u/Head-Head8702

I’m an independent researcher outside academia, with no formal background in cognitive science, philosophy, HCI, or AI research. English is also not my native language, and I have relied heavily on AI to help organize and formalize my ideas.

For the past few years, I’ve been developing a framework called Phrasome Theory, centered on a question about human–AI interaction:

Why can an AI feel like the same continuous “other” across a conversation, even when we know it does not possess a continuous subjective self?

My hypothesis is that this may not be explained by anthropomorphism alone.

During interaction, an LLM continuously responds from the same conversational position: it refers back to previous turns, repairs misunderstandings, maintains context and tone, and responds as the addressee of earlier utterances.

This led me to distinguish actual subjectivity from what I call a Subject-Position: a position that can remain stable within interaction even without a continuously conscious subject behind it.

I use Quasi-Otherness to describe the resulting phenomenon in which something can be experienced as a relatively continuous “other” through linguistic interaction.

I’m not arguing that current LLMs are conscious. What interests me is the cognitive gap between knowing that no continuous self exists and nevertheless experiencing continuity during interaction.

Earlier versions of this work were submitted to established academic journals. They were ultimately not published, but I did receive some encouraging feedback suggesting that parts of the framework may have originality or novelty.

Because I’m outside academia—and because much of the manuscript was developed with AI assistance—I’m now hoping to find people who can help me judge whether there is actually something here worth developing.

I would especially appreciate guidance on:

• Are there existing concepts in cognitive science that already explain this phenomenon?
• Could this be related to theory of mind, agency attribution, social cognition, or predictive processing?
• Does distinguishing a stable conversational Subject-Position from actual subjectivity make sense?
• How could this idea be operationalized or experimentally tested?
• What literature or researchers should I be looking at?

The full manuscript is quite long, so I don’t expect anyone to read it. Even discussion of the central idea, relevant references, or suggestions for turning it into a testable research question would be extremely helpful.

If anyone is genuinely interested in the framework or willing to help, I’d be very happy to discuss it further and share the full preprint privately.

At this point, I’m mainly trying to find out whether people with actual expertise in cognitive science see something here worth pursuing—and, if so, how I should develop it beyond what I can do alone with AI.

I’m an independent researcher outside academia, with no formal background in computational linguistics, pragmatics, HCI, or AI research. English is also not my native language, so I have relied heavily on AI to help organize and formalize my ideas.

For the past few years, I’ve been developing a framework called Phrasome Theory, which tries to connect questions of AI subjectivity with pragmatics and discourse structure.

The basic observation is this:

An LLM does not need to possess a continuous subjective self in order to keep occupying the same conversational position across an interaction. It can respond to previous turns, repair misunderstandings, maintain context, and continue functioning as the “same” interlocutor.

My hypothesis is that part of what we experience as a continuous AI “other” may arise from the structure of linguistic interaction itself, rather than from anthropomorphism alone.

This led me to distinguish actual subjectivity from what I call a Subject-Position: a formal-pragmatic role that linguistic address itself establishes between an emitter and an addressee. Such a position can be occupied even when no conscious subject exists behind it.

I also use Quasi-Otherness to describe the phenomenon in which an AI can be experienced as a relatively continuous “other” through sustained interaction.

I’m not arguing that current LLMs are conscious. My question is whether pragmatic or discourse structure can help explain why they can nevertheless function as apparently continuous interlocutors.

Earlier versions of this work were submitted to established academic journals. Although they were ultimately not published, I received some encouraging feedback suggesting that aspects of the framework may have originality or novelty.

Because I’m outside academia—and because a substantial part of the manuscript was developed with AI assistance—I’m now looking for human guidance to help me judge whether there is actually something here worth developing.

I would especially appreciate thoughts on:

• whether pragmatics, discourse analysis, dialogue research, or computational linguistics already has concepts that explain this better;
• whether distinguishing a Subject-Position from actual subjectivity is meaningful;
• whether this idea could be operationalized or tested using human–LLM dialogue data;
• and what literature or research direction I should be looking at.

The manuscript itself is quite long, so I don’t expect anyone to read the whole thing. At this stage, even discussing the core idea, pointing me toward relevant literature, or suggesting how to turn it into a more rigorous research question would be extremely helpful.

Because this subreddit currently restricts external links from new accounts, I can’t include the preprint link in this post. If anyone is interested in the idea or willing to help, feel free to send me a private message and I can share the link. You can also search “Phrasome” online to find the work.

I’m mainly hoping to find people familiar with language technology, pragmatics, or dialogue research who can help me understand whether there is something worth pursuing here, and where I should take it next.

I’m an independent researcher outside academia, with no formal background in philosophy, linguistics, HCI, or AI research. English is also not my native language, so I have relied heavily on AI to help organize, translate, and formalize my ideas.

Over the past few years, I’ve been developing a framework I call Phrasome Theory, which explores a possible connection between AI subjectivity and pragmatics.

The basic question behind it is this:

We know that an LLM does not possess a continuous subjective self in the human sense. Yet during sustained interaction, we can still experience it as a relatively continuous interlocutor—something that occupies the position of an “other” in conversation.

My hypothesis is that this may not be explained by anthropomorphism alone. Part of this experience may arise from the structure of linguistic interaction itself.

This led me to distinguish between actual subjectivity and what I call a Subject-Position: a position that can be produced and maintained within linguistic interaction without requiring an actual conscious subject behind it. I use Quasi-Otherness to describe the resulting experience of an “other” that is linguistically sustained without necessarily possessing subjective continuity.

I have submitted earlier versions of this work to some established academic journals. Although it was ultimately not published for various reasons, I did receive some encouraging feedback suggesting that aspects of the framework may have originality or novelty.

That is part of why I don’t want to simply abandon it—but I also don’t have enough academic background to judge how much is genuinely valuable, what I may have misunderstood, or where this work should go next.

The current manuscript is quite long, and a substantial part of its development involved collaboration with AI. I’m very aware that this means there may be conceptual, terminological, literature-related, or methodological problems that I cannot identify on my own.

So what I’m really looking for here is human guidance.

If anyone working in—or seriously familiar with—pragmatics, philosophy of language, HCI, cognitive science, AI, or related fields finds this idea interesting, I would be very grateful for help figuring out:

• whether there is actually something here worth developing;
• what existing theories or literature I should be engaging with;
• whether my concepts make sense or overlap with established ones;
• how this could be made more rigorous or empirically testable;
• and what academic direction would make the most sense.

I don’t expect anyone to read the entire manuscript. Even discussing the core idea, pointing me toward relevant work, or helping me understand what I should do next would already mean a lot.

Preprint: https://philpapers.org/rec/MINTPL-2
Email: phrasome@gmail.com

At this point, I’m mainly hoping to find real people who see something potentially interesting here and are willing to help me move beyond what I can realistically do alone with AI.