Tag: Psychology

Social-Network Cameraphone Girls

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Social networks have exploded with a rash of photos that people, girls—surprisingly often attractive ones—in particular, post of themselves, often in their underwear. They tend to be of the variety in which the subject (read she) is holding their camera-phone up and taking a photo of herself in the mirror or holding the camera out as far as they can and taking the photo of themselves.

What people don’t seem to realize is exactly what these (pretty dumb looking) photos mean: the girls have nobody to take the picture for them.

It could be argued that they are taking the picture themselves because it’s kind of private what with them wearing just underwear, but then again, they can’t exactly be shy since they are posting these photos on the Internet for the whole world to see. It could be rebutted that they are more comfortable with having unknown strangers seeing these photos than they are with having an actual, live person seeing them in person. Really‽ If that is the case, then I suppose it explains why so many actresses are so willing to do nude scenes, even knowing what fat, hairy men around the world are doing to those scenes. Finally, it could be counter-pointed that they are not posting the photos for everybody to see, but rather only a select group of people (who exactly‽). If that were true, then why are so many of these photos available consolidated on so many blogs? Perhaps these girls just don’t know how to set the privacy of the photos? Either way, do their camera-phones not have a timer function?

It’s pretty likely that a lot of these girls simply have nobody to hold the camera, which means that not only do they probably not have a boyfriend, but they must not even have a girlfriend that they trust and are comfortable with. It does make sense to a degree though since people who are introverted and relatively lonely are often the ones who go (too far) all out on-line.

Also, do they not have a plain wall, like in the bathroom or hallway, to take the picture against? Do they have to take it against a cluttered, background showing their messy rooms?

Rollercoaster Masochism

Synetech 1 Comment

What exactly makes a roller-coaster ride so much fun? Certainly the physics is part of it; the speed, the momentary weightlessness, the air, the normally impossible manoeuvres; but there is no doubt that the danger is as much, if not more a part of it. The idea of possibly dying makes roller-coasters a thrill just as it does for skydiving and bungee jumping.

What would happen if you rode a roller-coaster that you knew was completely safe? That is, you know for certain that there is a 100% chance of living through it because there was absolutely no possibility whatsoever of getting hurt (let alone dying). Would you still enjoy it? Would it feel the same?

I’ve also wondered the same thing about watching scary movies or eating hot peppers. Why do we enjoy things that are ostensibly harmful? That’s definitely masochistic.

I Smell Burnt Toast – Would You Know If Your Brain Broke?

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Would you know it if your brain was not functioning correctly? Perhaps; it depends on exactly what problem it was having.

Would you know if you had forgotten something? How could you if you have forgotten it? Wouldn’t simply knowing that you knew it allow you to know it? Again, it depends on the knowledge. It’s possible to know that you used to know how to integrate a calculus problem, but be unable to do so anymore because you’ve forgotten how. You have lost the primary knowledge, but retained the meta-knowledge, that is, knowledge about other knowledge. On the other hand, you could know that you have an appointment tomorrow, but forget it. There is no meta-knowledge involved in this however because the mere act of knowing that you know that you have an appointment is itself the primary knowledge: that you have an appointment. The closest thing to meta-knowledge in this case would be knowing that you had to do something, but cannot remember what, but that is too generic and applies to pretty much all knowledge one has.

What about more significant damage? What if you incur Alzheimer’s disease? Would you know it? How could you since the disease affects the fundamental ability to think?

These problems arise because the brain is our primary (and only) method of thinking about things, including our brains themselves. If the brain gets damaged, how can it think about itself? If you sustain some brain damage resulting in a loss of cognitive ability, how can you know it if that requires the brain to know and understand it?