fuck yeah Synesthesia

Internet no more :)

As you may have guessed, I went the whole summer without internet — while in school — and simply took off flying from there and never came back.

I found out someone made a “fyeahsynesthesia” since I stopped using my “fuckyeahsynesthesia”.

But — I don’t care. At all. With no internet, I started reading books. Lots and lots of books. It’s changed the way I think. I no longer think in short bursts of instant gratification but in long durations of complex thought, uninterrupted by the endless sea of distractions that is the internet.

I don’t ever want to come back. It’s nice out here. It’s too crowded online. I don’t like “socializing alone”, it’s so counterintuitive, mind numbing.

But.

I got an iPhone one month ago. Sure, I’ve stopped using a computer, so my internet addiction is physically impossible to manifest, but interestingly it doesn’t manifest on my iPhone. Even so, I rarely use internet on my iPhone. If I do, it’s only for practical purposes like finding the closest restaurant, etc. And I especially rarely ever use it when I’m around other people. It’s simply rude.

Everyone already knows it’s rude to text when you’re with people, but I find it rude to use a phone for any reason (besides emergencies, of course). Why? Because when you’re using your phone, no one knows what you’re doing with it. Sure, maybe you’re reading Kafka on the iBooks application, checking the latest NFL stats, etc, but those things are rude, too! Would you read a book at a party? Check the newspaper to see how your team is doing during dinner? No! Additionally, I find it rude even if you’re just looking up a word on the dictionary. Your attention is diverted from the conversation and you wouldn’t normally have a dictionary on hand. Ultimately, though, no one knows what you’re doing on the phone. The normal assumption is your texting. But then you respond, “Oh! I wasn’t texting I was just looking up the definition for that word you just used.” “Oh, OK, carry on.” Eww!!! I can’t believe people pardon this behavior. Why not try and keep the flow of the conversation? Learn to socialize and find meaning of words through body language and context, keeping your attention focused on your conversation partner. Be a true human and socialize!

Up at school I often climbed a water tower with a friend to star gaze (my school is in the middle of nowhere). Inevitably, we would have philosophical discussions and the like. But we agreed that we wouldn’t use our phones at all. I admit, I had urges a few times to look up something on Wikipedia or Dictionary.com, but all that would do is interrupt the beauty of the conversation between us.

Oh, yes. What I was originally going to say when I said “But I got an iPhone”: I may start using the tumblr application, and upload blogs, pics, ideas, etc on the go. I’ve already started a collection of photos on my iPhone that I would upload here. A good chunk of them are pictures of quotes from books I’ve read, like funny passages, witty sayings, cute fables, tall tales, fun stories, and etc. Sometimes I try to take a picture of the paragraph when it’s in a cool shadow.

But the question is, would this pulverize my new “internetless” brain? Starting to use tumblr again may initiate the “oh, I’ve got to post this!” desire, and ruin my real enjoyment of a setting sun, for example. It may seem like an obvious choice, to not get back online, but I see tumblr as a creative outlet. It’s a way to express my thoughts… Hey. Duh. I’ll just write in my journal in addition to reading. Real writing, with a pen and paper.

I guess this is goodbye?

— oh!

Update: after spending all summer at my college, I finally have completed my AA degree in Liberal Studies. I’m taking a year off as I’m kind of burnt out to “rekindle” my spirit, change, grow, and develop, and keep this “no internet” thing going, so I can fully get an “internetless brain” for when I return to college to get my BS degree (maybe in Physics but we’ll see).

During the year off I’m doing three core things:

1) In 36 hours, I’ll be leaving home to live on a Jewish organic farming community (not a kibbutz, but similar; in the states) through early November. (I need somewhere to live after this though. Give me ideas! Being an RA at a hospital for developmentally challenged people, Americorps, another farm… something!)

2) Group therapy program for young adults at my psychiatrist’s office. Kind of like a learning how to be an adult thing, but with a holistic vibe to it.

3) Porn/internet addiction specialist one-on-one and group sessions with other addicts.

Basically, by living in a new environment, I’ll be purposely giving myself culture shock to deconstruct and then reconstruct my identity, so that I can radically change my behavior and thoughts. If I had kept living at home all year, I would have stayed in the same environment that has been conditioning me for the past 21 years of my life. My parents would have kept expecting the same behavior from me and kept using the same language with me. And since language creates culture, I’m breaking free from home. I’ve realized that I’ve been depressed, anxious, restless, and generally stressed when I live at home. It wasn’t until I went away to college and experienced freedom in a stress free environment, and then came back home, that I realized home was really that bad. It’s not like my parents are evil or anything — they are caring, loving, nurturing parents. But for some reason, I just can’t take it. It’s annoying and irritating to have to live here even in the span of the few weeks I’ve been here waiting between college and the farm.

Thoughts?

Summer School with no Computer or Internet

As little as possible, anyway. Just giving a brief update on what’s been going on.

I’m a week into my second summer course and on track of things. I had given my computer back to my friend after borrowing it for the weekend in between the courses.

Teachers are admiring my decision, as well as the librarians here. People say their amazed at what I’m doing, astonished at my tenacity, and curious about how it’s going. To be honest, it’s hard to describe how it’s going — actually I haven’t gave it as much thought as I would like to, as I’m fairly busy with school work. But it’s been a huge breath of fresh air. I don’t feel the need to do trivial things like reading the latest psychology article, checking friend’s facebook pages, keeping up to date with the world. I can lay back and relax. I’m engaging in more timeless activities as opposed to timely. I’m reading books instead of online articles. Essentially, I’m reading things that apply to the present but aren’t applied from the present.

With all this free time I used to spend surfing the internet, I’m returning to the social life I used to have, retreating from my hermit cave, so to speak. I’m doing homework outside — I cannot do it in the library when it’s a beautiful day out. Living with no internet makes you realize the outside world is so beautiful — why read inside when you can sit under a tree in the grassy shade, listening to birds sing as a gentle breeze finds waves in the grass, creating a sea of bliss as dandelion pollen swarms like a school of fish in the ocean.

My friends are admirable of my decision, too, but they know more about the real reasons I’m doing this: I’m super addicted to the internet. However, for education in general, it’s a true experiment. How can I rid myself of the internet disease completely??? Everyone uses internet. Communication is practically dependent on it. We’re forced to use the internet. We become addicts because we have to.

Experiment: School With No Computer

Three week Summer Session course, Race, Class, and Gender, with no computer use at all. I can do it, there’s no question in that. The question is what will happen, how my thoughts and behavior will change.

The past three weeks I already began not using a computer to some extent while I was taking Modernism. I gave my Mac to a friend, but I still used the library computers intermittently. I wrote papers by hand, but I still used my phone’s internet for reference (my blackberry’s internet is very slow, so I don’t use it obsessively like I do with my Mac). I also still checked my email through my phone.

The next three weeks, however, we’re going all-out. No blackberry internet, only phone calls and texts. Maybe for the five week Adolescent and Adult Psychology in July and early August I’ll stop using technology all together.

Anyway, that’s why I haven’t been posting or reblogging. At the end of the summer and in between courses I’ll check in to write about it.

So far anxiety has been at a record low for the past year. In addition to minimal internet I’m exercising, eating right, sleeping right, and socializing enough — all that normal healthy stuff, ya know?

OK, I have to get back — I still have a paper to write due tomorrow for Modernism (our final exam is tomorrow, as well). Race, Class, and Gender starts Monday, so maybe I’ll blog again this weekend and give a more in depth analysis of what’s going on.

Oh, this also means very minimal use of Facebook and social media. Since my phone has super slow internet, I effectively can’t go on any social media site on it. The lack of social media, particularly Facebook, is part of this experiment as well.

Philosophy: After-course Reflection —- Social media addiction: it’s real. And a variable ratio schedule of reinforcement —- Conformist culture stifles varied intelligence identities

I wrote the following as an end of class reflection:

Since I missed many classes, my Dialogue and Debate (Philosophy-esque) professor invited me to his weekly, Saturday morning moral philosophy discussions. After attending two sessions, observing the first time and practicing the second time, I acclimated to the setting, formed my own arguments, and joined in the dialogue and debate.

            In general, both two hour sessions adhered to the rules of argumentation. In the first minute of the first meeting, for example, someone called out Bob for lack of evidence when he claimed that a hotel clerk gave a disheveled Indian man a hard time. When the man went to the bathroom, Bob informed the hotel clerk that the man was Amartya Sen, a Nobel Laureate. Upon returning, Amartya’s customer service was much better. Bob admitted that it, of course, was impossible to tell if there was truly discrimination, but he upheld his claim that it most likely was.

            Both two hour sessions also adhered to standard dialectic practices. During periods of dialogue, opposing viewpoints were respected and considered by everyone. In bouts of debate, the participants withheld from using rhetorical fallacies. Arguments were generally good overall, consisting of well-constructed logic and reasoning as well as supporting evidence.

            The topics covered in both sessions varied immensely and jumped from topic to topic. On the first day, we even managed to briefly refer to Paris Hilton, Lady Gaga, Adolph Hitler (Complying with Godwin’s Law, “As a discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1), and anal sex, though, not simultaneously, thank God.

            One pop-culture reference, however, persevered through much of the first hour of both sessions: The Royal Wedding and its significance. A key issue brought up was the British government’s suppressing of protests, even though the event was for a marriage in the monarchy funded by the taxes paid by the British people. Do they have a right to protest? At any rate, the event was very popular and the protesters would have affected its aesthetic quality.

            Additionally, we discussed the symbolic value of the event for the British people. The anthropologist in our group suggested the wedding represented the solidarity of the nation, which can be corroborated by the wedding’s immense popularity. However, there may be negative attributes accompanying the solidarity, such as a conformist culture bound in popular, viral ideas reminiscent of memes.

            According to the Oxford American Dictionary, a meme is, “an element of a culture or system of behavior that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by non-genetic means, esp. imitation.” In the developed world’s culture, shrouded by the ever growing cloud of globalization, ideas are persistently shared internationally throughout the media on news websites and between individuals on social media.

            A recent YouTube video of a penguin being tickled, for example, spread virally on Facebook and surged in popularity. Though it may seem trivial, there is an important concept worth noting. By mimicking what is popular, the thoughts of the individuals in the upcoming generation will vary less. The whole generation will follow their own ideas like a swarm of bees, buzzing from idea to idea. It’s not a government controlling the people, though; they will be controlled by their own thoughts, repeating whatever fashionable ideas they see.

            However, individuals will persist in the delusion that they are unique, tailoring their Facebook profile, for example, “No one is as creative as I am to post something like this on their Facebook profile,” even when millions of Facebookers already shared the same information. For instance, when it rains, it pours — not water, but torrential downpours of Facebook and Twitter status updates exclaiming the current weather condition (Checking peers’ Facebook profiles for what happens beyond the indoors has trumped checking television weathermen for the meteorological conditions). People express their identity by personalizing their profiles. But when addicted to social media, this identity expression becomes a feverish rat race, and people will go to great lengths to post as much as possible on their profile, even if it’s mundane information like the weather.

            Additionally, the dispersal of news, information, drama, and celebrity gossip all happens by sharing each other’s posts on Facebook. Yet, we’re sharing the feeling of instant gratification. I shoot up a status, a friend “likes” it, I get a notification that they “liked” it, and then my dopamine soars. I “like” my friend’s status back (which happens to be the same status as mine), and then their dopamine soars. Internet and social media addictions begin like this, as Facebook pummels us with a constant stream of hyperlinks, rendering hedonism and conformism as the popular thing to do. Heck — “instant gratification”, “hedonism”, and “conformism”, “delayed gratification”, “altruism”, and “non-conformism” are what half of what my blog posts are about. I’m turning these terms into trite memes. Everyone who writes about them is propagating these phrases.

            Returning to the topic of memes, however, it should be noted that our Facebook profiles, blogs, social media, etc., could be thought of as art galleries. Of course, they’re full of other people’s art, not ours, but the art galleries are our own. What characterizes an art gallery is mutating. The significance of the Smithsonian is shrinking as social media sustains stealing information (Social media is also sustained by stealing). My blog is my personal art gallery. The blogs I follow are art galleries I frequent, which are littered with memes — originality is rare. And because it’s so rare, we enjoy it more. It gets us high more, surging our dopamine. Moreover, our desire to get high increases as our desire for originality increases.

            Companies and marketers make note of this and have been doing so for decades. “NEW” products blanket supermarkets. We’re susceptible to shiny, flashy, attention grabbing “NEW” signs. We buy, buy, and buy. Consumerism. It runs our nation — ahem — ruins or nation. It’s ruining and will continue to ruin even more, as our desire for the increasingly rare originality increases.

            We want to be original, too, more and more so. We all crave Facebook notifications telling us that someone “liked” something of ours. The originality of Facebook statuses and posts are defined by and reinforced by how many “likes” they receive. The more “likes” one gets, the higher the dopamine surge, so we share ideas on Facebook even more, hoping to get those precious “likes”. This reinforcement, however, is variable ratio schedule of reinforcement, which is the most addictive kind. Variable ratio is a schedule of reinforcement in which responses are reinforced randomly (this is the same reason why gambling is so addictive). Ergo, we increasingly want originality and want to be originality, but we share the same information. We’re deluded sheep with wool of memes.

***

            Our culture of conformity also breeds a single-dimension spectrum perspective of intelligence. We identify as being “smart”, “dumb”, or somewhere in between, there’s little for anything else — it’s become single dimensional, whereas it’s actually very multi-dimensional. However, it’s very evident, with a helping hand from Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences, that our current notion of intelligence is no good. The conformist culture stifles varying intelligence identities.

            Thousands of years ago, notions of intelligence were associated with one’s skill, one’s identity and role within their community. We identified ourselves as whatever “helper” we were in our tribe, and that is how our peers identified us. Blacksmiths, for example, were intelligent/talented in the ways of the blacksmith. We were all smart for our own crafts, which we inherited, culturally, from our ancestors. Identities passed down generation to generation, father to son, farmer to farmer, blacksmith to blacksmith. Intelligence was a totally different concept back then, with different connotations attached to it.

            Today, however, most of our children are trained the same way in a vast pool of conformity through the age of about twenty. Children, and the adults they grow into, no longer identify as having a special ability within the community, that their community needs. Everyone has roughly the same abilities, which breeds the “black and white”, single spectrum, view of intelligence.

            It seems that “knowledge” traveled across the linguistic landscape from associating with talents and abilities in the past to associating with general knowledge today. In the past, intelligence was one’s identity, and knowledge was the collective identities-intelligences shared by the community. One had a piece of that shared knowledge for their craft. Today, we distinguish between intelligence and talents; they are they not synonymous. I identify as musically talented, for example, but it’s not considered a quality of intelligence by the culture.

            The attitude towards knowledge began to change once democracy was born in Greece. People could argue about disputes rather than fight over them. It became of value to learn as much as possible to win an argument. Originally, only property owning Greek male citizens could participate, but, over the millennia, the value of knowledge and learning soon spread to women, non-citizens, and everyone else. This tradition continues today in modern education.

            Knowing a lot became valuable, where as knowing a little was not. A spectrum was born. People are now labeled and placed on the spectrum between “smart” and “dumb”. Today, general knowledge is even awarded to people on game shows like “Jeopardy!” and “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?” For the first time, a hierarchy of identity-intelligence arose, such that different jobs are associated with stupidity or intelligence. Today, people subjectively rank occupations, condescendingly looking down upon janitors, for example, or looking up to and venerating astrophysicists.

            Keep in mind what studies in psychology have shown. By praising students with phrases such as, “You’re so smart!” one is reinforcing a static identity in the student. However, by praising students with phrases such as, “Good job! Keep up the work!” one is reinforcing a behavior – a behavior that leads to more knowledge and a continued desire for learning. The former phrase seems more appropriate for pre-Grecian democracy societies, since it reinforces one’s identity in the community. The latter phrase, however, sounds more suitable for today’s world, in which continued striving for knowledge is of value.

            Though this is a lot to conclude from a simple statement that the Royal Wedding represents solidarity in the British people, it can be applied generally to most developed countries’ cultures. The Royal Wedding was simply a jumping off point, an example, from which to illustrate the effects of a conformist culture. However, continuing to study this cultural phenomenon, even if we value knowledge as much as we do, will be challenging since technology, Internet culture, and social media are rapidly advancing.

Rebloggers unite — Too late, You already did.

Meme:

an element of a culture or system of behavior that may be considered to be passed from one individual to another by non-genetic means, esp. imitation.

Each of you. You. The one who shares unoriginal media. Posting it on your Facebook profile, “OMG LOOKZ!!!!1 It’s a penguin being tickled! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K3MXY5ITxQ No one is as creative as I am to post something like this on their profile.”

Fifty-four million Facebookers already shared it.

And when it rains, it pours — not water, but streams of status updates exclaiming the current weather condition.

FUCKING LOOK OUTSIDE

Yet — it’s the instant gratification we’re sharing. I shoot up a status, a friend “likes” it, my dopamine soars. I “like” my friend’s status back (which is the same as mine). Their dopamine soars. Shared addictions. Hedonism. Conformism. Channeled as the popular thing to do.

Heck — “instant gratification”, “hedonism”, and “conformism”, “delayed gratification”, “altruism”, and “non-conformism” are what half of my posts are about. I’m turning these terms into trite memes. Everyone who writes about them is propagating these phrases.

Back to the topic: memes.

Our Facebook profiles, blogs, tumblers, social media, etc., are art galleries. Not our art, but other people’s.

“The Art we look at is made by only a select few. A small group create, promote, purchase, exhibit and decide the success of Art. Only a few hundred people in the world have any real say. When you go to an Art gallery you are simply a tourist looking at the trophy cabinet of a few millionaires…”

— Banksy, http://www.banksy.co.uk/

What characterizes an art gallery, though, is mutating. The significance of the Smithsonian is shrinking as social media sustains stealing (Social media is also sustained by stealing (two different definitions of sustain)). My tumblr is my personal art gallery. The tumblrs I follow are art galleries I frequent. My dashboard is littered with memes — originality is rare.

And because it’s so rare, we enjoy it more. Gets us high more. Dopamine surges. Our urge to get high increases — our desire for originality increases. But does originality increase? Nope.

Companies and marketers are making note of this — and they have been doing so for decades. “NEW” products litter supermarkets. We’re susceptible to shiny, flashy, attention grabbing “NEW” signs. We buy, buy, buy. Consumerism. It runs our nation — ahem — ruins or nation. It’s ruining and will continue to ruin even more, as our desire for the increasingly rare originality increases.

— and we want to be original, too. More and more so. We all crave “likes” on Facebook. Originality is defined by “likes”. And is reinforced by “likes”. The more “likes” I get, the higher the dopamine surge. It’s variable reinforcement, too: the most addictive kind (same reason why gambling is so addictive). 

A chart demonstrating the different response rate of the four simple schedules of reinforcement, each hatch mark designates a reinforcer being given. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinforcement#Schedules_of_reinforcement

Ergo, we increasingly want originality and want to be originality. But we’re sheep; with wool of memes.

*Note: my tumblr blogs are streams of consciousness. That is why my ideas are so cluttered, there’s little organization or structure — no planning. I could put as much effort into them as I do on papers for school. Should I start doing so? I originally intended tumblr simply to be an creative outlet (using the term ‘creative’ loosely). Maybe I should practice blogging here in the same way I write essays and papers? The practice might help for school papers, and I would still enjoy it (I like writing, no matter the subject). Of course, the whole procrastination thing is another issue. I should be writing a paper right now instead of blogging!

I only go online when I have something else to do.

Also known as: the best way my room gets cleaned is if I have a paper to write.

It’s very evident; simply observe my Facebook habits.

Rarely do I post on weekends.

Most Facebook interactions are Sunday night through Wednesday night.

Why?

Knowing I have something to do.

Anxiety, “Fuck, what should I do?”

Loss of control. Impulsive behavior.

I cajole myself, “Go to bed!” yet — dearth of vigor.

Stressed. Depressed. Want to break free.

I use poetic cliché obediently.

“… screws up the aesthetic value of my Facebook wall”

Yes. My mind just excreted that thought while Facebooking. Fucked up, isn’t it? I should never let that happen again. But it’s going to. It is. Because, what’s scary, is that it was involuntary. I’m so addicted that my thought processes have dilapidated — no, acclimated to the internet. Acclimated instead of dilapidated because a very distinct psychological process is happening. We may have little idea what that is, but it is happening. And it’s happening all over the nation. The internet is changing society in the 21st century like the way the printing press did in the 15th. Radical shifts are happening and we need to study what’s happening and be on high alert for how to shift education in the right direction.

*Actually, I wasn’t just Facebooking. I was tumblring, Facebooking, YouTubing, gmailing, and doing research simultaneously. Even though I’m well aware that multi-tasking is very bad for you. In fact, multi-tasking compounds on itself to make one LESS able to multi-task, contradictory to what our generations assumes.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/brain-sense/200908/the-madness-multitasking

Memed

Theory of mind is innate, it’s automatic. Being embarrassed happens instantly, we don’t decide to be embarrassed. We don’t decide to put ourselves in others’ shoes and imagine what they’re thinking. When embarrassed we automatically assume what our peers are thinking, tagging ideas to their character and ours.

This thought. A hundred years from now, my thought to tumblr process may become automatic. Imagine that. Everything we think instantly goes on the internet. Can we edit the privacy settings? Sure, but we will do that before hand, choosing which kinds of thoughts we will allow to be published, so the thought to internet process is instantaneous, and thoughts will automatically go online, preset to be public, semi-public, or private.

A sea of ideas. An ocean of memes. Waves of popular ideas crashing into the land, altering the geography of human existence. Periodic tidal waves continuously alter humanity on their own. No government will do this, but we, our ideas, will do this on their own. Our ideas are alive. Breathing in our desire and curiosity, breathing out our behaviors, actions and habits.