What is "attention", really?

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• actionjbone@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  One ttention

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• SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Your ability to focus on one thing voluntarily

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  • dope@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    ok, are you focusing your attention on one thing? Or is attention the ability to focus this (as yet unnamed thing) on one thing?

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    • azdle@news.idlestate.org ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Your thoughts.

      (And to a lesser extent your actions, but that gets tougher to define since external factors will apply more there.)

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• jbrains@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  The act of directing your thoughts towards something.

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  • dope@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You can direct attention at thoughts though. And sights, sounds, etc.

    It’s like sights, sounds, thoughts, smells etc are things in a dark room. And attention is a flashlight. And you shine the flashlight upon things.

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    • jbrains@sh.itjust.works ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Why “though”? We usually reserve that word when we’re about to introduce a counterexample or some other means of contradicting a claim.

      But thoughts are also particular things, so clearly one can direct their thoughts to particular thoughts. And even to the act of thinking in particular about thoughts, because that is a thing one can think about.

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• monotremata@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Attention is a kind of surplus mental capacity that we have, which isn't specialized, but can instead be directed to tasks as needed. Ironically, we also use the term for the dedicated mental system which directs this extra capacity, which makes talking about it a bit more complicated.

  Most of the stuff we do, our brains just kinda handle for us. Walking is usually like that; it's an incredibly complex feat of dynamic balance, movement planning, and adaptation to changes in the environment, but it rarely takes any conscious effort on our part. Conscious effort is directed attention.

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• DrunkenPirate@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Attention is the connection of the brain waves of two living subjects

  You never pay attention to a car. Nor did get attention from a car. Only from humans or animals.

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  • skulblaka@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    You never pay attention to a car.

    Your tires and oil change are in severely desperate shape, then.

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    • DrunkenPirate@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Indeed, they are. Riding bike way too often. Currently my car is painted with spider webs, leaves, and moss

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  • RubiksIsocahedron@reddthat.com ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I’d like to talk to you about your insurance premium…

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    • DrunkenPirate@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Nah. I pay attention to the driver not the car.

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  • PwnTra1n@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    man dies crossing street

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    • DrunkenPirate@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I‘m German. I even wait at the red traffic light if no car is on the street.

      (German) man dies waiting for green light.

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• fubo@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Attention is the ability of an intelligent system to temporarily work selectively on a particular subset of its inputs, thus making less use of other simultaneous inputs.

  When you attend to a piece of music you’re listening to, your mind makes less use of the visual details of what’s in front of your eyes, or of your memories, or of the texture of the seat your butt is on.

  If you reach your hand over and start attending to the thigh of the person sitting next to you, your mind makes less use of the music.

  If you’re meditating and attending to your breath, you might still notice the crow cawing outside your window, but you don’t dwell on it; the crow sound passes and you go back to your breath.

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  • dope@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Let’s say you are in a dark room with a flashlight.

    You direct the flashlight at stuff in the room.

    The things in the dark room are sights, sounds, thoughts.

    We could call the flashlight “attention”.

    We could call the act of directing the flashlight “paying attention” or “directing” attention".

    And we can focus the light, make it tight and bright. Concentrate it.

    We could also spread it out wide.

    But the light itself? I dunno. Is it a magic ray?

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• Kolanaki@yiffit.net ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Focus placed specifically upon a thing.

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  • dope@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Focus what, exactly? Give it a name.

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    • Kolanaki@yiffit.net ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It can be any sort of focus. Physical, mental, emotional, etc.

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    • Pons_Aelius@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Ok, you asked for their words.

      They gave them.

      You decide their words are not enough.

      So, give us your definition.

      (if you reply with, I don;t know that is why I am asking then I suggest don't attack those that are willing to answer you.)

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• Markimus@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Attention is where you place focus on something. This is done through both the action of looking and the action of taking that information in and comprehending what you’re looking at. Attention can be applied to other senses too, such as listening, feeling, etc.

  It’s also another word for alertness.

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• Sarazil@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  The ability for a brain to continue to focus on one concept without getting distracted.

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• HipPriest@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  What you stand to when I tell you to soldier, if you've quite finished asking questions!

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• pruwybn@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Occupying someone’s conscious thought.

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• oillut@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Where/what a given amount of time’s energy allotment is focused towards

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  • dope@lemm.ee ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Attention is a thing that we focus?

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• dandroid@dandroid.app ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  It’s a song by The Academy Is

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• squiblet@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Putting an idea, perception, external entity or phenomenon in the foremost of your thoughts and senses, and actively considering it to the exclusion of other input, to an certain extent.

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• MxM111@kbin.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Selecting a particular stream of sensory data to be of higher importance or validity over other streams of data and over mental picture generated by brain based on other data and prior assumptions.

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• u202307011927@feddit.de ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Conscience that focuses on either an object of the physical world and/or a subject of the nonphysical world

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