Today we watched a really funny video which illustrates racial stereotype of black man and white woman.
The stereotypes appeared in the video were that white women work out a lot and they sometimes go for jogging alone in the night. Other stereotype was that black man commit crime.
I have to admit that I had the stereotypic idea about black man and when I shared with my opinion with my group members, they also had same kind of ideas.
Then we learned how to make google presentation.
It is fun to correct good images and make original presentation to express ideas, but I really don't like the speaking part, which is, the most critical part.
I think I have to practice speaking part millions of times..
otherwise, I'm sure that will embarrass myself in front of my class mates next Friday !!!!
2010年10月1日金曜日
Radical Revolution journal 3
I read chapter 4 and 5 of Radical Revolution.
There are many amazingly smart people in this book, and at this point, I think that Ray Kurzweil, who appears in chapter 4, is the smartest person.
I cannot imagine how these people's brains work. I just wonder how is it possible for one to imagine what is going to be happening in 50 years or a century later ??
These scientists who do such thing certainly knows a lot about things in their fields, and thus are able to think about future possibilities.
However, the predictions Kurzweil have become reality and that gives certain credibility to what Kurzweil predicts about the scientific development from 2019 and after.
The speed of scientific evolution is so fast and things that are expected to be developed sound just like things than we encounter in Science fiction movies, but I think all these can be possible.
With all these predictions, our future can be described as heaven in a way that almost every person will become a super-human. People will have super strength and their brains will be connected to devices to support them.
There will also be emergence of robots which can behave just as we do.
I think all these developments can bring us a lot, but also take a lot from us.
For example, if develop ourselves by taking man-made devices in to our body and also to brain,
can we still be able to have an identity as human? Or should we change the identity to an identity of super-human? How will the change affect us?
These questions, obviously have no answers until the predictions come to reality and actually make changes. However, I think that is too late and it is important to limit the speed of scientific development. Because once a thing comes to reality, we cannot make a clock going back even the thing was a very harmful one.
Therefore, I cannot be optimistic enough to believe in the Heaven scenario and by taking the human nature in to account, I believe that our future is likely to be a similar one to the Hell Scenario.
Without any future scientific development, I think that the current world has already been turning into a hell like place for plants, insects, animals, and even for some people.
We have also discovered that there are those of who suffer from actions that we take.
For example, we all know how devastating nuclear arms are and how harmful the emission of carbon dioxide and green house gases are to the earth.
Yet, we cannot agree on one single treaty to regulate our actions.
Thus I think that we will not be able to cope with issues that arises from future scientific development.
There are many amazingly smart people in this book, and at this point, I think that Ray Kurzweil, who appears in chapter 4, is the smartest person.
I cannot imagine how these people's brains work. I just wonder how is it possible for one to imagine what is going to be happening in 50 years or a century later ??
These scientists who do such thing certainly knows a lot about things in their fields, and thus are able to think about future possibilities.
However, the predictions Kurzweil have become reality and that gives certain credibility to what Kurzweil predicts about the scientific development from 2019 and after.
The speed of scientific evolution is so fast and things that are expected to be developed sound just like things than we encounter in Science fiction movies, but I think all these can be possible.
With all these predictions, our future can be described as heaven in a way that almost every person will become a super-human. People will have super strength and their brains will be connected to devices to support them.
There will also be emergence of robots which can behave just as we do.
I think all these developments can bring us a lot, but also take a lot from us.
For example, if develop ourselves by taking man-made devices in to our body and also to brain,
can we still be able to have an identity as human? Or should we change the identity to an identity of super-human? How will the change affect us?
These questions, obviously have no answers until the predictions come to reality and actually make changes. However, I think that is too late and it is important to limit the speed of scientific development. Because once a thing comes to reality, we cannot make a clock going back even the thing was a very harmful one.
Therefore, I cannot be optimistic enough to believe in the Heaven scenario and by taking the human nature in to account, I believe that our future is likely to be a similar one to the Hell Scenario.
Without any future scientific development, I think that the current world has already been turning into a hell like place for plants, insects, animals, and even for some people.
We have also discovered that there are those of who suffer from actions that we take.
For example, we all know how devastating nuclear arms are and how harmful the emission of carbon dioxide and green house gases are to the earth.
Yet, we cannot agree on one single treaty to regulate our actions.
Thus I think that we will not be able to cope with issues that arises from future scientific development.
2010年9月30日木曜日
ELP journal
Yesterday the first thing we did was to take our socks and shoes off.... I was a bit hesitated to do so because just before the class I had a PE class and was very, you know, sweaty.
Anyways, the reason why we had to do the activity was to see our feet and to categorize them in to groups. There were three types of feet in our class, the Greek, the Egyptian, and the Peasant.
My feet turned out to be the Greek, one which has the middle finger longer than the big toe. Most people in the class had either the Greek feet or the Egyptian feet, and only 2 people had the Peasant feet.
They Rab asked us to decide which type of feet is the most beautiful and the result was that people chose the feet which they have to be the most beautiful.
It was explained that it is natural for a person to believe that the group of people which he or she belongs to be superior than other groups.
People can categorize themselves in to groups by many aspects, such as gender, age, nationality, blood type, skin color, language, etc.
I think it is a human nature to do so because at the very ancient time, people couldn't live without forming groups or tribes. They had to stay together to do hunting and finding a worm place to sleep.
(I also believe that it is essential for a person to be with someone else, because we humans are made to be social, but maybe it is another story. )
However, I also think that forming groups could be dangerous because when you are in a group, you sometimes get a rivalry feeling towards other groups, without any specific reason.
I would like to know the academic researches about this tendency of human to form group.
We also continued to learn the proper way of essay writing and maybe I have said the same thing in my previous blog entry, but I found the class very very helpful.
I studied all the rules concerning essay writing in my high school but now I don't remember a thing....
It is scary how much you can forget when you are not using your brain.
Anyways, the reason why we had to do the activity was to see our feet and to categorize them in to groups. There were three types of feet in our class, the Greek, the Egyptian, and the Peasant.
My feet turned out to be the Greek, one which has the middle finger longer than the big toe. Most people in the class had either the Greek feet or the Egyptian feet, and only 2 people had the Peasant feet.
They Rab asked us to decide which type of feet is the most beautiful and the result was that people chose the feet which they have to be the most beautiful.
It was explained that it is natural for a person to believe that the group of people which he or she belongs to be superior than other groups.
People can categorize themselves in to groups by many aspects, such as gender, age, nationality, blood type, skin color, language, etc.
I think it is a human nature to do so because at the very ancient time, people couldn't live without forming groups or tribes. They had to stay together to do hunting and finding a worm place to sleep.
(I also believe that it is essential for a person to be with someone else, because we humans are made to be social, but maybe it is another story. )
However, I also think that forming groups could be dangerous because when you are in a group, you sometimes get a rivalry feeling towards other groups, without any specific reason.
I would like to know the academic researches about this tendency of human to form group.
We also continued to learn the proper way of essay writing and maybe I have said the same thing in my previous blog entry, but I found the class very very helpful.
I studied all the rules concerning essay writing in my high school but now I don't remember a thing....
It is scary how much you can forget when you are not using your brain.
2010年9月28日火曜日
ELP journal
On last Friday, we had a class at ILC and we watched several interesting video clips.
I didn't know that there are many web-sites which introduces artist's creative works for free, and I am definitely going to use them for my studies.
About the videos we watched, I found some of them very creative and innovative.
For example, I really liked the one with many mouths. I thought the idea mouths going against junk foods and starting revolution was catchy.
In contrast, I didn't like the Meatrix because I generally don't like watching parodies, especially when it is animation. But I thought the idea of it was very good.
After watching couple more videos, I found that how strongly can visual /audio tools affect our ideas, comparing with materials in papers.
For example, in animation, we can put our theme in to a very simple story, which is easy to understand for many people. But at the same time, we can also illustrate the story with attractive pictures and sounds that can grab attentions from audience.
Soon we will be doing a group project, and I would like to use this sort of tool to make the project creative and mostly, fun to watch.
I didn't know that there are many web-sites which introduces artist's creative works for free, and I am definitely going to use them for my studies.
About the videos we watched, I found some of them very creative and innovative.
For example, I really liked the one with many mouths. I thought the idea mouths going against junk foods and starting revolution was catchy.
In contrast, I didn't like the Meatrix because I generally don't like watching parodies, especially when it is animation. But I thought the idea of it was very good.
After watching couple more videos, I found that how strongly can visual /audio tools affect our ideas, comparing with materials in papers.
For example, in animation, we can put our theme in to a very simple story, which is easy to understand for many people. But at the same time, we can also illustrate the story with attractive pictures and sounds that can grab attentions from audience.
Soon we will be doing a group project, and I would like to use this sort of tool to make the project creative and mostly, fun to watch.
ELP journal
We got to discuss about the Ohinata reading yesterday.
Over the weekend I didn't have a chance to read Ohinata because I didn't have the paper.
So obviously at first I didn't understand what the reading is all about but my group members explained about it very well. And I also got the point that the reading is a boring piece.
We also learned the academic writing style in English and I found it very useful. I've been writing essays in English since high school but it is still difficult for me to follow every required steps for writing essay.
Maybe it is a different story, but I sometimes cannot agree with the whole point of essay writing.
I found it very uncomfortable to state that my argument is right and thus it is also difficult for me to put efforts to prove my argument. It is because I do know that there are so many things that I do not know about the theme of my essay.
I assume that the difference between Japanese and American style of writing may come from their difference in ways of arguing.
I would like to learn more about essay writing because I am not satisfied with my way of writing and I really want to improve it.
Over the weekend I didn't have a chance to read Ohinata because I didn't have the paper.
So obviously at first I didn't understand what the reading is all about but my group members explained about it very well. And I also got the point that the reading is a boring piece.
We also learned the academic writing style in English and I found it very useful. I've been writing essays in English since high school but it is still difficult for me to follow every required steps for writing essay.
Maybe it is a different story, but I sometimes cannot agree with the whole point of essay writing.
I found it very uncomfortable to state that my argument is right and thus it is also difficult for me to put efforts to prove my argument. It is because I do know that there are so many things that I do not know about the theme of my essay.
I assume that the difference between Japanese and American style of writing may come from their difference in ways of arguing.
I would like to learn more about essay writing because I am not satisfied with my way of writing and I really want to improve it.
2010年9月19日日曜日
Radical Revolution: journal 2
I've read chapter 2 and 3 of "Radical Revolution".
I like this book because in each chapter, it always introduces some new scientific technologies which are under development. For example, I found the idea of filling a space with full of technologies very exciting.
Also, by reading these chapters, I got a bit more idea about the heaven and the hell scenarios.
Either it is heaven or hell, it is caused by a radical and rapid revolution in science.
I basically believe that scientific development is good for us. One obvious reason is beacause it can halp our lives for many ways. For example, there are people who have incureable disease and waiting for new treatement. For them, scientific development is a way to save their lives.
However, I am also worried about development. Because as it was written in the book, I think that the development is uncontrolable.
When we discover something new, we usually discuss either it is good for us or not. However, it takes long time before we reach to conslusion and there are even times when we cannot reach to conclusion because of complexity of issue. And while we are discussing, there are always some people who are using the newly discovered technology.
In this way, we are not able to control or manage the result of our technology.
I would like to know wether the book is going to introduce some thoughts similar with mine.
I like this book because in each chapter, it always introduces some new scientific technologies which are under development. For example, I found the idea of filling a space with full of technologies very exciting.
Also, by reading these chapters, I got a bit more idea about the heaven and the hell scenarios.
Either it is heaven or hell, it is caused by a radical and rapid revolution in science.
I basically believe that scientific development is good for us. One obvious reason is beacause it can halp our lives for many ways. For example, there are people who have incureable disease and waiting for new treatement. For them, scientific development is a way to save their lives.
However, I am also worried about development. Because as it was written in the book, I think that the development is uncontrolable.
When we discover something new, we usually discuss either it is good for us or not. However, it takes long time before we reach to conslusion and there are even times when we cannot reach to conclusion because of complexity of issue. And while we are discussing, there are always some people who are using the newly discovered technology.
In this way, we are not able to control or manage the result of our technology.
I would like to know wether the book is going to introduce some thoughts similar with mine.
ELP journal
On last friday, we did a little psychological test in our class.
We were asked to think of our favorite color, animal, form of water, and to imagine a white room.
Then we were asked to give 5 adjectives for each of three things.
It turned out that the adjectives for color are the personal qualities that you want to have, and adj. for animal represents characteristics which you want for your boy or girl friend. Then form of water represents your ideal form of love and adjetives for the white room represent your image of death. I thought the test was interesting but i don't really know if they are right or wrong because I've never been in a relationship with someone ... and so obviously i don't know much about love.
One thing i found very interesting was my image about death. I found that I'm affected by christianity more than I thought. I am not a christian but I've been studying at christian school since kinder garden. I wonder how other people who have different religious beliefs imagine about death.
We were asked to think of our favorite color, animal, form of water, and to imagine a white room.
Then we were asked to give 5 adjectives for each of three things.
It turned out that the adjectives for color are the personal qualities that you want to have, and adj. for animal represents characteristics which you want for your boy or girl friend. Then form of water represents your ideal form of love and adjetives for the white room represent your image of death. I thought the test was interesting but i don't really know if they are right or wrong because I've never been in a relationship with someone ... and so obviously i don't know much about love.
One thing i found very interesting was my image about death. I found that I'm affected by christianity more than I thought. I am not a christian but I've been studying at christian school since kinder garden. I wonder how other people who have different religious beliefs imagine about death.
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