Posts tagged life
(via charismatism)
Welcome back! This week, we’re going to tackle a topic that a few commenters brought up in the last Challenge.
Erika: “I’ve found that blog[s] typically have contributed to my cynicism and decreased empathy towards people. I tend to read many political blogs and or celeb gossip blogs, which inherently make me hate the world most of the time.”
CGMcBG: “I struggle with this also. I stopped watching the news a bit after 9/11, but the internet had [sort of] taken [its] place. I want to stay informed, but it’s hard to remain positive in light of such worldwide madness. How do you balance the two? (rhetorical question)”
:) this is what I’m doing… only going without *any* news, internet, et cetera.
ps- I may write a blog soon… as much as I try to escape the media over-saturated world, it’s very difficult when it still completely surrounds you. I feel like the character in Brave New World — the one that commits suicide at the end. However, I’m not suicidal, so don’t worry.
Quoted from “Our Tragic Universe” by Scarlett Thomas
“El-ahrairah, your people cannot rule the world, for I will not have it so. All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you, digger, listener, runner, prince with the swift warning. Be cunning and full of tricks and your people shall never be destroyed.”
- Richard Adams, Watership Down
(via charismatism)
Fascinating article about our gut bacteria and how they work together with our bodies. Here.
Seems like there’s been a lot of awesome bacteria-in-humans news lately.
Definitely check out this and also here.(via realcleverscience)
(via realcleverscience)
Happy Earth Day. “We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.” — Native American Proverb
As of now, I’m thinking I’ll be a math and philosophy double major. Learning how to think critically, read, comprehend, do comparison analysis, communicate, write, solve problems, learn, etc.
Ten, twenty, thirty years from now, the information currently being taught in other majors will be irrelevant. What I need to learn to prepare myself for the future are not facts, but how to think, how to learn.
Question:
Why do people who are depressed question life’s meaning?
Initial thoughts (pre-research, pre-googling, pre-asking-friends):
Does it have something to do with an impaired theory of mind? When depressed, is one’s theory of mind impaired?
According to research, those with little theory of mind (Asperger’s and Autism) think in less teleological ways. Teleological reasoning is instinctual in humans. It’s reasoning in which one assigns purposes to things. For example, when asked why a mountain is there, a kid may say, “For people to climb”. Or, when Justin Beiber was asked about his opinion of rape, he said, “Everything happens for a reason.” Beiber is stupid, yes, but it’s important to note that his answer is more to do with not receiving a good education, which would have allowed him to override his instinctual thought processes. His life has been and still is devoted to lip-synching to simply, auto-tuned teeny-bopper music. Eww. I never wrote about pop-culture before. It was painful. I’m climbing out of here and returning to higher levels of thinking. So, anyway, another example of teleological reasoning is the xkcd comic I posted, titled, “Existentialism,” with the subtext of “It’s like the squirt bottle we use with the cat.” She wonders why she keeps coming back to the question of what it all means, even though it doesn’t mean anything. The reason the question keeps coming back to her is that teleological reasoning is instinctual. It’s instinctual to assign purposes to things, even to life. We assign a purpose to life not only because it feels natural but because it is natural.
So, if one’s theory of mind is taken away completely, they’ll think in scientific terms. My theory breaks down, though, because people with Asperger’s and Autism can certainly be depressed.
Or, maybe it doesn’t break down. Maybe people with depression have a hyper theory of mind, to questioning existence.
Of course, I’m no psychologist. I don’t even know the statistics of people with depression questioning their purpose in life.
However, my words here are written as if I thought of myself as a psychologist. I better watch my behavior on this site. I could become a megalomaniac. (That was sarcasm, did you catch it? I was self-diagnosing my potential future self, even though I was just saying I shouldn’t pretend to be a psychologist).
Oh, yeah. Answer my question if it’s a legit answer. I don’t want any superficial, undergraduate response.
The impermanence of digital media and the confusing regulatory architecture around legacy data combine to create a serious headache for anyone looking to curate their own, or a loved one’s, postmortem Internet identity. And as more people with online personae pass away, the more pressing these issues become.
On the to do list: Executor of my Tumblr estate
Very important and relevant right now … a student missing for two weeks was found dead on our campus.
★ discovered on imgfave.com (social image bookmarking)
At first glance, another inane rant. Second glance, I see emotions dance.
(via imgfave)
