The complex human mind is a powerful weapon that lies within the arsenal of every individual in society. However, how useful the human mind can be depends on how the individual who possesses the mind uses it to his or her advantage. Malcolm Gladwell’s essay “The Power of Context” illustrates that an individual’s behavior is based on his or her social context. Oliver Sacks in his essay ventures into how experiences come to exist within a person. Susan Blackmore in her essay “Strange Creatures” explains the imitative nature of human behavior through memes. We shape our ideas and behaviors through our perceptions and our perceptions through our behaviors and ideas based on what we use our mind to allow us to see.
We shape our ideas and behaviors
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through our perceptions and our perceptions through our behaviors and ideas based on how we use our mind to control the influence of the culture around us. Each individual in society is surrounded by a specific culture. This culture consists of various elements and some of these elements include the following: morals, beliefs, customs, and even the people around an individual.
Jacques Lusseyran was an individual who went blind and for him this was a blessing since he “stopped caring whether people were dark or fair, with blue eyes or green. I felt that sighted people spent too much time observing these empty things” (Sacks 334). Lusseyran was able to escape the mentality that he had due to his culture of previously caring about how people looked. His blindness that occurred at a very young age made him able to visualize what he cared about from the visual experience that he did have. He would have never had this ability to escape the part of culture that cares about trivial parts of life if it wasn’t for the power of mind that was unleashed to him due to his blindness. The culture around individuals in society attempts to limit and suppress the ability of the human mind to venture and shape its own behaviors and ideas. The culture around people makes them behave in certain manners. The Zimbardo experiment made people who were the subjects behave in the manner that they thought they were supposed to behave. The subjects who volunteered in the Zimbardo experiment shaped their actions based on what they thought the role of prison guards was …show more content…
since “The guards, some of whom had previously identified themselves as pacifists, fell quickly into the role of hard-bitten disciplinarians.” (Gladwell 153) People seem to become products of their culture because they want to imitate the behaviors of the culture that surrounds them. This imitative behavior is a meme because “when you imitate someone else, something is passed on” (Blackmore 4). In this case it was the passing of the certain type of behavior. This imitative behavior will impair an individual because “Memes spread themselves around indiscriminately without regard to whether they are useful, neutral, or positively harmful to us.” (Blackmore 7) Culture affects the way people think and how they behave. It sets people up to think that they can’t achieve the ideas and behaviors that they truly desire due to how much influence culture has. We shape our ideas and behaviors through our perceptions and our perceptions through our behaviors and ideas based on how we use our mind to find the inner motivation within us to succeed.
An individual’s motivation can empower him or her to accomplish feats that he or she wanted to achieve. This motivation exists to act as a defense mechanism in the human mind. It fends off the intruders that exist in the form of limitations around people. This motivation can propel and provide individuals with the necessary drive to succeed in shaping their behaviors and ideas in the fashion of their liking. It provides an individual with the discipline and determination to not give up. Zoltan Torey was able to use the motivation inside him to continue to have visual imagery even after his accident. He didn’t want to lose hope and believe that he wouldn’t be able to behave the way he previously did before the accident. Since Torey continued to hold visual imagery to tasks such as carpentry and roof repair, “One has a sense that Torey’s adaptation was largely shaped by conscious motive, will, and purpose” (Sacks 337). Torey was able to use his motivation to continue to live his life the way he wanted to live it. On the other hand, people can make their perceptions to show behaviors and ideas that they may not want if they don’t have the necessary motivation in their mind. Gladwell explains how people are influenced by their environment by the windows theory which describes that “If a window
is broken and left unrepaired, people walking by will conclude that no one cares and no one is in charge. Soon, more windows will be broken, and the sense of anarchy will spread from the building to the street on which it faces, sending a signal that anything goes.” (Gladwell 141) If someone doesn’t have the necessary motivation in his or her mind, he or she can become stuck in a situation that he or she may not want to be in. If a person sees his or her situation as a reason to be motivated, then he or she can become dedicated enough to prosper in achieving their goals. If the young boys who had the encounter with Goetz didn’t show the same type of behavior typically seen from the environment that they come from, then they wouldn’t have had the criminal record that they all had. What people believe that they can achieve is what they can achieve through their motivation. The motivation that comes from the mind is what provides the vision needed to achieve the behaviors and ideas one sets for one’s self. We shape our ideas and behaviors through our perceptions and our perceptions through our behaviors and ideas based on how we can equip the skill of language. The skill of language is an ability that the majority of the members of society takes for granted due to the fact that it is done so effortlessly on a daily basis. The communication that language elicits can provide an individual with a form of vision in its own sense as explained by the Law of the Few that communication can make “a message so memorable that it sticks in someone’s mind and compels them to action.” (Gladwell 166) Vision isn’t limited to just what the eyes see since the language people speak can convert the language into visual images. A language that is reciprocally understood can hold a priceless power. The language one speaks can provide the vision necessary without the actual ability to see. Arlene Gordon showed the strong influence that language can have to allow an individual perceive something. Gordon was able to create visual images in her mind through verbal descriptions that allowed her to create visual images within her mind. This shows that “Language, that most human invention, can enable what, in principle, should not be possible. It can allow all of us, even the congenitally blind, to see with another person’s eyes.” (Sacks 345) This is done through the power of the mind to interpret language and to turn it into a visual image. This visual image can exist without the actual need of vision. The language that a person speaks can allow him or her to take the words within the language and to turn them into visual images. This can be done because of the visual images that words within a language trigger for an individual. Since these visual images that are triggered by language create a perception, it can allow an individual to hold a greater grip over shaping his or her ideas and behaviors. We shape our ideas and behaviors through our perceptions and our perceptions through our behaviors and ideas based on how people use their imagination. The human imagination is something that is created within the human mind. The imagination can create nearly any image that the human wants. The imagination within the mind can create “Images of something which has never been seen by the physical eye but which can be conjured up by the creative imagination and serve as models for investigating reality” (Sacks 339). The models created by the imagination serve as a guide to how life really is and how people should see life from the power of their own mind. The power of imagination can be stronger than the physical power of vision because it has the ability to “construct a virtual visual world that seemed as real and intense to him as the perceptual one he had lost- indeed, sometimes more real, more intense” (Sacks 332) If people are able to trigger the imagination that lies within their mind, they can use this ability to shape their ideas and behaviors in their everyday life. Since “Perception and imagery share a common neural basis in the visual parts of the brain” (Sacks 341) the mind plays a pivotal role in what people see. That’s why an extensive and diverse imagination can do wonders to the perception that an individual possesses. Humans have the power to be as complex in their ideas and behaviors due to their imagination. The imagination enables the power to see using visual images. Without imagination, what is visually seen has no meaning because “Visual perception depends on the visual imagery” (Sacks 341). The human mind can continue the ability to see without physical vision since “The human mind has a kind of “reducing valve” that creates and maintains the perception of continuity even in the face of perpetual observed changes in actual behavior” (Gladwell 162). The reducing valve allows people to choose a certain visual image over the other. That’s why the mind can continue to shape behaviors and ideas in a certain way because it sees the world around people from a certain perspective. The perception that our mind brings to us, guides us in shaping our ideas and behaviors. Based on how we use our mind to our power, the more we can shape our ideas and behaviors to our liking. I see this in my own life when I take something negative in my life and turn it into a positive. When I am in a negative situation, for instance if I get a poor grade on a test, I try to see it in a positive light. I do this using the poor grade as motivation to strive to do better. This perception that I have to use the poor grade as a positive is because of the fact that I used the motivation in my mind to my advantage. In this manner I try to use the perception that my mind allows me to have in a positive way in shaping my ideas and behaviors.
Throughout history we see monsters taking many different shapes and sizes. Whether it be a ghoul in the midst of a cold nightly stroll or a mass genocide, monsters are lurking everywhere and our perception of what monsters truly are, is enhancing their growth as a force with which to be reckoned. Fear of the unknown is seen throughout time, but as humans progress we are finding that things we once were afraid of we are less frightening than they once were. Monsters can evoke fear in their targeted victims rather than physically harm their victims. For instance, every year a new horror film is released with the next scary beast, but why do we call something a monster even if we know it is not real? Even certain people and creatures are classified as monsters, but are they really monsters, or do their actions speak of monstrous doings? In his article and book chapter Monsters and the Moral Imagination and chapter 5 of On Monsters, Stephen Asma suggests that monstrosity, as we know it, is on the rise as humans progress, and how we perceive monsters can often define monstrosities in itself, providing evidence as to why monster cultures are on the rise, and showing how human progress has evolved our perception of how we think on the topic that is monsters.
The motivation of people can sometimes be crazy, and sometimes, ridiculous to us but to them, it can be as important as a lifeline. Take Aengus for example. His motivation may seen ridiculous to some, but he probably spends his whole life looking for the glimmering girl. Or you could see Walt Masters as another example. His motivation rides on a single promise to a man named Loren Hall, whos claim was about to get jumped.
The human brain has great power and abilities, some of which we fail to realize it uses every day of our lives. This can be exemplified by our brain’s ability to create mental shortcuts by assigning labels to what is around us. Although this skill is typically good and helpful to us, “[it] can also be extremely damaging, especially when it comes to categorizing people” (Kaufman). This statement’s validity true enough that novelists have noticed and incorporated it into their work to raise awareness. Different authors have incorporated this into their work such as Barbara Kingsolver and John Irving.
Trying to identify the force that drives humanity is thought-provoking. What motivates our everyday actions? What inspires people to behave the way they do? The novels The Great Gatsby and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, by F. Scott Fitzgerald and Philip K. Dick, respectively, address these questions by suggesting that human nature is driven by the desire to be superior relative to others. Both authors propose that all human actions, regardless of how compassionate they appear, are actually impelled by an underlying selfish and avaricious impulse that fuels an individual’s air of superiority.
This book presents the relationship between human and animal behaviors and the behavior that is now created by our modern day society. The mind has two main parts. There is the conscious mind and the unconscious mind. The unconscious mind is the better half, yet it is potentially threatening; therefore, the conscious mind is aware at all times. The unconscious mind influences your behavior in many ways. Pi experiences both of these minds. Pi is consciously planning his survival and how he was going to spend his food, so he didn’t run out. His conscious mind contributed to Pi surviving at sea. Consequently, when Pi`s father fed a goat to a tiger to prove a point, he was unaware that this event changed his personality brutally. He became more
Within humanity people tend to motivate themselves by the effect it will have on themselves or the people that they genuinely care for. In the novel, The Road by Cormac McCarthy the man and boy
Social technology, the product of human counterfactual thinking, has pervasive into a global phenomenon. People consider robots as servers in human companions, rather text than talk, and feel like a death if they leave their phone. People having ability to think causally make those imagining possibilities real. Causal understanding is the basic process and element in achieving possibilities. It helps people understand what should do and how should do to make imaginations real. In Alison Gopnik’s essay: “Possible Worlds: Why Do Children Pretend?” she writes that people’s ability to make counterfactuals and make them real is commendable. It helps people change the world to what they want. Sherry Turkle, the author of “Alone Together”,
Technology surrounds us every day in the modern world. It has become almost a necessity to most who use it, while others would beg to differ. There is debate surrounding both articles written by Nicholas Carr, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” and Jamais Cascio, “Get Smart” both arguments provide opinion and evidence about the use of technology. Carr discusses how the use of the computers affects our thought process. Carr begins by talking about his own experience as a writer and how he felt like “something had been tinkering with his brain, remapping his neural circuitry and reprogramming his memory”. (Carr, 1). On the contrary Cascio’s article "Get Smart," Cascio urges
When put into an authoritative position over others, is it possible to claim that with this new power individual(s) would be fair and ethical or could it be said that ones true colors would show? A group of researchers, headed by Stanford University psychologist Philip G. Zimbardo, designed and executed an unusual experiment that used a mock prison setting, with college students role-playing either as prisoners or guards to test the power of the social situation to determine psychological effects and behavior (1971). The experiment simulated a real life scenario of William Golding’s novel, “Lord of the Flies” showing a decay and failure of traditional rules and morals; distracting exactly how people should behave toward one another. This research, known more commonly now as the Stanford prison experiment, has become a classic demonstration of situational power to influence individualistic perspectives, ethics, and behavior. Later it is discovered that the results presented from the research became so extreme, instantaneous and unanticipated were the transformations of character in many of the subjects that this study, planned originally to last two-weeks, had to be discontinued by the sixth day. The results of this experiment were far more cataclysmic and startling than anyone involved could have imagined. The purpose of this paper is to compare and contrast the discoveries from Philip Zimbardo’s Stanford prison experiment and of Burrhus Frederic “B.F.” Skinner’s study regarding the importance of environment.
Motive theory is one more way psychologists evaluate personality. The motive theory searches for reasons why people do what they do. It asks questions like what drives people. The underlying idea of the motive theory is that behavior reflects underlying needs. A need represents an unsatisfactory state of being. For instance, primary needs are biological, such as a need for air, water and food. After these basic needs are met, less important needs can be met such as friendship and even love. David McCelland and John Atkinson studied the need for achievement. The need for achievement is the desire to do things well and have pleasure in overcoming obstacles (Clark et al., 1956). The need for achievement varies depending on sex, and childhood
Summary: This book is an autobiography of sorts. James Harriot tells of his life as a vet in the Yorkshire countryside of England. Although the book is one large tale, starting with is internship with Siegfried Farnon and ending with his marriage to Helen, smaller stories about his dealings with his “patients” make the book seem like a collection of short stories. Mr. Harriot tells of how he delivered a calf in the middle of the night, or how he had to deal with an interestingly slow family going to a play. The variety in his stories made the book very fun to read.
In June 1985, British mountain climbers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates ventured the unclimbed western face of Siula Grande, a 21,000 ft. high peak that is located in the Peruvian Andes. Simpson and Yates were both aware that what they are aspiring is nearly impossible because if something gone wrong it can be serious, which may lead to death, and there is no rescue available; in addition, mountain climbers before them who attempted to reach the mountain’s summit never achieved this goal. However, this didn’t stop them from climbing the west face of Siula Grande. They want to climb the mountain mainly because “it was just brilliant fun.” (2009). When people are aware that they are getting their selves in a detrimental situation, they still continue to do what they want to do. In my opinion, I believe people behave this way because they just want to try something extraordinary or they want to prove something to someone; but in Psychology, people behave this way because of motivation. Motivation is defined as the process “that makes a person move toward a goal.” (SparkNotes Editors, 2005); a motivation can be intrinsic, extrinsic, or both. Intrinsic motivation is a type of motivation which causes an individual to act or engage in activities to enhance their self-concept, while extrinsic motivation is a type of motivation that causes an individual to act in such a way for external awards. In Simpson’s and Yates’ case, they are both experiencing intrinsic and extrinsic motivation; despite of getting their selves in danger, they still yearn to reach the mountain’s summit because of interest, enjoyment, and rewards.
Morris, J. (2013, September). This is your brain on the Internet. Communication Arts 346. Lecture conducted from University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison WI.
Here is something psychological that Dwight Macdonald has so far presented or wanted to imply: the love of being informed or drowned by those irrelevant information. It's not exaggerating to say that a new generation lusting for unthinking, even enslaved lifestyle has emerged. The new generation is willing to accept everything given by the social media only if they are not asked to think a bit more. To think a little or without thinking has already become a necessity for the new generation. It couldn’t be further from the truth.
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs asserts that people strive to self-actualize after meeting their basic needs. Self-actualization is using one’s abilities to contribute to the world and grow as a person. A conscientious person might address their psychological needs, such as the desire to complete a major task. To write an important document, forming a schedule to break the writing process into blocks makes accomplishment more likely. By planning ahead, a conscientious person can contemplate which interests to pursue to reach their full potential. With diligence they can focus on specific goals and reach desired outcomes, such as completing years of medical residency to become a neurosurgeon. By Maslow’s theory, the conscientious person relies on external factors to maximize personal growth. While this theory emphasizes growing through achievement, the self-determination theory focuses on the sources of motivation. Someone with high conscientiousness relies on an internal drive to meet their goals. They do this by finding their way in life, finding something they are skilled at, and relating to others. By exerting self-control they seek happiness from within and tend to avoid hedonistic pursuits. Thus, this theory suggests that the conscientious person relies on intrinsic motives to pursue