September 2010 Archives

What's in the News?

What I would like you to do is to start applying what we are learning in class to real world matters. Some might ask, "What good is learning psychology if we can't apply it to real world matters?" So that is what we are going to do with this divergence assignment.

What I would like you to do is to either go to NPR (http://www.npr.org/ ) or the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/ ) and read, watch, or listen to something that is interesting to you and relates to what we have been learning in the class.

Please respond the blog by telling us what the piece you chose was and why you picked it (what made it interesting for you)? What did you expect to see? What did you find most interesting about the piece?

Next discuss how it relates to the class using terms, terminology, and concepts that we have learned so far in class.

Include the URL in your post.

Make a list of key terms and concepts you used in your post.

Let me know if you have any questions,

--Dr. M

Please read the Landscape of His Dreams from AoM.

After reading the chapter, go to your textbook and see what it has to say about the topics raised in the chapter. This might be difficult so if there is even something remotely similar in the text go ahead and read up on that. When you have done this, please respond to the following questions.

What did your text have to say about the topics raised in this chapter? What information was provided in the text? What additional details did your text provide?

What did you think about this chapter? Why? What are three things you will remember from what you read in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you really liked that was in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you disliked that was in the chapter? Why? What do you now know about your brain that you didn't know before reading the chapter? Has this chapter made you think about other issues about the brain? How does this chapter relate to the material in the earlier chapters?

Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.

Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: memory, cortex, visual system....)

Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance

Let me know if you have any questions.

Please go through the handouts you have received attached to this email. Please find two topics from the handouts that are of interest to you and discuss what your text has to say on those topics. Next indicate two topics that you would like me to cover in more depth in class.

What is the Thatcher effect? What does the face below have in common with 'thatcherized' faces at the bottom of the page?

 

Source (http://www.psychologicalscience.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi?__mode=view&_type=entry&blog_id=29)

Image source(http://scienceblogs.com/mixingmemory/2006/09/cool_visual_illusions_the_marg.php)

Please go through the handouts you have received through email. Please find two topics from the handouts that are of interest to you and conduct some online research on those topics. Synthesize are report your findings on this post. Next indicate two topics that you would like further clarification on.

How do our eyes decieve us? How does this relate to change blindness? How do our expectations drive our perceptual processes? Hint - Count the number of legs...

More photos - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/19/funniest-photoshop-fails_n_731037.html

 

I will be revising this shortly to cover the material on sensation, perception, and attention. I will put together some annotated power points in lieu of last week's lecture.

Think of the material we have covered so far in class. Next find a topic related to your interest and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find youtube clips that demonstrate something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. I would like you to use quality informative website though.

Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter, and why you are interested in it. Next, I would like you to take the information you found related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about it in an informative manner so the reader will learn about the topic through your writings (not by referring them to a website) . At the end, please include working URLs for the websites used.

Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.

Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance

Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: memory, cortex, visual system....)

Let me know if you have any questions.

Please read to See and Not See from AoM.

After reading the chapter, go to your textbook and see what it has to say about the topics raised in the chapter. This might be difficult so if there is even something remotely similar in the text go ahead and read up on that. When you have done this, please respond to the following questions.

What did your text have to say about the topics raised in this chapter? What information was provided in the text? What additional details did your text provide?
What did you think about this chapter? Why? What are three things you will remember from what you read in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you really liked that was in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you disliked that was in the chapter? Why? What do you now know about your brain that you didn't know before reading the chapter? Has this chapter made you think about other issues about the brain? How does this chapter relate to the material in the earlier chapters?

Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.

Include a list of the terms and concepts you used in your post. (example - Terms: memory, cortex, visual system....)

Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance

Let me know if you have any questions.

 

"WASHINGTON -- Federal health regulators are warning doctors that a class of injectable drugs used in MRI medical imaging scans can cause a rare and sometimes fatal condition in patients with kidney disease."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/10/fda-warns-of-deadly-side-_n_711895.html

In class we discussed the neuroscientist's toolbox. Of the various tools neuroscientists use which do you find the most interesting? How does that tool work? What types of research questions can you ask using it? What research question would you ask if you had such a device? Are there any ethical issues realted to this technique?

Let me know if you have any questions about how to proceed.

What I would like you to do is to read the chapter in your text about on from Sensation, Perception, & Attention. Next find a related topic that you are interested in and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find youtube clips that demonstrate something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. I would like you to use quality informative website though.

Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to say what your topic is, how exactly it fits into the chapter, and why you are interested in it. Next, I would like you to take the information you found related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about it in an informative manner so the reader will learn about the topic through your writings (not by referring them to a website) . At the end, please include working URLs for the websites used.

Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.

Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance

Let me know if you have any questions.

Please read A Surgeon's Life from AoM.

After reading the chapter, go to your textbook and see what it has to say about the topics raised in the chapter. This might be difficult so if there is even something remotely similar in the text go ahead and read up on that. When you have done this, please respond to the following questions.

What did your text have to say the topics raised in this chapter? What information was provided in the text? What additional details did your text provide?
What did you think about this chapter? Why? What are three things you will remember from what you read in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you really liked that was in the chapter? Why? What was one thing that you disliked that was in the chapter? Why? What do you now know about your brain that you didn't know before reading the chapter? Has this chapter made you think about other issues about the brain? How does this chapter relate to the material in the earlier chapters?

Please make sure you use the terms, terminology and concepts you have learned so far in the class. It should be apparent from reading your post that you are a college student well underway in a course in psychology.

Please use spaces between your paragraphs to make your post easier to read - thanks in advance

Let me know if you have any questions.

"CRASH! A deafening roar and the cinema screen explodes with light. The scene is certainly startling, but is this movie stirring up the right emotional reactions deep down? Rather than ask your opinion, it's now possible to cut out the middleman and go straight to your brain for the verdict."

http://gizmodo.com/5633312/brain-scans-can-predict-how-youll-react-to-a-movie-scene

Does this make sense based on what we know about neuroiamging? What techniques are they using? What do the data say? How is this related to the what researchers are doing in terms of lie detection using scans? Is this ethical?

"Traditional computer processing is based on 1 and 0, yes and no, but Lyric Semiconductor wants us to consider the power of  'maybe'. The Cambrdige, Massachusetts startup recently came out of stealth to announce the development of their new computer chip that calculates using probabilities. "

http://singularityhub.com/2010/09/04/a-computer-chip-based-on-probability-not-binary-video/

Why is this a radical change from how computers are built? What do you think computing will become as a result? Wil this allow computer to think/process information more like humans? Will this hasten the coming of the singularity? What is singularity anyway?

 

"A British soldier left blind by a grenade in Iraq has told how his life has been transformed by ground-breaking technology that enables him to "see" with his tongue."

http://news.discovery.com/tech/blind-soldier-sees-with-tongue.html

How is this possible? What next? Do you think the areas of the brain associated with sight beging to be taken over by the areas that involve the tongue? What other application might this or somethign similar have?

"For thousands of years people have worn shimmering silk to stand out in a crowd. Within the next few years people could wear silk to become invisible in a a crowd..."

http://news.discovery.com/tech/silk-invisibility-cloak.html

Also see http://infinitylabs.net/2006/07/03/invisible-cloaks-in-action-video-demonstrations/ for videos demonstrating a cloak.

How is this possible? What other attempts have been made to invent such devices? What do we know from sensation & perception section of the text that might help someone develop such a device (i.e., what do we already know about the visual system that would help us understand/know how to build this)?

 

"Tan Le's astonishing new computer interface reads its user's brainwaves, making it possible to control virtual objects, and even physical electronics, with mere thoughts (and a little concentration). She demos the headset, and talks about its far-reaching applications."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tedtalks/tan-le-a-headset-that-rea_b_679758.html

You should by now have your two readers Anthropologist on Mars (AoM) and Memory Observed (MO). Please read the last hippie from AoM.

You should by now have ordered or received your cognitive text book. Please email me if this is not the case as you will have difficulty in completing the upcoming assignments.

After reading the last hippie, please respond to the following questions.

What did you think about this reading? Why? What are three things you will remember from what you read in the reading? Why? What was one thing that you really liked that was in the reading? Why? What was one thing that you disliked that was in the reading? Why? What do you now know about your brain that you didn't know before the reading? Has this reading made you think about other issues about the brain?

What I would like you to do is to find a topic from cognitive neuroscience that you are interested in and search the internet for material on that topic. You might, for example, find people who are doing research on the topic, you might find web pages that discuss the topic, you might find youtube clips that demonstrate something related to the topic, etc. What you find and use is pretty much up to you at this point. Next I would like you to read what your cognitive text says about the topic.

Once you have completed your search and explorations, I would like you to (a) state what your topic is, (b) how exactly it fits into the chapter in your text, and (c) why you are interested in that particular topic. Next, I would like you to take the information you found related to your topic, integrate/synthesize it, and then write about it.

At the end, please include working URLs for the websites you used. And include a reference for your text book.

Let me know if you have any questions.

"Oliver Sacks visits the Pacific atoll of Pingelap to visit an isolated community of islanders born totally colorblind."

 

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CM06G26X-rQ
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x16fMHgjEp8&feature=related
Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izSVbHoc4hU&feature=related
Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0RorHKC2p4&feature=related
Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0OPtyUnthQ&feature=related
Part 6: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxPf4ASQ0ZM&feature=related