blog 14

Mindful Thoughts

Audible actions can otherwise be referred to as noises which promote a calming sensation. They free the mind and allow someone to focus and concentrate while being free of stress. They are important to relax the mind and break free from the daily stresses of life.

Lalling refers to a stagger in your speech, it may be due to a disability or just a difficulty to pronounce words. A phoneme is two similarly spelled words that are pronounced differently. The elements of sound distinguish what word is trying to be portrayed.

The term Gestalt relates to something newly introduced. It may relate to a factor that may influence something more than planned.

Metaphors are always left to the audience to interpret. Yes anyone could write a phrase and intend it to mean a certain thing but in the end it is all up to the audience.

Postman comments on the over and under achievers explaining how there are several categories in which someone can be "smart" in. Some kids are book smart like me while others are common sense smart. It is funny because typically those who are book smart struggle in the common sense aspect of things.

On a daily basis I try to map out the territory of what I am actually going to do with my life. I don't know where I am going to end up but I just try to think hard and plan it out so I can be successful. It is actually terrifying because I have no way of telling how it will end up.

blog 13

Bacon and Darwin 

   Bacon uses the word idols to mean phantoms or illusions. I don't think idol is a good word to use in this context because typically I relate something you look up to as an idol not an illusion. I believe the Idols of the tribe are the most effective in distorting all of the other idols. These idols reside in human nature itself and is "a false assertion that the sense of man is the measure of things." If your view on human nature is skewed everything will be altered with it. Idols of the Tribe and Idols of the Marketplace both are results of social intercourse while Idols of the Cave and Idols of the Theater both mainly affect the individual. If the individual was restricted they may be sheltered from those Idols of the Marketplace because these have to relate to words. If one man is alone then they won't have to communicate with others. A hermit may lack certain idols but I feel like he would experience more of the individualized idols because he would be used to focusing on himself. 

    Darwin writes about natural selection and survival of the fittest, this phrase can be best interpreted as those who are physically and mentally the strongest will live longer. For example if an animal has a specific terminal disease it will most likely die off before being able to reproduce. By this happening the genome for that individual which carries the code for that particular disease will not be passed on within the species. Natural selection is very important, nature will weed out the weak individuals hopefully allowing only the fit to reproduce. Natural selection is selecting for traits which will benefit the species as a whole. By selective breeding of animals the humans typically chose a certain trait they are breeding for and are only interested in making that offspring better. Natural selection increases randomness and chance and is by far more important. I don't believe Darwin would appreciate cloning, he is all for natural selection and evolution. There is no such thing as the perfect individual therefore by cloning you will just be repeating the bad traits. Darwin expresses the necessity of randomness and natural selection in order for the species to thrive. Humans are the worst species today, we are babied out of control. Survival of the fittest definitely does not apply to us or half of the humans wouldn't be alive right now. We will do anything to keep the lesser members of society alive, and to do what? They reproduce and now we have another generation of insufficient society members. Modern medicine allows us to beat the sickness quicker but all in all weakens our immune system when before we would have to build up immunity to certain diseases. 

blog 12

Plato, Freud and The Mind 

Plato believes that sensory knowledge is unreliable... I don't agree with him at all. As humans it is our nature to use our senses, we need to see, feel and smell things. Without senses we wouldn't be able to complete half of the necessary learning experiences of life. We can tell what is good or what is bad from our senses. 

I think it is impossible for us not to be materialistic when it comes to sense perception. Obviously some things tend to be better than others and typically the better things are more expensive. I don't know about you but the feeling when I'm driving a BMW is much greater than when I drive my car. If we lacked our senses and still had to function in this world I could see it as a dull lifeless place. Nothing would have to have eye appeal or none the less any appeal because we wouldn't have opinion whether it was good or not. If I had to chose a sense I didn't have it would definitely have to be mind reading. It doesn't tie into any of the other senses at all and could for sure be a useful tool. I like to know what everyone is contemplating and the thoughts that are rushing through their minds. 

I for sure believe that our dreams have some sort of a significance on our daily life. I'd love to know the reasoning for why I think about what I do when I am sleeping, I feel like there is a deeper reasoning to it. The dreams the most mystify me are the ones that I feel could actually happen. They feel so real and I can't tell if it is some way of indicating something similar may happen in real life. Frightening dreams I typically don't last to long through, I am an extremely light sleeper so I usually will wake up. I believe dreams are often forgotten because they are written off so quickly. If believe took dreams more seriously they may be more apt to remember them. On the note of dreaming being a mental activity I believe that it is. Anytime your brain is thinking or formulating ideas it is working.

blog 11

Differences in Gender Roles

Woolf and Mead both discuss gender roles, Woolf focusing more on women.

          Woolf wrote an essay directed to two Oxford students which happened to be both women. You can tell this because Woolf recognizes their gift of intelligence, she makes several comments regarding back to their intelligence. During this time women were basically considered property, chapter headings from Trevelyan’s History of England support this. Many of these chapter headings consist of something regarding war, women obviously weren’t fit for war so therefor it can be inferred that women weren’t very relevant to society. An important change in society that is needed to benefit gifted women, is that more acceptance for women needs to be in place. Talent makes a women’s situation difficult because they basically challenge the men therefor are resented. 

          Mead broadens her research to the temperament of both the male and female. Her research finds that the traits of women and men vary from culture to culture. In some cultures, men are only fit to paint in color while in others women are apt to fish. When restricting opportunities of one sex, the society limits themselves of potential fillers for jobs. Say for example if they needed teachers and only men could do this then they would have a limited pool to choose from. Opposite sexes pay a high toll in discrimination when standardized temperamental expectations are put in place. If they are not within the norm, then they are shunned. Our society needs to be concerned and follow the ways of the primitive cultures because the gender roles where not as prominent. More people were allowed to do various jobs and they were not discriminated upon do to their gender.

blog 10

Diversity, Women and Inequality

The Pernicious effect… it makes perfect sense. The rich lack morals, you may try to deny this but it is true. Many wealthy individuals will do whatever it takes to stay wealthy and turn their head to actions that may be questionable. In order to fix this problem of morality we must bring our class gap closer together. This will bring down the wealthy people and set them at a level closer to the middle class where they must practice morals in order to get by. 

Property, a common thought associated with wealth. What if women counted as property? I mean that’s basically what a trophy wife is. Women in this past society had so many restrictions on what they could do. In order to be considered an adequate woman they needed to cater to their man’s needs. The “unnatural distinction” caused women to behave ignorant, during this time it was the best thing a girl could do. By just going with whatever they were told they were in a disgusting way better respected.  

According to Kozol schools extremely lack diversity, diversity indicates a mixture of different races, genders and ethnic backgrounds. Kozol believes that the schools that claim they are diverse are just segregated. You don’t usually see an Asian, African American and Indian all sitting at one lunch table. My definition of diverse is having all different types of people within a given area. Many Africans are considered miss-educated according to Woodson. They are taught to basically hate their own culture and believe that the white way is correct. Woodson believes that the best educated Africans are the uneducated or self-taught because they actually can think for themselves. 

Alternate Education Methods

                                

       Montessori and Dewey are both individuals who created alternative methods to education. Both of them believe that each individual has specific needs which should direct their education. Also the teacher must guide the students through their educational journey.

            Montessori had a basic scientific pedagogy for her method of education, freedom was essential. Students needed to be free to explore, by exploring different objects and problems students would learn how to figure things out on their own. She didn’t believe that schooling needed to be like slavery, children should be comfortable in school and able to move furniture to suit their needs. Stationary furniture can limit freedom while movable furniture encourages engagement with the rest of the people in the classroom. Pupils must be free, without freedom in the class room children will be discouraged to learn and experiment. By allowing students to have more choices they will be able to learn in ways that they want and be able to encounter multiple problems they must solve.

            Dewey had an even more freedom based method, he believed children should be able to do what they want with what they had. He often used the phrase “thinking in education,” which is a process where children participate in a series of activities which provides them with skills to solve problems. The conditions required in a Dewey based classroom are as follows, there needs to be several objects that the kids can experiment with and the teacher needs to allow for multiple hands on experiences. Dewey believes the best process of education is experience, knowledge and then putting these two together to solve a problem. 

Montessori Video

Dewey Video

blog 8

Agriculture vs. Manufacturing

In the mid 1700’s Adam Smith compiled a book which discusses the economic system of England at that time. He examines how manufactures depend on farmers and how trade between towns is superior to trade between nations. The importance of ownership of land is also a big part of the, Of the Natural Progress of Opulence, section of his novel. Smith believes that with owning land the individual has more control of his wealth, the land owner is the first individual to the completion of a final product so therefore he not only controls his wealth but that of the community, with no wood grown on the property owner’s land then there will be no furniture produced by the wood craftsmen.  

I believe that during Smith’s time, his recordings were an accurate representation of what it took for a nation to become prosperous. In our current economy I think farmers play less of a role, technology producing companies seem to fill one of the larger segments in our nation’s trade. Big business owners seem to be the ones that proper over the farmers. Land has lost its value in today’s world. Wealthy individuals seem to want to invest their money into steady stocks of big businesses and education. They want to ensure they will be benefiting from where they place their money and land does not fulfill this obligation.

In regards to Smith’s statement, “According to the natural course of things, therefore, the greater part of the capital of every growing society is, first, directed to agriculture, afterwards to manufactures, and last of all to foreign commerce,” I disagree with the first part but in total compliance with the last part. I think manufacturing has overcome agriculture in importance, more money can be produced for the nation through fabricating goods rather than growing products. The time frame to say construct a computer is far less than to grow an acre of corn. Relating to foreign trade I couldn’t agree more, keeping trade within the nation will benefit the specific country because money is being confined to the country. If you are constantly trading with other nations, money is being lost especially if you are importing more than exporting and that is the current situation the United States is in.