Revisiting my previous discussion about language, I want to talk about thinking in languages. In general, we say that language is a means of communication. But of course, it is also a form of thinking. Has it every occurred to you that we also think in certain languages? (Maybe this doesn't apply for those who only speak fluently in one language.)
When I was born, the first language that I learnt to speak was English. Although both of my parents were Chinese, they studied Chinese in school only until elementary standard and studied in the United States for their university courses. As I turned 7, my parents understood that speaking one's mother tongue was very important, so I was sent to study at a Chinese elementary school. I had a hard time. Although I understood Chinese, I was very slow in responding because in my mind, the words were all in English.
From 7 to 16, my Chinese improved a lot and English, hmm, not as much. One thing that I did not realize until I came to Vietnam, was that I was no longer thinking in English. I thought in Chinese most of the time. I feel in the Chinese language. For example, if there were two people who said "I love you" to me and one person said in Chinese whilst the other said in English, I would feel the love more from the person who spoke in Chinese. English, to me, was merely words.
After two years of studying in Vietnam, I am ashame to admit that I think the language that I'm thinking in is changing again. I don't know how much it has changed, but the lack of speaking in my mother tongue, especially when I don't live with my family anymore, I realized that phrases that I used to say are not being substituted by English sentences. I like English, but I love Chinese. I am afraid of the change. Is it possible to be able to think in two languages? When I don't think in Chinese, does that also affect my ability to speak it?
In our Economics class, we learnt about Game Theory and Mr. Isley showed us a movie about the creator of Game Theory, John Nash. "A Beautiful Mind" must have been one of the most touching movies I have ever watched. John Nash was a brilliant mathematician. He wrote a paper about Game Theory and became famous. He also had a beautiful wife. Unfortunately, John Nash started to have hallucinations and he was diagnosed to have schizophrenia. Then, he had to have medicine to stop the hallucinations but the medication prevented him to have a clear mind to perform mathematics. Finally, he succeeded in convincing himself of which was the reality and which was just his imagination.
Very few people are able to do what John Nash has done - to know which was the reality and which was not. I've also heard stories about people secretly stopping their medication and then their hallucinations came back. What are their intentions? Maybe because they hated the effect of the medications, that they cannot really think consciously, but at the same time, I feel sorry for those who live within their hallucinations. This reminds me of the movie "Inception" as the main character kept wanting to go back into his dream to live with his wife. I think that living in hallucinations and dreams are mentally unhealthy and they should be aware that there are people who care about them are waiting for them in the real world. The reality has what you really have whilst the hallucinations or dreams have what you think you have, but what you really don't have.
Currently we are studying about the Romantics. A few days ago, we watched a video clip about a few of the poets. In the clip, one of the poets was depressed because he stopped believing in Christianity and felt loss thinking that he did not have an afterlife.
To be honest, when I was watching the video clip, I did not feel any empathy for the poet. I think this is due to the fact that I do not have a religion and I do not understand why the poet is so depressed from not having a religion. (I'm sorry, please do not be offended when you're reading this.) What is the purpose of an afterlife? In my opinion, the most important thing is to live the life that we're living right now to the fullest. Do what we really want to do and have no regrets. Even if we have an afterlife, we are separated from the ones we love. I think that this is the only lifetime that I have, so I try to live it the best way possible.
I read Q&A section in this website The Straight Dope about a person asking if swallowing chewing gum was dangerous. Apparently this person, Patrick, chews an average of eight to ten sticks of gum each day and he always swallows the gum he eats. His friends were shocked when he told them about this so he was wondering if doing so was really dangerous.
According to the answerer of the website, Cecil Adams, it was not dangerous to swallow chewing gum and the rumored consequences, such as the gum staying in one's stomach for seven years, were ridiculous. Yes, chewing gum is indigestible, but humans eat many indigestible things.
This funny Q&A reminded me of I was afraid of eating seeds of fruits when I was young. I believed that if I ate the seeds, the seeds would stay in stomach and grow into a tree. I couldn't let that happen! So whenever I eat watermelons, I have to pick out the seeds before eating them. It's funny how I believed that seeds would grow in my stomach when I was young. Now the whole idea just seemed ridiculous. I think nowadays, even adults believe in many things although the things are ridiculous. Why do we believe in them? Maybe it was caused by fear. Sometimes, we just don't think consciously enough with our heads.
We watched a TED Talk video by Beau Lotto about optical illusions. The main purpose of the TED Talk was about the difference of our perception of the world and how the world really is. Beau Lotto used a lot of colors to show how they can affect our perceive the world. A quote that he used, "We have no direct access to our physical world other than our sense". Light allows us to see the world, but there are many factors that affect our vision, such as the color of the object, the color of the light that reflects the object, the color of the space between our eyes and the object, and etc.
I think an issue that Beau Lotto is trying to point out that we will never know how or what the physical world really is. Maybe every individual on this earth has their own different perception of the physical world. This then makes me wonder, if physical things are actually not what they seem and are perceived differently by everyone, then do we perceive intangible things, such as emotions differently too? If we cannot be sure of what we see is the same, then there might be a flaw in our standards. For example, Ariel and Betty are looking at a color. Assuming that both of them don't know the name of the color, but Ariel sees the color green and Betty sees blue. Then, they were taught that the name of the color was sea green. As a result, every time Ariel sees the color green and Betty the color blue, they call it sea green. Then again, I wonder, does the difference really matter?
During class, each of us were given a piece of paper with children's drawings on it. The drawings were divided into two categories - drawn by city children and farm children. Then, we were given the instructions to describe the characteristics of the two categories. After a short moment, Ms Jackson asked us to talk about what we wrote. Oddly enough, the students on the left side of the classroom talked about city and farm children whilst the students on the right side of the classroom talked about creative and non creative children. We then realized that the descriptions on our paper about the drawings we different.
I think it was interesting how we managed to describe the drawings without much difficulty although the class was given different categories. This reminds me of confirmation bias. As I believed what I was told on the paper, that the drawings were drawn by city and farm children, I was still able to find characteristics from the drawing to support my belief. All I saw was evidence that can confirm what I believe was true. This was caused by the idea of city and farm children drawings before I could make a judgment by myself of who had drawn the drawings. If I wasn't told that city and farm children had drawn those drawings, I might have drawn a different conclusion, possibly that creative and non creative children had drawn those drawings.
As we were learning about sense perception in class, we were divided into groups of three and assigned a type of sense perception to read and make a skit of. The sense perception that I was responsible of was smell. In the article "A Whiff of Experience", I learnt several important facts about the sense of smell. The facts include odors will become less noticeable after we are exposed to them frequently, odors affect what we do and how we feel, certain sicknesses have their unique smells, and the power of smells to bring back the most vivid memories.
I think the smell of a place is very unique. Once I walked into a place (I've forgotten where) and I was stunned. The place smelt like my former school. It was a wonder that another place in another country would smell like my old school. At that moment, I felt as if I didn't want to leave that place because of the smell that brought back nostalgic memories. I tried to find what was the thing or things that created the amazing smell of a place of old buildings, grass, trees, food, students, cars, and newspapers. It was as if I was suddenly brought back in time, to 2008 when I was still a student of my previous school.
Synesthesia is the combination of two or more senses of perception. One of the most common characteristics of synesthesia is the assigning of colors to numbers. For example, a person who has synesthesia will always see red color surrounding the number 5. In class, we did a synesthesia test. As Ms Jackson read out a series of numbers, we had to write down the color that we associate with the numbers. We did the test again after a week. I did not have synesthesia, because the colors that I wrote were different.
I think it would be interesting if someone had synesthesia. Does it affect the person's lifestyle? I think this depends on the symptoms of each individuals who has synesthesia. A few weeks ago, Mai Vi told me about a character in an American drama Lost who has synesthesia. The character can associate sounds with colors. Other than that, the character later also realized that certain colors are related to certain emotions. For example, if the character's mother was shouting, the sound of the mother shouting creates red sound wave. In some ways, this is an advantage for the character because the character is able to know the emotional state of people who are speaking. I personally would want to have that characteristic of synesthesia. It would help me to identify people's emotions and it would be a great help when I'm interacting with people.
As we watched a 10 minute clip of At First Sight, we were learning about sense perception. In the movie, the main character was blind since birth and in the clip that we watched in class, Virgil had just did an operation and the doctor was opening his wound dressing. It was a very nervous moment for Virgil's sister and girlfriend, Jennie and Amy.
After Virgil opened his eyes, he was very frightened as he couldn't understand what he was seeing. Even if his closest sister was standing in front of him, Virgil did not know who she was because he had never perceived his sister's physical appearance. Hence, he had to associate his sense of touch to help him believe what he is seeing is what it is. In addition, one interesting moment that was shown in the clip was that Virgil did not recognize himself when he saw himself in the mirror. He thought that the figure in the mirror was another person until he saw the reflection followed his actions then he only realized that it was himself.
Firstly, I think that people who used to be blind and regain their sight would not have a sense of beauty. They wouldn't know if a person or thing is beautiful or ugly. This is because their minds are not affected by different factors - commercials, artists, culture, etc. For example, a very traditional Chinese may think that single eye lids women, with their eyes slightly diagonal (phoenix' eyes) are beautiful.
In addition, I also came up with a question: how do blind people dream? Usually when we dream, we have visions. The visions are created from our imagination, or settings that we have seen before. Given the fact that blind people cannot perceive the material world, I assume that they won't have visions in their dream. Then what do their dreams consist of? The touch of things, sounds, and voices of people?
1 Inductive Reasoning
A kind of reasoning in which a general conclusion is drawn from specific examples, usually personal experiences and observations. The conclusion drawn from inductive reasoning may not always be true, but practical for the person used.
Example: All humans cannot breathe underwater for a long time, therefore, humans cannot live underwater.
2 Deductive Reasoning
A kind of reasoning in which a specific conclusion is drawn from general statements. Deductive reasoning is more reliable than inductive reasoning because we can know whether the conclusion is true but sometimes the logic is difficult to follow.
Example: Some fish are silver. A salmon is a fish. Therefore, some salmons are silver.
3 Syllogism
A kind of deductive reasoning that consists of two premises and one conclusion.
4 Premise
Statements that provide information in order to come to a final conclusion. The premises have to have quantifiers and three terms in total.
5 Conclusion
A proposition formed based on two premises. In order for a conclusion to be true, the two premises have to be true and the logic must be valid.
6 Terms
The subjects of premises, usually nouns.
7 Quantifier
Words that tell us the approximate amount of things that are referred to.
8 Fallacy
A kind of reasoning that has flaws; the false reasoning is used to make a invalid conclusion.
Equivocation: A type of fallacy that is caused by words that have double meaning. Sometimes the way how the words are used are ambiguous so it is difficult to know if someone is using the word with the same meaning consistently in an argument.
For example, a paper is light. The light is broken. Therefore, the paper is broken.
9 Inference
The action of drawing a conclusion based on evidence and logic.
10 Argument
A series of statements intended to establish a proposition, to come to a valid conclusion.
11 Logic
A process of reasonable and rational thinking that guides and allows us to judge for what is correct.
12 Hasty Generalization
To make a generalization without enough evidence.
Example: I have never seen Sae Hyun eat bananas, so she hates bananas.
13 Enthymeme
A premise that is not expressed because it is implied that everyone knows it.
Example: James is a businessmen. James is rich. (The premise that is missing is "Businessmen are rich.")
14 Confirmation Bias
When people are unconsciously selecting (to only see) evidence that support their beliefs to confirm that what they believe in is true.
Example: I believe that Asians are good in math and the Asians who are good in math in my school confirm my belief (I ignore the Asians who are not as good in Math.).
15 Belief Bias
When people believe an argument to be valid because the conclusion that fit with their beliefs.
Example: I believe that all bears are black because I have never seen bears in any other color.
16 Synesthesia
The combination of two or more sense of perception. For example, a person who has synesthesia may see certain colors when they see, think or hear certain numbers.
17 Veil of Perception
The idea that we can never perceive how the material world really is, because there are veils or barriers, such as our ideas, impressions, and interpretations that affect how we perceive the world.
18 Naive Realism
The things that we see are how we perceive them to be. For example, an apple is dark red because that is how I see it now.
19 Idealism
Something does not exist unless there is someone to perceive it. For example, if a tree falls on the ground but no one is there to hear the sound of the tree falling, then the sound does not exist.
20 Immaterialism
There is no material world, the only thing that really exists is our mind.
21 Law of Simplicity
We do not invent new names for shapes that are irregular, but categorize them into what they are similar to. A shape that is not a circle but looks like a circle is called a circle.
22 Law of Parsimony
To explain a thing or event with the simplest explanation that fits the data.
23 Context
(a) Based on our understanding of the world, we see something depending on the context in which we see it.
(b) Our mind is set of how things should be so when things are out of our expectations, they become disturbing.
24 Expectations
The tendency for us to overlook the things that are irregular, that do not fit with our expectations.
25 Selectivity
The tendency for us to only notice things that we are concentrating on and unconsciously ignore others because we cannot be aware of everything that is happening around us.
26 Visual Grouping
The tendency for us to look for shapes and patterns in what we perceive in order to make sense of it.
27 Figure and Ground
The tendency for us to draw attention to certain things and treat others as the background. We usually highlight things that are in black (figure) and white as the background.
28 Gestalt Principle
The tendency for our mind to perceive things as how we think they should be, seeing things according to what we already know.
Example: This book is is blue (We omit the second "the".)
