Mind the Step…
This section is about various aspects of mind, and influences on the mind. See the other pages for aspects of the extended mind, nature vs. nurture, and mind control.
Scientists on the whole tend to be an impartial lot unless there is some form of hidden agenda or receive stipends from controlling bodies. These for example, might be governments or corporations that are funding research to support their own agenda. Thus, all is not perfect because most scientists have to earn a living, and may thus compromise their own beliefs.
However, science in the humanities is generally generic, so applies to the vast majority of the population – unless a part or the whole of their research is aimed at specific groups or communities.
Here’s a short video that shows why you shouldn’t accept unverified “truths.” The clip from the UK shows an experiment based on the game “Chinese Whispers” (also known as “Broken Telephone” in the US), using the general public. Chinese Whispers is traditionally a party pastime where a small piece of information is given to someone, who then passes it on (often slightly altered) to the next person, then on to the next, and the next etc. Eventually, what comes back is frequently almost totally unrecognizable.
Imagine if you will, that everyone is doing this all the time everywhere. We are all filtering, altering, adding and omitting information continually. Even reading books and online text, or writing the printed word in some manner is little different, because it has to pass through someone’s mind, resulting in its becoming filtered and altered before it ever reaches our eyes. However, because it is written down, many then regard it as just having become set in stone, forgetting the inherent or unwitting biases of the author.
What is the answer? Well, the information you are presently reading has just been created, edited and passed through my own filtering mind. As such, I can only say that you should carefully examine everything, not rejecting anything, nor accepting anything, until the evidence is very convincing. Often, holding things in abeyance until supportive or non-confirming facts or info comes along is the way to go. To be open, but seeing everything with a curious intelligent mind that is aware of these many pitfalls in our own human nature is appropriate:
The following video originally from CNN is a modern update to both the Stanford Prison Experiment and The Milgram Experiement that are both now cast in doubt. Electric shock “therapy” has been used right up until and including 2012, by the Judge Rotenberg Center in Massachusetts, USA. Their “aversion therapy” is used to “treat” autistic children.
All the same characteristics are on display here that have been evidenced since the 1930’s and beyond, such as internally rationalizing concepts that are barbaric and inhumane. Others in the organization stand by apathetically while the practice is carried on, turning a blind eye to events that would make any normal sane person balk.
Many of their actions (or lack of action), are of course due to a fear of losing a job by not disturbing the status quo, but is any job worth the loss of what it is to be human? Here is the video from Fox News on YouTube:
Why do we deceive ourselves? White lies and more…
Necessary Lies:
Why Everyone (Else) is a Hypocrite:
The Better Angels of Our Nature – Steven Pinker:
The following 20 minute video with Richard Davidson on Edutopia called “The Neuroscience of Social, Emotional and Academic Learning” is actually an interesting mixed bag. Primarily he shows how brain plasticity enables us to learn new things even into old age in many different spheres. However, Davidson also shows us that emotional arousal impacts on our health, and that good emotional regulation is needed to keep our brains and our bodies in better health for longer. He suggests that learning the appropriate methods to do this improves the function of the pre-frontal cortex – a very human part of the brain:
See also: Aspects of the extended mind.
And: Possible aspects of mind control.