One thing humans differ from other animals is that humans have a sophisticated and complex system of language to communicate with each other. Although animals do have some means of communication such as movement, chemicals or hormones, they are rather used for simple and basic purposes that are directly related to survival and basic needs like gathering food and alerting the emergence of natural enemies.
Friday, 9 December 2016
Friday, 25 November 2016
Sense Perception
Do we believe the senses we perceive or do we perceive senses the way we believe? Many would say the former, but there definitely are some cases whereby our bodies tend to distort senses and deliver fabricated information to the brain, usually to support whatever the brain thinks beforehand.
As aforementioned in the 'intuition' post, intuitive people tend to gain information from internal world whereas sensible people gain information from the external world. Therefore, sensible people are usually more likely to be relatively objective, as the information they would perceive would not so much be affected by their own subjective opinions. They would see, smell, hear, taste and touch things the way they actually are. Their kind of sense perception would be fairly direct, straightforward and unfiltered. On the other hand, intuitive people would not really care about or learn much from the outside world. They would believe in their own hypotheses, and their senses may deceive themselves.
There is one famous anecdote about Saint Wonhyo. While he was travelling to Tang to practice asceticism, he stayed the night in a cave. Among the dark there was water in a bowl, which Wonhyo drank it and it was so fresh and cool. The next morning, Wonhyo then finds out that the water he drank was the water stagnating in a skull, not a bowl.
As aforementioned in the 'intuition' post, intuitive people tend to gain information from internal world whereas sensible people gain information from the external world. Therefore, sensible people are usually more likely to be relatively objective, as the information they would perceive would not so much be affected by their own subjective opinions. They would see, smell, hear, taste and touch things the way they actually are. Their kind of sense perception would be fairly direct, straightforward and unfiltered. On the other hand, intuitive people would not really care about or learn much from the outside world. They would believe in their own hypotheses, and their senses may deceive themselves.
There is one famous anecdote about Saint Wonhyo. While he was travelling to Tang to practice asceticism, he stayed the night in a cave. Among the dark there was water in a bowl, which Wonhyo drank it and it was so fresh and cool. The next morning, Wonhyo then finds out that the water he drank was the water stagnating in a skull, not a bowl.
Friday, 11 November 2016
Intuition
I, personally, have a very strong sense of intuition. It occurs in every part of my daily life,
such as when I pick an answer for a multiple-choice question or choose what
menu I would go for this evening. I don’t think or consider thoroughly about
the conditions of each choice I could make, like each of their benefits and
drawbacks. All people have times when they can make a decision without any
hesitation because they have a feeling that it’d be right. Though it may not
always be a right and rational decision, people would probably not change their
minds if their inner voice says, “Go for it”. We call this ‘intuition’.
The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator, also known as MBTI personality test, examines whether the person is extraverted (E) or introverted (I), sensing (S) or intuitive (N), thinking (T) or feeling (F), and judging (J) or perceiving (P). Hence the result can come out 16 different combinations. For me, I was told I was an ENFP person: extraverted, intuitive, feeling and perceiving. To focus on sensing (S) and intuitive (N) factor, it represents the method by which someone perceives information. Sensing means that a person mainly believes information he or she receives directly from the external world. Intuition means that a person believes mainly information he or she receives from the internal or imaginative world. Hence, people who got N would be more likely to go for their own decisions and care not so much about what others say, as the information from their own outweighs that from outer world.
The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator, also known as MBTI personality test, examines whether the person is extraverted (E) or introverted (I), sensing (S) or intuitive (N), thinking (T) or feeling (F), and judging (J) or perceiving (P). Hence the result can come out 16 different combinations. For me, I was told I was an ENFP person: extraverted, intuitive, feeling and perceiving. To focus on sensing (S) and intuitive (N) factor, it represents the method by which someone perceives information. Sensing means that a person mainly believes information he or she receives directly from the external world. Intuition means that a person believes mainly information he or she receives from the internal or imaginative world. Hence, people who got N would be more likely to go for their own decisions and care not so much about what others say, as the information from their own outweighs that from outer world.
Friday, 28 October 2016
Emotion
Emotion is powerful: it can control many things. It can raise billions of dollars, or kill a person, or create amazing masterpieces depending on who and what kind of emotion was used.
Emotion can either be individual or social. It can simply be what an individual person feel, or can be shared among a group of people. Emotion can become more powerful when shared by more people. The more the people share the common emotion, the bigger change it can provoke.
Pity is one of the most significant and most humane emotions humans can feel. In a human's mind, there lays a hill of pity. When one walks by that hill, s/he would feel a strong sense of pity in his/her mind about something. Hence, when the one goes down the hill, s/he would perform a kind action that can improve whatever s/he felt sorry for, usually someone in harsh situation such as a beggar.
There is one example in South Korea, where the citizens are very emotional,
when the emotion was powerful enough to raise two hundred thousand dollars, to help a patient diagnosed with neurofibroma. Neurofibroma is a very rare disease that deforms the patient's face and body.
Her target fund was only thirty thousand dollars at first. However, as her tragedy was introduced to the public via TV programs and social media, more people who felt pitiful for her gathered and raised money for her. They were sharing the common pity towards this lady, and they've managed to work a miracle.
Such disease, rare and hardly curable disease which did not enable her a normal social life, created only a pure sense of pity to help her. However, some other tragedies not only evoke pity but also fury. The sinking of MV Sewol was one of those. Only 172 out of total 476 passengers were rescued. The captain, who should be responsible to save as many passengers as possible, escaped from the ferry the very first. The ferry, old and broken, was carrying more passengers than its capacity, in only purpose of earning more money. Most of the passengers were young high school students, aged only 17, heading for a school trip. The incompetent president, who should have mobilised and directed maritime police officers to save the passengers, did not appear for 7 hours when all those hundreds of people were dying. It is recently revealed that she was in a hair salon getting her hair done, doing nothing for such accident while people were sinking in the cold sea. This made the whole citizens in Korea furious, and there were yellow ribbons hung everywhere and a myriad of protest. Now, two years from then, there is an ongoing protest in Korea that is one of the biggest in the entire history, to impeach the president.
Emotion can either be individual or social. It can simply be what an individual person feel, or can be shared among a group of people. Emotion can become more powerful when shared by more people. The more the people share the common emotion, the bigger change it can provoke.
Pity is one of the most significant and most humane emotions humans can feel. In a human's mind, there lays a hill of pity. When one walks by that hill, s/he would feel a strong sense of pity in his/her mind about something. Hence, when the one goes down the hill, s/he would perform a kind action that can improve whatever s/he felt sorry for, usually someone in harsh situation such as a beggar.
There is one example in South Korea, where the citizens are very emotional,
when the emotion was powerful enough to raise two hundred thousand dollars, to help a patient diagnosed with neurofibroma. Neurofibroma is a very rare disease that deforms the patient's face and body.
Her target fund was only thirty thousand dollars at first. However, as her tragedy was introduced to the public via TV programs and social media, more people who felt pitiful for her gathered and raised money for her. They were sharing the common pity towards this lady, and they've managed to work a miracle.
Such disease, rare and hardly curable disease which did not enable her a normal social life, created only a pure sense of pity to help her. However, some other tragedies not only evoke pity but also fury. The sinking of MV Sewol was one of those. Only 172 out of total 476 passengers were rescued. The captain, who should be responsible to save as many passengers as possible, escaped from the ferry the very first. The ferry, old and broken, was carrying more passengers than its capacity, in only purpose of earning more money. Most of the passengers were young high school students, aged only 17, heading for a school trip. The incompetent president, who should have mobilised and directed maritime police officers to save the passengers, did not appear for 7 hours when all those hundreds of people were dying. It is recently revealed that she was in a hair salon getting her hair done, doing nothing for such accident while people were sinking in the cold sea. This made the whole citizens in Korea furious, and there were yellow ribbons hung everywhere and a myriad of protest. Now, two years from then, there is an ongoing protest in Korea that is one of the biggest in the entire history, to impeach the president.
Friday, 14 October 2016
Reason
What are reasons needed for? Why do people
tend to have reasons behind their actions? Reasons validate, or justify,
certain things. It moreover convinces others to understand things that are
usually not plausible.
For example, Jean Valjean stole a loaf of bread. Stealing is a crime, one of the things that are prohibited to do in order to maintain peace within the society. However, Jean Valjean had a nephew who was starving and close to death, and he had no money whatsoever to give him any food or medicine. His stealing was due to his harsh situation, and was from a noble reason, to save a life. Some people, after the reason revealed, would be convinced and say Jean Valjean’s theft was reasonable. However, others, who stand with Javert, would say theft is never allowed under any circumstances. They would argue that Jean Valjean could have chosen other ways to save his nephew, such as working hard to earn money and legitimately buy the bread, or even begging to the bakery owner. But still, those alternatives would not have been as immediate and practical solutions to solve the problem, though they are considered ‘moral’. For Jean Valjean, what was more important was saving his dying nephew, than such cliché like moral.
For example, Jean Valjean stole a loaf of bread. Stealing is a crime, one of the things that are prohibited to do in order to maintain peace within the society. However, Jean Valjean had a nephew who was starving and close to death, and he had no money whatsoever to give him any food or medicine. His stealing was due to his harsh situation, and was from a noble reason, to save a life. Some people, after the reason revealed, would be convinced and say Jean Valjean’s theft was reasonable. However, others, who stand with Javert, would say theft is never allowed under any circumstances. They would argue that Jean Valjean could have chosen other ways to save his nephew, such as working hard to earn money and legitimately buy the bread, or even begging to the bakery owner. But still, those alternatives would not have been as immediate and practical solutions to solve the problem, though they are considered ‘moral’. For Jean Valjean, what was more important was saving his dying nephew, than such cliché like moral.
Friday, 30 September 2016
Imagination
People these days definitely lack imagination. It is due to their lack of time and creativity.
Ironically, in this modern society - where it is fully composed of the imaginations the people from the former era imagined - people are super busy and do not have any time to imagine. They are all worn out by their harsh reality and fatigue. They are busy working, competing, beating each other and stepping forward, because that's the only way to survive in this rat race. Not to fall behind and be left alone.
People call the ones who imagine as ‘daydreamers’, or ‘idealists’, because they live in dreams and do not think of reality. Or at least people think they would do so, because they generalise them with their superficies. People argue whatever they imagine in their minds are mere ‘dreams’, not achievable ‘goals’. They believe thinking and talking about those unachievable delusions is totally a waste of time.
But are imaginations really that valueless? Are they not important at all? Imaginations are only evoked from creative people, and in other words, are called as the creative ideas, which a myriad of corporations are looking for. All those innovative inventions, for example like smart phones, were at first ‘imagined’ and then were actually produced. Moreover, the more the creative the product is, the more it appeals to customers, and the more profit it earns. Hence, corporations are seeking to recruit people who are capable of coming up with creative ideas. And those people are, in other words, the ‘imaginers’, who were pointed at.
Ironically, in this modern society - where it is fully composed of the imaginations the people from the former era imagined - people are super busy and do not have any time to imagine. They are all worn out by their harsh reality and fatigue. They are busy working, competing, beating each other and stepping forward, because that's the only way to survive in this rat race. Not to fall behind and be left alone.
People call the ones who imagine as ‘daydreamers’, or ‘idealists’, because they live in dreams and do not think of reality. Or at least people think they would do so, because they generalise them with their superficies. People argue whatever they imagine in their minds are mere ‘dreams’, not achievable ‘goals’. They believe thinking and talking about those unachievable delusions is totally a waste of time.
But are imaginations really that valueless? Are they not important at all? Imaginations are only evoked from creative people, and in other words, are called as the creative ideas, which a myriad of corporations are looking for. All those innovative inventions, for example like smart phones, were at first ‘imagined’ and then were actually produced. Moreover, the more the creative the product is, the more it appeals to customers, and the more profit it earns. Hence, corporations are seeking to recruit people who are capable of coming up with creative ideas. And those people are, in other words, the ‘imaginers’, who were pointed at.
Saturday, 17 September 2016
Memory
Let me tell you an interesting fact from the start. Our brain, surprisingly, remembers everything. It stores every single information we get to know. It is just our synapse that is not developed enough to reach to the stored information. That is when we forget something. We actually do remember the thing, but we just can't access to the thing.
Then, what are the things that we do not forget? We all have an experience that we study hard for an exam and basically memorise and study everything, and after the exam we forget most of those. Like the status quo of us IB freshmen, who forgot almost everything what we've learnt from IGCSEs. (I bet I'm going to fail them if I have to take them again right now😂) Hence, not to forget certain things we should acknowledge the importance and value of knowing the thing, and keep remembering the thing. For instance, suppose you have your final exam in a week. You know that this exam is very important and would affect your university admissions. Therefore, unless you are not interested in going to university and don't care about your grades, you would definitely have to study. You won't probably be simply putting all the information at once; you would rather be revising many times, to make sure you don't forget the contents at the exam day. In contrast, after you pass the exam and get a good grade, there is no need for you to study the contents anymore. If you really like and enjoy the subject, you might continue studying, but in most cases you won't, thus never looking through the book again. At this point you know that revising is neither necessary nor useful anymore. There's just no point of doing all the studies again. From this point you start to lose your memories. You don't need to keep all those miscellaneous information in your brain no more, so you gradually stop to remember, to 'reach' to your memories. So basically it can be described as a bridge. There's a bridge that reaches to your memories and you don't cross it for years, it gradually wears out and breaks down at last.
Once, a way not to remember thing has been introduced. It is, to remember it at least 3 times over somewhat periods of time. For example, you search for the meaning of a difficult scientific term. Let's say, photosynthesis, because it was the most difficult vocabulary I've been learning when I was 10. You first understand what photosynthesis means. Then like a month passes, and you find photosynthesis in your textbook. You might not remember then, but when you search for it again and find out the meaning, you would realise the fact that you already knew the word. This would make it easier for you not to forget the word again. In other words, it would strengthen the bond, or the 'bridge', to your antecedent memories about photosynthesis. Now you can do this process after some period of time again. It is known that to fully make the knowledge yours you should do this sort of relearning-remembering process more than 3 times. You will then eventually be able to say "Yes I know it goes like that" instead of "Um...well I knew this but I just forgot..."
Then, what are the things that we do not forget? We all have an experience that we study hard for an exam and basically memorise and study everything, and after the exam we forget most of those. Like the status quo of us IB freshmen, who forgot almost everything what we've learnt from IGCSEs. (I bet I'm going to fail them if I have to take them again right now😂) Hence, not to forget certain things we should acknowledge the importance and value of knowing the thing, and keep remembering the thing. For instance, suppose you have your final exam in a week. You know that this exam is very important and would affect your university admissions. Therefore, unless you are not interested in going to university and don't care about your grades, you would definitely have to study. You won't probably be simply putting all the information at once; you would rather be revising many times, to make sure you don't forget the contents at the exam day. In contrast, after you pass the exam and get a good grade, there is no need for you to study the contents anymore. If you really like and enjoy the subject, you might continue studying, but in most cases you won't, thus never looking through the book again. At this point you know that revising is neither necessary nor useful anymore. There's just no point of doing all the studies again. From this point you start to lose your memories. You don't need to keep all those miscellaneous information in your brain no more, so you gradually stop to remember, to 'reach' to your memories. So basically it can be described as a bridge. There's a bridge that reaches to your memories and you don't cross it for years, it gradually wears out and breaks down at last.
Once, a way not to remember thing has been introduced. It is, to remember it at least 3 times over somewhat periods of time. For example, you search for the meaning of a difficult scientific term. Let's say, photosynthesis, because it was the most difficult vocabulary I've been learning when I was 10. You first understand what photosynthesis means. Then like a month passes, and you find photosynthesis in your textbook. You might not remember then, but when you search for it again and find out the meaning, you would realise the fact that you already knew the word. This would make it easier for you not to forget the word again. In other words, it would strengthen the bond, or the 'bridge', to your antecedent memories about photosynthesis. Now you can do this process after some period of time again. It is known that to fully make the knowledge yours you should do this sort of relearning-remembering process more than 3 times. You will then eventually be able to say "Yes I know it goes like that" instead of "Um...well I knew this but I just forgot..."
Friday, 2 September 2016
Knowledge
Knowledge. Before going into this complicated in-depth topic, let's start from a simple question. Why do we go to school? A practical answer, for most of us students, would be because we need to achieve certain grades to apply for a university. Other reasons may be to socialise and interact with friends, or because going to school is an obligation as a student. An ideal answer, or someone might call it a lame answer, would be to learn and acquire knowledge.
Knowledge is what we know, what our brains are aware about. If we say we know a certain fact, it means that we understand, though not completely, but at least we know the thing goes like the way it does. For instance, we know that the Earth orbits around the Sun, though we do not know why.
Knowledge can be obtained either first-hand or second-hand: by experiences or by teachings. One can have an experience, either positive or negative, and after that s/he knows what to do if the same thing occurs again since s/he's already got the preceding experience. S/he might not acquire the knowledge at once, but at least s/he can figure out to make a better choice than the former one. One can also obtain knowledge from other people who have their other own experiences. The teachings are usually given from the teachers, parents, or antecedents to the students or kids through various ways such as lessons, books, or speeches. Students go to school and learn English, humanities, and mathematics. Parents teach their children not to be rude and respect others.
However, knowledge is not acquired in a simple, perceptual, or passive way just by listening to a lecture or watching a video. It is rather an active job that you should do it to get the knowledge for yourself. In order to obtain the knowledge, one should understand, comprehend, discuss, debate, write essays, or go through question papers. There are a variety of ways that each fit one's style of learning.
Not only its ways of conveying vary but its types vary. Knowledge is ubiquitous, regarding all areas of studies. There exist cultural knowledge, scientific knowledge, lingual knowledge, artistic knowledge, and a lot more. Knowledge is the concept that truly encompasses all the fields and furthermore can break down the barriers between the areas and integrate them. Perhaps knowledge is the only thing in the world that is limitless and eternal. All people die, but the knowledge never dies. It is passed onto the next generations, yet it may be extended or altered.
Having a lot of knowledge enables a person to be wise. And wise people in general have a stereotype of an elder with glasses and white long beards. Away from their appearance, wise people are usually old as they have gained most of their knowledge from their first-hand experiences. Proportional to the amount of time they lived, they gained a tremendous amount of experiences that most of the others haven't yet.
But here's a quite critical and radical question: how do we actually distinguish 'knowing' and 'not knowing'? For instance, if you have somebody as your roommate, and when people ask you if you knew him/her, you'll probably going to answer yes you know. But can you ever 'fully' know the person? Even though s/he is your best friend, always hangs out together with you, and tells you his/her secrets, it is not really possible to get to know a person who is not yourself.
To go into more general forms of knowledge, as in academic knowledge, the question continues. If you get 100% in your maths exam, can you say you fully know maths? Do your grades represent your knowledge? It rather depends on how much in depth you keep the knowledge, as if it's part of you, so it is quite natural for you to apply in your life.
Here goes another critical question: can the knowledge be an absolute truth? The answer, on my perspective, is "No". What we know now as the facts proven from the discoveries, are only how we humans observe and define the nature. The nature, even before the humans have ever existed or developed, was in that place all the time. It is just how humans view the nature, creating our own hypotheses and substantiating them with our own proofs based on our views on nature. For example, it is we humans who classified all those living organisms; hence cats are cats, fish are fish, sunflowers are sunflowers, and pine trees are pine trees. We never know, pine trees might have had their own names. It's just what we call and name the pine trees as pine trees; pine trees being pine trees therefore cannot be an absolute truth. In my personal view, all the scientific discoveries and mathematical formulas are mere promises made on our humans' behalves, in our own world. The others from rest of the world, or even from the outside of our world, may consider us ignorant and arrogant. We never know the absolute truth, but rather we believe in certain things to be true.
Perhaps obtaining knowledge is not about learning new things, but rather getting to believe in new things.
Knowledge is what we know, what our brains are aware about. If we say we know a certain fact, it means that we understand, though not completely, but at least we know the thing goes like the way it does. For instance, we know that the Earth orbits around the Sun, though we do not know why.
Knowledge can be obtained either first-hand or second-hand: by experiences or by teachings. One can have an experience, either positive or negative, and after that s/he knows what to do if the same thing occurs again since s/he's already got the preceding experience. S/he might not acquire the knowledge at once, but at least s/he can figure out to make a better choice than the former one. One can also obtain knowledge from other people who have their other own experiences. The teachings are usually given from the teachers, parents, or antecedents to the students or kids through various ways such as lessons, books, or speeches. Students go to school and learn English, humanities, and mathematics. Parents teach their children not to be rude and respect others.
However, knowledge is not acquired in a simple, perceptual, or passive way just by listening to a lecture or watching a video. It is rather an active job that you should do it to get the knowledge for yourself. In order to obtain the knowledge, one should understand, comprehend, discuss, debate, write essays, or go through question papers. There are a variety of ways that each fit one's style of learning.
Not only its ways of conveying vary but its types vary. Knowledge is ubiquitous, regarding all areas of studies. There exist cultural knowledge, scientific knowledge, lingual knowledge, artistic knowledge, and a lot more. Knowledge is the concept that truly encompasses all the fields and furthermore can break down the barriers between the areas and integrate them. Perhaps knowledge is the only thing in the world that is limitless and eternal. All people die, but the knowledge never dies. It is passed onto the next generations, yet it may be extended or altered.
Having a lot of knowledge enables a person to be wise. And wise people in general have a stereotype of an elder with glasses and white long beards. Away from their appearance, wise people are usually old as they have gained most of their knowledge from their first-hand experiences. Proportional to the amount of time they lived, they gained a tremendous amount of experiences that most of the others haven't yet.
But here's a quite critical and radical question: how do we actually distinguish 'knowing' and 'not knowing'? For instance, if you have somebody as your roommate, and when people ask you if you knew him/her, you'll probably going to answer yes you know. But can you ever 'fully' know the person? Even though s/he is your best friend, always hangs out together with you, and tells you his/her secrets, it is not really possible to get to know a person who is not yourself.
To go into more general forms of knowledge, as in academic knowledge, the question continues. If you get 100% in your maths exam, can you say you fully know maths? Do your grades represent your knowledge? It rather depends on how much in depth you keep the knowledge, as if it's part of you, so it is quite natural for you to apply in your life.
Here goes another critical question: can the knowledge be an absolute truth? The answer, on my perspective, is "No". What we know now as the facts proven from the discoveries, are only how we humans observe and define the nature. The nature, even before the humans have ever existed or developed, was in that place all the time. It is just how humans view the nature, creating our own hypotheses and substantiating them with our own proofs based on our views on nature. For example, it is we humans who classified all those living organisms; hence cats are cats, fish are fish, sunflowers are sunflowers, and pine trees are pine trees. We never know, pine trees might have had their own names. It's just what we call and name the pine trees as pine trees; pine trees being pine trees therefore cannot be an absolute truth. In my personal view, all the scientific discoveries and mathematical formulas are mere promises made on our humans' behalves, in our own world. The others from rest of the world, or even from the outside of our world, may consider us ignorant and arrogant. We never know the absolute truth, but rather we believe in certain things to be true.
Perhaps obtaining knowledge is not about learning new things, but rather getting to believe in new things.
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