There will be NO "in-class" meeting this Thursday week #6. As such you will be asked to go on-line to the Ted Talks web site - http://www.ted.com/topics and find a Ted Lecture that ties into the material we have been covering in class to some extent. Once you watch the video please answer the following questions:
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
How your working memory makes sense of the world.
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_doolittle_how_your_working_memory_makes_sense_of_the_world.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video?
The talk is given by Peter Doolittle who is speaking about our working memory and how we navigate through our everyday lives.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
While he explained the working memory in good detail, the speaker also gave a few pointers on how to improve your working memory capacity. In the video the speak Peter Doolittle explains that humans are very visual learners, he claims that painting a mental photograph in your mind or pairing a stimuli with another sense but also we need to practice again. I also found it interesting that our working memory is about the size of a pea and yet it has to constantly process information and remember stimuli in our environment.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
In the video Mr. Doolittle talks about the capacity of our working memory being very poor. An example he gave that made me think of how often my working memory fails me was when he asked if anyone had ever walked into a room and forgot why you walked in? Have you ever forgotten your keys….or your car? After he asked these questions I realized how often this happens to me.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I would like to ask him if the working memory is a centrally located area, as he said it was only about the size of a pea, or if it is located in many areas like our long term memory.
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
This talk tied into our discussions in class from last week as we briefly discussed memory models but it covered more of chapter 5 and 6. The working memory model and the support were covered briefly within the book but many of the concepts that were present in the early 90s are still being expanded upon today.
1. The title of the Ted talk that I watched is Steve Ramirez and Xu Liu: A mouse. A laser beam. A manipulated memory.
2.http://www.ted.com/talks/steve_ramirez_and_xu_liu_a_mouse_a_laser_beam_a_manipulated_memory.html
3. These two men have found a may to take memories that have been formed and reactive them at will. They did this study on mice and injected light sensitive switches into the cells of the brain that were a part of this memory. They found that by shooting a laser beam into the brain they could at any time turn on those memories and induce the fear reactions that go along with that memory. They then further went on to test if it was possible to manipulate those memories and change their content. They found that this was also possible.
4. I found it interesting when they explained how hard it was to be able to locate the cells that were all active and a part of a particular memory. The difficulty comes from there being so many cells that are involved in the process and the speed of the process. Memory recall happens extremely fast and so seeing the tiny cells that are all involved so fast become hard. Luckily, cells that have just been in use give off a signal. The metaphor given for this was it was just like a window that let light out to show work is being done. Once they found the cells they then created a virus that contained a light sensitive switch that would infect the virus so that the cell could be controlled by the laser. I also found it interesting the way that they manipulated the memories of the rats using the same switch. They once again used those fear reaction and the laser to turn the memory on, but they also used the memory of a rat being in a particular box and injected those with the switches as well. They then put the rat in a different box and turned on the memory for the first box along with a memory of the fear to see if they could create a false memory of fear for the first box. It was shown to work when the mouse was put into the first box once again and it exhibited the fear response right away.
5. While they were explaining this procedure and findings in the mouse I couldn't help but think about what this would mean if we brought the same technology and procedure to humans. I thought on one hand it could be helpful to those who suffer from diseases such as PTSD to manipulate their memories and eliminate the stress or the fear related to certain memories. I also thought of the many ways that this could be used for the wrong reasons and the problems that it could cause. We know that our memories already aren't a perfect picture of what actually goes on in the world and this gives us more power to change them even further. There is already problem with the validity of eyewitness testimony and technology like this could take that to a new level.
6.I would ask what other ways would it be possible to manipulate memories. From the Ted talk I got the understanding that memories can only be manipulated with other memories that are inside the brain. Is there a way to manipulate memories to hold any content that we would want or are there limitations to what can be changed and added?
7. This talk ties into the chapter about neuroscience. They talked about the different cells that are active during one particular memory, and the fact that they are not in on specified location. They also talked about the importance of the hippocampus, because this is where many of the cells for a memory are found. It also ties in with the memory sections of the chapter that we have been focusing on recently. The particular memories that are being used are in the long term memory which is what we are reading about for next week. We have talked about how memories can be manipulated, but by our own perceptions rather than with neuroscience.
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
The title of the Ted Talk I watched is Marco Tempest: The magic of truth and lies (and iPods)
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/marco_tempest_the_magic_of_truth_and_lies_on_ipods.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
The general idea was about deception. The speaker made a comment I found interesting with how magicians are the most honest in their career, because they promise to deceive and that’s exactly what they do. He used three iPods he said he borrowed from people in the crowd and did some neat deception tricks the entire time throughout his talk. It was really fascinating to watch and I thought he had a lot of talent.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
I thought the most intersting part of the talk was the deception with the iPods the entire time throughout. It kept my interest and kept the presentation really interesting. I also noticed he had his sleeves rolled up the entire time, making the tricks where something such as the butterfly or spare change came “out of” the iPod even more neat to watch and wonder about. I thought some of the most useful information he presented was how we often deceive ourselves. Even when we know a trick is a trick, we can deceive ourselves to believe it’s more than that, and we essentially end up lying to ourselves. It was just a really interesting concept to consider and wonder about how often we do lie to ourselves throughout a day.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
Some of the ideas I wondered about, as I just mentioned in the last question, is how often do we actually lie to ourselves. I also wondered how, strangely yet interestingly, sometimes lying to ourselves may be beneficial. For example, what about those days when everything is going terribly, and we tell ourselves that what’s coming next will get better because it has to. This might not be true, something else terrible could certainly always still happen. Yet sometimes in order for us to continue on and complete what needs to get done we may need to deceive ourselves about how bad the situation really is. This was really interesting to think about because lying is often only viewed as a negative act. It often can be very harmful and negative, but it was interesting to wonder about if there are scenarios were it’s actually positive or even necessary.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
Obviously I would want to ask the presenter how he did the deceptions and how much he had to practice that speech in order to get it to perfectly correlate with the tricks he was performing with the iPods. I’d also ask him about his thoughts on why people often don’t just lie to other people but to themselves as well. I’d ask him about my thoughts I mentioned previously regarding whether or not he sometimes saw lies as beneficial or necessary.
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
This ties into part of what we covered in class because we had spent part of a chapter in the text and part of our discussion time going over illusions. Illusions, lies, and deception can be fairly synonymous terms. In my topical blog I had even found a website discussing another concept where deceiving our own minds can potentially be beneficial. An example was when we’re perceiving light intensity or shock intensity. When switching our glance from the light of a computer screen to the light coming in our window on a sunny day, we don’t perceive the astronomical difference that exists in light intensities between the bulbs in our computer and from the sun. This could be done intentionally by our brain so that we aren’t blinded when we decide to glance up at the window. The other example involved perception of electric shock, and how when feeling one shock that was double the intensity of the previous, we perceive it as much more than just doubly as intense. This is also possibly done intentionally by our brains so that we’re quicker to perceive danger and initiate our fight or flight responses. I thought this talk tied in well with some of the research I had done on that topic because it made me ponder more on if there are other beneficial sides to intentionally (consciously or subconsciously) deceiving ourselves.
Week 6 – Thursday Assignment
1 – What was the title of your ted talk?
Cesar Kuriyama: One second every day
2 – Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/cesar_kuriyama_one_second_every_day.html
3 – What is the general topic/idea expressed in your video.
The general topic of this video was that visualization helps your memory. Cesar Kuriyama in this video explained that by taking a one second snapshot every day of your life helps you to recall the event or day within your short-term memory. However, by having a quick snapshot video of your day helps you to recall the day in your mind and places the day within your long-term memory.
4 – Explain in some detail what you found interesting/useful in the talk.
The concept that I found useful in the talk I chose was that the video had an interesting paradox. By having the best second of each day on video makes you mindful of that moment all day long. The video separates you from fully “being there” in the moment, but it allows you to store the memory in your working capacity.
5 – What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
The ideas I was thinking of while watching the talk was why the author did not always record bad day and only recorded the good days. Our minds to not want to remember the bad days, but I think in recording the bad days, we would come to appreciate the good days. Our long-term memory tend to hold on to bad memories and the video would be more realistic if memories such as these were discussed as being placed in our working capacity.
6 – What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I would like to ask the author if he thought by having these recordings would these memories cause a strain on our working capacity if an individual tried to recall specific details of their life for, let’s say, an entire month.
7 – How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
This talk covered concepts such as working memory, short- and long-term memory, and bottom-up and top-down processing. Memories are being placed in our long-term memory from these videos and the video may manipulate our perception of an experience. The videos also cause our brain to hold a lot of memory capacity as we recalled events over and over. We have also discussed bottom-up and top-down processing in class. By recalling memories through a video, it may cause our mind to interpret a situation in a different way each time we review the memory. We may think about the occurrence from the bottom-up the first time we watch it, but once we have the memory stuck in our mind, we may think about it from the top-down the next time we view it.
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
Scott Fraser: Why eyewitnesses get it wrong.
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/scott_fraser_the_problem_with_eyewitness_testimony.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
The main idea expressed in this video is that eyewitnesses are not always a good source to use in an investigation. Eyewitnesses can get it wrong even if they think they are 100% sure they know who committed the crime.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
I thought the information he gave on memory was interesting and useful for what we have been studying in class. In this video, Scott Fraser mentioned that when we are an eyewitness and we are thinking back to ta crime scene, we only encode and store bits and pieces of information. I also thought it was awesome how the man in his story who got convicted of the crime was eventually set free. I also thought it was cool how his girlfriend was pregnant at the time and now, 21 years later, he and his son are both taking college courses at the same college. A few things that he said also stuck out to me. He said, “All our memories are reconstructed memories.” “We all need to remember to be cautious that the accuracy of our memories is not measured in how vivid they are nor how certain you are that they’re correct.”
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
While watching this video, I thought of the eyewitness story that Dr. Maclin studied and shared with us. However, I cannot remember the man’s name. This video also made me think about all of the innocent people who have to sit in prison knowing that they’re innocent. It is hard for them to convince a judge that they’re innocent because they have a witness who is saying that they are the suspect and it is hard not to believe a witness who was there and saw the crime happen.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I would ask the presenter if he has ever been involved with a case where the person was freed because of this and then later found that he really was guilty. I would also want to ask him if there are any crimes that are more likely to have false testimonies from eyewitnesses, like did this case have a higher chance of having false testimonies because the witnesses were so close to the victim (one of the witnesses watched his father die).
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
This talk ties in perfectly with the discussion we had on eyewitnesses and memory. Our memories are not always perfect even when we are sure a memory we recall is true and accurate. It also ties in perfectly with Dr. Maclin’s expertise area of eyewitness testimony.
1: Alessandro Acquisti: Why privacy matters
2: http://www.ted.com/talks/alessandro_acquisti_why_privacy_matters.html
3: How by using facial recognition and cloud computing we are able to find information on almost anyone. This is a huge disadvantage when trying to protect our privacy.
4: When we had a lecture on the subject of facial recognition I was very interested in the subject. I raised my hand and started asking about how employers use this against us and how I feel it is a huge invasion of our privacy. The speaker in this video reassured me of this exact idea. It also provided several different very interesting experiments that were done at Carnegie Mellon University to prove some of this information. In the first experiment participants were photographed and then were given a 10 page survey. While taking the survey there photos were uploaded to a cloud computing device and by the time the student go to the last page it had updated the content of the survey. This last page contained pictures of the students in a crowd that had been pulled off of facebook and they were asked to identify themselves in the photo. All in all this experiment proved that 1 out of every 3 subjects could be identified. The next experiment took pictures of subjects, and then matched it with public information that could be found online through the US Government website/social security information and eventually they could pair the two and figure out 27% of each subjects first 5 digits of their social security number. Using these two studies together allowed researchers to take a picture of a person and then overlay relating information including Name, date of birth, state they reside in, and social security number. Next, just to show it could be done, researchers created an app for the iphone where you could take a picture of a person and essentially this same order of business could be done. All of this type of information use to be reserved strictly for qualified organizations but now that we provide so much information on ourselves through social media databases this information is public and almost anyone has access to it.
5: I was just so blown away by all of the experiments that have been done on this subject and how creepy they all are. Ever since reading more on this subject I have really been debating deleting all of my social media accounts, but then I wonder if even that will solve the problems since facebook technically owns all of my pictures. Also in this talk later on they discussed how Tom Cruise is in some movie that takes place in the year 2050 and when he walks into a building floating images appear as advertisements based on things he doesn’t even know that he wants yet and it really made me think about all of the different technologies that are going to be available in the future and this is so scary to me.
6: Mainly I would ask what we can do to gain our privacy back? He talks about how it is comparable to Adam and Eve taking the apple from the garden of Eden, but this just seems like a huge issue and I cannot believe there hasn’t been more of an uproar about it from the public. Also I would ask him if when we signed up for Facebook was it known that there would be these types of privacy issues, did we sign acceptance forms allowing them to download all of our images? Has anyone attempted to sue facebook for taking their privacy away?
7: Again this talk relates to what we have discussed in class because it is all about facial recognition and how it affects our privacy rights.
Cognitive Psych Make Up Assignment
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
"A New Equation for Intelligence" by Alex Wissner-Gross
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
https://new.ted.com/talks/alex_wissner_gross_a_new_equation_for_intelligence
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
The man giving the lecture presented an equation that he believes explains all forms of intelligence. That equation is ["F = T ∇ Sτ"], where intelligence is represented as a force (F) that seeks to maximize future freedom of action. T is the variable accounting for strength, S is the diversity of possible accessible futures, and t (or tao) is the fixed point of some future time.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
I thought it was interesting when the man talked about the 'impending cybernetic revolt'. He said that it has been a worry ever since the first mention of robots, but that they have the concept in reverse. He says that rather than robots becoming intelligent and then seeking control of the world, that the drive to have control over the most possible outcomes is actually the force that drives intelligence.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
I thought about how versatile an equation for intelligence might be, and the implications that may have when producing artificial neurons and other possible bio-enhancers of the sort.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I would ask him if he thinks intelligence is somewhat less special when worked down to such a basic equation, and I would ask him what his thoughts are on how this equation of intelligence relates to evolution and the origin of life and basic intelligence.
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
Well the entire class is about cognitive psychology, which seeks for scientific explanations of mental processes, and this guy is proposing an equation that makes for all of intelligence. It seems like that is applicable on any level.
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
Elizabeth Loftus: The fiction of memory
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_loftus_the_fiction_of_memory.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
This TED talk was about how easy it is to mess up when trying to pick out a criminal in a line-up. She used the example of Titus and how a victim picked him out of a line-up. She speaks about eyewitness accounts and memory.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
She talks about how she doesn't study when people forget, but she studies what people remember. She looks at false memories. Information has been gathered on 300 cases where people have been convicted of things that they didn't do. She shared that 3/4 of those people were convicted falsely due to a faulty eyewitness account. She uses the example of our memories being like a Wikipedia page; we are able to change our memories, but so can other people. She also speaks about how the way a question is asked of someone can change what they believe they remember. If we prime eyewitnesses they tend to remember things that never happened. Studies show that when we feed people misinformation about an experience they had, we can distort or completely change the memory they have of the event. As we speak to other people about an event we tend to change and manipulate our memory to fit what they believe they saw. She also talked about how the brain might be affected after having a false memory planted in your brain. They found that once they planted a false memory, people's perceptions of similar events changed. They found that after planting false memories there will be repercussions. She talked about ethical boundaries and how it could be used.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
I kept thinking about how I could use this to actually experiment and see if by saying certain things I can get people to think they saw or did something that they didn't do. Elizabeth talked about how being able to plant false memories opens a lot of doors in the psychology world. She suggested planting false memories in our kids' minds to possibly help with obesity or diabetes. This certainly raises the ethical boundaries question but it is definitely something that could be looked into. I'm not sure how I feel about it at this time because it sounds so easy and so tempting and yet I can't help thinking how weird it would be for someone to plant a false memory in my mind. If it helped me I guess that's okay but if I didn't know it I wouldn't like it at all (even though I wouldn't know about it!).
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
Are certain words trigger words that cause people to second guess what they saw? What areas of the brain default during this and allow a false memory to enter?
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
Our text has been talking about our memory and how it can be effected. I have been learning a lot about short-term and long-term memory as well as priming or chunking. This talk was extremely interesting because I hadn't read very much about false memories in our text and the idea that we can have memories planted in our brains is scary but exciting. It is crazy to think about all of the possibilities that come with this realization.
http://www.ted.com/talks/daniel_kahneman_the_riddle_of_experience_vs_memory.html
The riddle of experience vs memory
The ted talk that I listened to had some interesting points. Daniel talked about the difference between memory and experience. He said that the common person lives in two different selves. There is the experiencing self and the memory self. The experience self lives in the present, like if a doctor were to ask how you were feeling. The memory self lives in the past and the future, like a doctor asking how you were feeling lately. Daniel tried to explain that the experiencing self lives its life through the memory self. We do not make decisions based on our experiences, but rather from the experiences of our memories. Another point that I liked from the ted talk was a point he made about happiness. Daniel gave an example of a gallop poll that was conducted on Americans. It showed that when Americans were making below 60000 dollars a year people were not happy. The interesting part was for Americans making over 60000 dollars a year. For those Americans there were flat lines suggesting that there was not happiness when making more that 60000 dollars a year. Therefore, money does not buy happiness just satisfaction, but what lack of money buys is misery.
Since the last chapter that we read was based on memory, I thought that this ted talk was correlated to the chapter. Even though the chapter was mainly based on the lack of memory rather than the use of memory, I thought it still could be justified. This ted talked about how people have to different selves. The one that relates to the chapter is the memory self. The memory self is what drives our experiencing self. What Daniel talked about in the video was the most of out life is not remembered at all. The amount of interactions that we have a day an the chance to store memory does not match with the total memories that we have. Most of the information that we process throughout the day and over the years is not stored into our memories. I thought this was an interesting comment because it really got me thinking about my life. I thought that I had a pretty good understanding of what was going on everyday in my life, but it turns out that most of the stimuli that I see throughout the day is never even stored into memory because there simply is not use for it. Therefore, most of out decisions are based on the experiences of our memories. The experiencing self that is focused on the present has nothing to do with the decisions that we make. Also Daniel talks about that most events in life can be completely forgotten because of the ending of the event. He talked about how a man said he was listening to music and it was very beautiful. At the end of the song there was a long sound that completely ruined the song for him. What he remembered was the horrible sound at the end of the song, but not the beautiful song that he listened too. A lot of our decisions are based on the endings of experiences. This can be a very hard concept to grab, but I think that Daniel did a good job of explaining this to the reader.
Some ideas that I had while listening to the author was how one begins to researcher a topic like this. It can be a hard concept to grasp and is very unique. The idea of the experiencing self and the memory sounds weird, but once it is explained I started to believe what Daniel was saying. Daniel made it sound like the experiencing self was useless. Kind of like a zombie that is there to experience new stimuli and interactions. The memory self is where we have all of our ideas and interactions stored, and with those memories we can make decisions through our experiencing selves. So what if we went on a vacation and had a blast. What if after that vacation we took a amnesia drug that made us forget the whole thing. Would we go on that trip again? We would not have the experience stored in our memory selves, so our experiencing self would not be able to make a decision on whether that vacation would be fun to go on. It is an interesting concept and I am glad that I chose this video for the blog.
Questions that I had while reading mainly had to do with the happiness section that he talked about. He said that money cannot buy you happiness, but satisfaction. But lack of money can buy you misery. So, you might as well make a lot of money? Is satisfaction more important than happiness anymore? Kind of sounds like a sell out...to be happy or satisfied or live in misery? To me I would rather live in satisfaction than in misery.
1) How your working memory makes sense of the world.
2) http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_doolittle_how_your_working_memory_makes_sense_of_the_world.html
3) The talk was about how our working memory and how we use it in our everyday life for navigation.
3) I found that this whole talk was interesting and that he put in into a perspective that we use in our daily life. In the video they give us different tools to use to improve our working memory. He also goes on about how all humans are visual learners. He also talks about how we paint a mental picture and using this information is how we actually have to use the information right away to be able to latter go back and store the information to use latter in our life. we are only able to retain about four things at a time and if we don't do anything with it in about 20 seconds then we will lose the information.
4) Some things that I found interesting from watching this video was how they were talking about only being able to retain 4 things at a time for about 20 seconds. This really made me stop and think about the information that I intake throughout the day and actually how many things that I am truly retaining throughout the day.
5) Some idea's I had while watching the video was more about what I do in my daily life to improve my working memory. I also thought about how our attention and working memory.
6) One thing that I would ask was what made them want to do this research? I always am interested in how and why some one decides to research something. Another thing I would ask is what have they done personally to expand their working memory.
7) This ties back to the last chapter that we read and the working memory in the book. I thought that the talk put it into a better perspective and how important our life really is and our memory and how we should exercise our working memory.
1. Beau Lotto: Optical illisions show how we see
2. http://www.ted.com/talks/beau_lotto_optical_illusions_show_how_we_see.html
3. Ben Lotto talks about how the eye sees the world. How the eyes sees the things that are seen on a daily basis, and why it sees the things that it does.
4. This video shows that there are things that they mind alters the world around us. The things that are perceived in ways that isn’t actually true. There are seen differently with different scenes. Like if you “program” your mind to see red on one side and green on the other red, and then you look at a photo that is identical on each side. The photo then looks different because it is seen in different colors. Then there is the world can make music with color, shown by a picture that is drawn by a 6 year old child. Then there is the variation of color in a square surrounded by a light or a dark frame and how that affects the color of the center square. It shows that there is a good sense that the world is perceived differently by the brain of each person.
5. That although our eyes are a very complex system it can be deceived by that of the things that are common day items that just seem to make your eyes and your mind believe that it is seeing what it is, but isn’t.
6. How long did it take to create your optical illusion that was in the form of a cube?
7. We were talking about illusions in class, and in the book. Illusions are seen every day all the time yet our minds see things around us to see many things. Yet, when you are looking around you may not realize when you see an optical illusion around you. They may be only seen in the periphery so when you see the things you do from the side you don’t always see it when you see it from another angle. Life is odd that way. The things that there are too be seen by the eyes but some of them are not correct. Though there are optical illusions in the world out minds can fix them even though we don’t want to realize it. The things that are done to see illusions may not be the easiest to understand but they will always be out there for us to see and we can only look at them and wonder how they make our mind so very confused.
1. Al Seckel: Visual illusions that show how we (mis)think
2. http://www.ted.com/talks/al_seckel_says_our_brains_are_mis_wired.html
3. This talk features a cognitive neuroscientist who looks at optical illusions and discusses not only how the illusions work, even when we are aware of them, but also how humans tend to enjoy being fooled by optical illusions.
4. I found this talk interesting because, while I know a lot about optical illusions and perception, these things still fool me. Seeing a video on optical illusions allowed me to see more than just illusions that can be put into a textbook. This video showed illusions on video and can change the angle of the video to show how our perception can alter what we see. This video also talks about how optical illusions have been used for hundreds of years in paintings and drawings. Each time you look at a painting and see a person in front of a wall or behind a bush, this is an optical illusion. Optical illusions can also be seen on photographs, so long as everything is placed just right.
5. While watching this video I started wondering about the people who create optical illusions and how they manage to do so. Is it mostly luck? I doubt it, which means that an insane amount of time goes in to creating these things. One illusion shown in the video is of a bunch of wood, then when looked at just right, becomes a piano. I could not stop thinking about the amount of trial and error that goes in to that piece, and that, if just one piece of wood is placed in the wrong spot, the entire illusion is ruined. I was also unable to see both points of view in some of the illusions, which makes me wonder if it depends on the perspective of the viewer or if some optical illusions require better eyesight than others.
6.I would like to ask the presenter what his favorite optical illusion was and why. I am sure that someone who studies optical illusions has seen more than almost anyone else on the planet and I would be interested in what he looks for in illusions. I would also like to get his opinion on magic as a type of illusion. It is not often talked about in sensation and perception discussions, but magic tricks are all about optical illusions and misdirection. I wonder if the magicians learn some of the same tricks as the people who draw illusions.
7. This talk ties into our classroom discussion because we had a chapter that focused on sensation and perception and looked at optical illusions and what causes them. This was a more informal discussion that showed just how prevalent optical illusions and and how powerless we are against them.
1. The title of my TED talk was Scott Fraser: Why eyewitnesses get it wrong.
2. http://www.ted.com/talks/scott_fraser_the_problem_with_eyewitness_testimony.html
3. The general topic of this talk is discussing the reason why eyewitness testimony isn't always a reliable source of information and why these shortcoming exist.
4. I thought all of the information he gave on how memory works and how it is a reconstruction of what actually happened at the time and also things that have come after was interesting. I also found the information he gave on various concepts of human perception were interesting and am hoping that we might cover some of them in the future in this class. I also enjoy most of the stories like this and the typical ones of people freed through the Innocence Project. The whole topic of eyewitness testimony and its shortcomings is interesting to me and I'm always eager to learn more about the topic so this TED Talk was pretty much perfect for me.
5. The ideas that I had while listening to the talk related somewhat to what we have discussed in this class. Most of what I thought about however was related to my time in Psych & Law with the other Dr. MacLin a few semester ago. Eyewitness identification is something we covered a lot in that class, as it relates perfectly to the topic of the class. I also thought about the book I read for that class call Picking Cotton. The story in the book is much like the story Scott Fraser tells in his talk, with a young black man falsely accused of a crime and sent to prison primarily due to faults in eyewitness memory. I thought about all of the various concepts that were discussed that outlined the shortcomings of eyewitness memory, such as stress impacting memory encoding at the time of the crime and weapon focus. I also thought about the topic of the cross-race effect and how it could have had an effect on the teenagers recall of the shooter if conditions were different and they had a better chance to look at the people in the car.
6. I suppose if I could ask the presenter a question it would just be about other examples throughout his career of cases like this he might have worked on,
7. The talk ties into memory and eyewitness testimony of course. It lays out an example of how our perception and recall of an event can be tainted by time and other factors.
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
Elizabeth Loftus: The fiction of memory
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_loftus_the_fiction_of_memory.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
The general topic in the video is memory cannot be trusted 100%, and especially when used in court. Loftus presented her audience with many unfortunate real life cases, as well as a variety of lab experiments regarding the concept of false memory. Memory plays a big role in one’s identity, but as a scientist who studies memories that are “remembered”, Loftus knows how much fiction is involved in constructing the memories we all thought were real. She said memory is just like Wikipedia: you can change it and so can anyone else, and most importantly, memory can be implanted.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
I am considering a second major in Criminology, so the devastating case of Titus that Loftus started her talk with grabbed my attention. It is understandable that the legal system relies largely on memory (even after three quarters of victims were wrongly convicted due to false memory), but what grabbed my attention the most was the fact that the victim initially went from “That one is the closest”, to “I am absolutely positive” in the court, and no further investigation was conducted. In one of her many examples regarding how false memories come about, she mentioned that when under an extreme amount of stress, one can mistake a person with another even though they might not have any similar facial features. False memory can do as little harm as slimming down an obese child, but it can also snatch away person’s life in an instance.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
I started to revise come childhood memories I remember, and asked myself is there any chance that those memories are partially made up? I was very certain that those memories were real and they actually happened, but is this how the rape victim feel as well when she claimed that Titus was the man who raped her? I thought about the lives of people after they are affected with false memories, and I wish I could do something about it. I also thought about the many psychotherapy techniques that are used nowadays to help victims come to terms with their problems, and I wonder is it because victims are victims, so no one questions too much about their statements? As much as I feel sorry for the victim, I think that it is necessary that the court gives it more time for more investigation. A decision should not be made based on the victims’ confident claim, and memory should not be the only evidence and reason for a conviction.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I know that memories can be constructed and distorted in many ways, so to what extent can we take one’s memory accountable? Or to what extent can the legal system rely on witnesses’ and victims’ memories?
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
We discussed perception, false memory, memory, and illusion in class. I think this TED talk is very closely tied to the materials we have been looking at. Memory does not work like a recording machine; it is constructed and distorted in the process of storing and rehearsing. Perception can be false, so why are we placing so much weight on memories?
1: Scott Fraser: Why eyewitnesses get it wrong
2: http://www.ted.com/talks/scott_fraser_the_problem_with_eyewitness_testimony.html
3: This video involved a drive by shooting. The father was shot. Within less than 24 hours the suspect was chosen. They made a photo array, and it was showed to the son the day after and he said that was the shooter he saw. During the trial all 6 of the people testified, and a 17 year old boy was sent to prison, but no gun was ever found, and no vehicle was identified. He has been in there for 21 years. The problem is there are 250-280 cases where people were convicted and put on death row and later found out to be innocent. Even under the best observation conditions we only detect and store bits and pieces of the experience that is happening to us, so when going to recall, it is only a partial story. The brain will fill in information that is not originally stored, and it comes from outside sources. In a case the speaker had the judge go out to the actual scene and had the occurrence reenacted to see if the judge would be able to recognize a face in the car with the lighting and different distances. There was going to be a retrial, but he ended up being a freed man.
4: One thing I found to be interesting was where it talked about how even under the best observation conditions with adequate lighting and open space, our brain still only detects and will store parts of the story. Then it will continue to fill in the missing spots by what people hear from other people or on the social media. Due to dilation of the eyes, all the information can also not be gathered due to a visual impairment that is happening because of the lighting.
5: One idea I had was, how many other cases are there when the person has been on death row and the information needed to prove them innocent has still not been found? How many people are sitting in prison wrongly accused due to eye witness testimony? If shown more than one mug shot of a person, would these people have been able to make a decision out of the ones given? Would they have been confused?
6: I would want to hear more about different cases that the presenter had fought, and what happened with those, because I found this case and video to be very interesting.
7: In class we talked about how eye witness testimony’s are not very accurate, and how people get wrongly accused due to this. This video made it so much more clear about different reasons why they are not accurate, and a case study was actually given and he went through it in detail and explained why it wasn’t from different angles.
1. How your "working memory" makes sense of the world
2. http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_doolittle_how_your_working_memory_makes_sense_of_the_world.html
3. The speakers main argument seems to be that our working memory is a vital component of how and why we behave the way we do in day to day life.
4. What I found interesting were the real world examples of how our working memory influences our attention and behavior. In one example he describes a person listening in on someone else’s conversation but then switching back to listening to their own conversation once they realize a question has been asked by the other person. This is akin to our books description of working memories executive functioning. That is working memory’s prioritizing which information to process. Our text and the speaker both note that our working memory’s ability to hold information is finite and can be challenged by the demands of processing too much information. A simple example the speaker gave was walking into a room and forgetting what reason one had for walking into the room. This could have happened because one did not rehearse the information or there were too many other stimuli that became prioritized above the reason one had to go to the room.
5. I wondered how taxing of working memory certain common experiences are such as driving. I wondered if working memory can keep up with the demands during driving and how it copes with so much information being fed to it in such a situation. I thought about how I feel when I have an overabundance of information to process and how the situation influences my emotional reaction to the excess information. I thought about how if there was excess information for my working memory in the context of work I may feel frustrated. In the context of a video game I the excess information may elicit excitement or other positive emotions.
6. I would ask the presenter about how our emotions influence working memory functioning. I would want to know what situations enhance working memory and what emotions act as a detriment to it. For example if anger can ‘key up’ or agitate a person, does this lead to a heightened arousal that benefits working memory or does it hinder it. I would also be interested in asking if while solving a puzzle if working memory functioning tends to improve while we are engaging in such a task.
7. His conversation example I described in question four highlighted the role that the central executive plays in processing information. The other example I discussed with forgetting why one entered a room is a good example of the limited capacity of our short term memory. The speaker also discussed that by practicing or utilizing information immediately we can help ourselves remember something which is related to our text’s discussion of rehearsing information helping one remember information. Overall this talk tied into our text’s discussion of the working memory model and working memories limitations.
1) The ted talk video that I had watched was Peter Doolittle: How your “working memory” makes sense of the world.
2)www.ted.com/talks/peter_doolittle_how_your_working_memory_makes_sense_of_the_world.html
3) Peter Doolittle talked much about our abilities to solve problems that we experience every day in our lives which is done by our working memory. Peter gave a memory quiz almost immediately, which was 5 words, then shortly after he gave some problems for the people solved. Peter mentions that people with high working memory are very good at several different things that involve having to come up with something new and interesting, or they are able to solve problems much easier. Peter mentions that only about 4 things are able to be remembered for only about 10 to 20 seconds when not being used for a reason. Peter gives some strategies that will help someone being able to process things much easier. One of the strategies was that a person needs to process the information right away, and relating it to ourselves. Another strategy was that the things we experience in our lives need to be repeated either by talking about it with someone or just saying it over and over. Another strategy was that when we experience a work or hear something we should imagine it. The final strategy was that it needs to be organized, and then it needs to be supported by others.
4) What I found interesting was the strategies that Peter gave to help up process the information we experience in our every day lives. The one that I thought was the most interesting was that the information needed to be supported by others.
5) I did not really think about many ideas while watching the talk, but I did think of some of the topics I read about in the recent chapters.
6) One thing that I would ask the presenter would be about the MRI imaging that they did to figure out that about only 4 things can be remembered for a short period, and what it looked like on the images to notify them of the 4 things.
7) The working memory ted talk video relates to the recent chapter we have read about which involved memory.
Snow Day Assignment – Ted Talks
Scott Fraser: Why Eyewitnesses Get It Wrong
http://www.ted.com/talks/scott_fraser_the_problem_with_eyewitness_testimony.html
The general idea that is expressed in this video was that eye witness testimonies have a very high chance of being false. Fraser talks about a certain incident that he was involved in. There was a man that was convicted of murder, and Fraser was trying to get him set free. He made a very good case and showed strong evidence that the man was not guilty. He even took the judge to the spot where the murder happened and re-enacted the entire thing. The man was eventually set free because it was proved that the eye witnesses were wrong. And it wasn’t even just one eye witness. There were five teenage boys that were all there at the time of the murder. They all chose the same person out of a series of pictures. This man was convicted. But Fraser helped to get him freed by proving that the eye witness testimonies were false.
I thought that this talk was very interesting. I have heard before that eye witness testimonies can be false. I never knew the extent though. I really saw the seriousness of it while watching this talk. Fraser showed the series of pictures that were shown to the teenage boys. Just by seeing those pictures, there were some men that I couldn’t even tell apart. I don’t know how the boys would have picked one. It was really interesting how Fraser’s evidence all came together. He took the judge to the place of the murder and had the judge pose as the murder victim. There were pictures taken so that we could all see the point of view of the murder victim. The point of view was moved drastically closer than it was when it happened in real life. And even when that was done, it was impossible to see the shooter’s face. This was very interesting to me. It makes me wonder how often eye witness testimonies are false and no one catches them.
I feel like there are probably a lot of eye witness testimonies that are false that we don’t catch. This is something that we should probably be more aware of. While watching this talk, I was wondering how often eye witnesses are wrong. I was also wondering what we can do to fix it. There has to be a way to make eye witness testimonies more reliable. And even is there isn’t, we should probably just not use them – especially if they are false a lot. I don’t think that we should risk ruining innocent people’s lives. I understand that in serious cases, such as murder, a villain needs to be convicted. But it would not be right and it would not be just if we were convicting people who didn’t deserve it.
I would ask Fraser about some specific statistics about false eye witness testimonies. Like I said earlier, I have heard many times that eye witness testimonies are false. But I want to know how many are false, as opposed to how many are true. I think that if they are more false than not, we shouldn’t use them anymore. I’m sure that they are true to an extent. And I’m sure that eye witness testimonies have helped solved a lot of crimes, but I would never want to convict an innocent person.
This talk ties into what we are learning in class because at the very end of the video Fraser brings up memory. He says that memories are false – a lot. That’s not a good thing, especially when it comes to convicting villains of crimes. He basically says that our memories trick us, and they can’t be trusted. He also says that our memories can be persuaded or altered. This isn’t a good thing either. If we are going to convict someone of a crime, I would hope that we were certain we remembered what his face looks like. This might be a bigger issue than we think.
1. Elizabeth Loftus: The fiction of memory
2. http://www.ted.com/talks/elizabeth_loftus_the_fiction_of_memory.html
3. The general topic of this video is false or pseudo memory. She explains very broadly what it is, how it comes about with using an example of a court case, and how she goes about studying it.
4. One of my favorite parts of this video was when she was explaining constructive memory. She compared our memories to a Wikipedia page in that it is not set in stone. We can go in and change it ourselves, but so can other people. I found this quote to be perfect based on what I knew before watching this about constructive and pseudo memory in general as well as how she explained it. She explains that the biggest culprit of our altered memory is misinformation. If we see an event that occurs quickly or maybe causes great stress to us then it is likely that we will not recall it accurately. Also, if we witness an event, and then talk to another person who witnessed the event, our memory of the event may be changed to include what they described as well altering the way we will recall that event for the rest of our lives. This sort of situation is especially problematic in the legal system when you have one very convincing witness come to the stand in front of a jury and point to someone in that courtroom saying, “I know it was him.” Even if you have an expert come up and explain all about false memories and how common they are, we as humans have a tendency to appreciate the personal encounter and the empathy we feel with the witness, and discredit the expert, this of course we do not do consciously.
5. While watching I thought a lot about how many false memories I probably have, and how they could have come about. I also wonder if there is a way to identify false memories within the mind, and she touches on this idea just a little bit at the end of the video and she says that no one person can reliably distinguish a false memory with a real memory because to us they are all real memories.
6. If I had the chance I would want to ask her what made her want to study false memories. Also, does she believe that we will ever be able to definitely tell the difference, perhaps through fMRIs or some new technology, the difference between a false memory and a real one?
7. This talk is very relevant to a few chapters ago when we discussed nothing but memory, however it goes much further beyond that. The problem of false memories is a huge cognitive and functional question. What is it about the way our brains are wired that allows for such a big mistake to take place, and not only a mistake in recall now, but also how it affects us later in life. She talked about how in Canada scientists have done studies where they plant the false memory that when you were a child, you ate pickles and got extremely sick. They then took these participants on a pick-nick, and no one even touched the jar of pickles, and when offered all of them turned it down, some even citing the false memory as the reason for the refusal. As you can tell, this false memory doesn’t just affect one moment of your life, it could affect you forever.
1: What as the title of your ted talk?
Daphne Bavelier: Your brain on video games
2: Copy and paste the URL to the talks.
http://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_bavelier_your_brain_on_video_games.html
3: What is the general topic / idea expressed in our video.
The general topic expressed in this video was how video games can improve certain cognitive processes. Researchers found that individuals who played action videogames were better able to identify details. Individuals who played action videogames also performed on Stroop tasks indication that they have better attention. They are able to resolve conflicts in visual stimuli quicker than those that do not play action videogames and they are able to track multiple objects better than those who do not play action videogames. Individuals that play action gamers are also able to switch attention more readily. These results are specifically related to action games, though. The effects of other types of videogames on the brain needs further research; however, individuals who played ten hours of an action videogame improved performance on mental rotation tasks suggesting that the brain can trained using action videogames.
4: Explain in some detail what you found interesting / useful in the talk.
I found it interesting that individuals who play action videogames actually have better eyesight than those who do not. We have all heard the old adage that too much television causes bad eyesight but research actually supports the opposite. Something as simple as playing action videogames might be an effective treatment for loss of eyesight.
5: What ideas did you have while watching the talk?
While watching this talk, I was thinking about the point when videogames have negative rather than positive effects. The researcher cautioned that too much time spent playing videogames is not good but she never specified the negative effects only the positive ones.
6: What question would you ask the presenter if you had a chance?
I would ask the researcher how much time spent playing videogames is required before experiencing these benefits. I would also ask if action videogames are being used in treatment yet. I would also ask research done on other types of videogames aside from action videogames.
7: How does the talk tie into what we have been covering in class?
This talk ties into what we have been covering in class because research has supported action videogames as a method for improving how we process and store information about our environment. This talk discussed how videogames may increase our storage capacity and reduce interference.