true/full/actual belief in the exact same way in both fictional and nonfictional encounters.

Perhaps the observer's belief includes the awareness of the barrier separating it from the threat, similar to how someone views tigers through a cage at the zoo?

That barrier would be the awareness of the fictionality and thus of the unreality of the story, and thus the reader/watcher would not believe the story to be real even while engaging in the story, since you cannot believe p and ~p at the same time.

Now apply that to the tiger in the zoo cage.

I'm not sure what you mean?

If I meet a real tiger in a real cage I don't have to entertain conflicting beliefs about what is real and what not.

What's different between the inauthentic meeting with the tiger behind the cage and the inauthentic meeting with Jaws behind the screen?

Why aren't you afraid of the tiger behind the cage, like you would likely be of the tiger in the jungle?
Consequently, why can't you fully believe in Jaws for the duration of the movie, but feel perfectly safe due to the screen between you two?
Where is the conflict?

That still doesn't explain why while in that state you wouldn't feel and react the exact same way you would irl if faced with the same creatures/situation/damage/whatever, if your belief is real/true/full/actual belief in the exact same way in both fictional and nonfictional encounters. — Artemis

The problem here, I think, is your over-riding need for precision, exactitude and certainty. We are discussing belief here. Not as the simple term that can be compared and contrasted with "truth", or preceded with "justified", but the human experience of belief. Your approach seems naive, when we are faced with something here that we understand only partly, if at all. We just do it, because we're humans, and so we can. But exact and clear understanding? Maybe one day.... :chin:

you cannot believe p and ~p at the same time. — Artemis

No? The arena here is the human mind; normal rules don't apply. :wink: Did you think doublethink was fictional? :chin:

Your approach seems naive, when — Pattern-chaser

Your posts seem condescending. But I guess that's to be expected from someone who thinks they've got some mystical insight :chin:

If being precise about language and trying to get the ideas here right is naive, then so be it. Not sure what else we're doing here if not that though :lol:

No? The arena here is the human mind; normal rules don't apply. :wink: Did you think doublethink was fictional? :chin: — Pattern-chaser

Doublethink is not the ability to entertain to contradictory beliefs at the exact same time in the same experience. That's impossible.