The Madness of Crowds and Delusions

Today I want to continue delving into the amazing sci-fi show LEGION. Being a massive fan of the show, I just can't believe that it's finally over after 3 exquisite seasons.

This is a superhero show based on MARVEL comics so if you are as much into MARVEL and DC as I am you should definitely give it a go. 

The interesting thing about this show in particular is that it is not centered around the typical hero who comes to save everyone from impending doom but rather on a kind of "antihero"- "lunatic" sort of bloke who people think suffers from mental illness.

 AND THIS IS WHY I love it so much. I'm fascinated by the intricacies of the mind, the illnesses connected to it and the corresponding behaviour analysis that derives from it or surrounds it.

Season 2 of this show has the brilliant idea of introducing each episode or a group of episodes with a psychological observation accompanied by a beautiful visualization. These introductory narrations are read by the incredible JON HAMM (voice over)

I will share all of the texts periodically - some of which will have the corresponding video - starting with these two: 

SEASON 2 - EPISODE 1: "Chapter 9" 

[Part 2: The Madness Of Crowds]

There is a maze in the desert carved from sand and rock. A vast labyrinth of pathways

 and corridors a hundred miles long, a thousand miles wide, full of twists and dead ends. 

Picture it... a puzzle. You walk, and at the end of this maze is a prize just waiting to be 

discovered. All you have to do is find your way through. Can you see the maze? Its walls 

and floors, its twists and turns? Good, because the maze you've created in your mind is 

itself the maze. There is no desert, no rock or sand. There is only the idea of it. But it's an 

idea that will come to dominate your every waking and sleeping moment. You're inside 

the maze now. You cannot escape. Welcome to madness.

[Chapter 3: Delusions]

And now we must speak of Zhuang Zhou, who fell asleep one day and dreamed he was a 

butterfly. For hours, he fluttered in the warm winter sun, until he no longer remembered he 

was Zhuang Zhou. Suddenly he awoke, and he was Zhuang Zhou again. But in that 

moment, he didn't know. Was he Zhuang Zhou who had dreamt he was a butterfly, or a 

butterfly who was dreaming he was Zhuang Zhou? 

A delusion starts like any other idea, as an egg. Identical on the outside, perfectly formed. 

From the shell, you'd never know anything was wrong. It's what's inside that matters. 

Albert A had an idea. One day, as he was walking, he stumbled. And for a moment, it 

seemed that his right leg didn't belong to him. This is how it begins. The leg was clearly 

Albert's. It was attached to his body, and when he pricked it, he felt pain. But despite that, 

the idea grew. Such is the power of an idea. With every day that passed, Albert became 

more and more certain that this was not his leg. He decided he didn't want it anymore. 

And so one day, he went to the hardware store. You see, an idea alone isn't enough. We 

have ideas all the time, random thoughts and theories. Most die... before they can grow. 

For a delusion to thrive, other, more rational ideas must be rejected, destroyed. Only then 

can the delusion blossom... into full-blown psychosis.

I Carry Your Heart With Me (I Carry It In My Heart)

Ésta ha sido la frase más hermosa que leí y que decidí hacer conmemorativa hace 5 años. Quien quiera leer un poco más acerca del escritor tan hermoso que escribió esto a su hermana o a su mejor amigo ( no recuerdo) les dejo los links a su biografía (Wikipedia) y a la hermosa imagen del poema que me guardé en mi escritorio.

Autor: E.E. Cummings

Imagen del poema completo

Poema completo:

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

5 años. Mismo día. Misma hora. Cíclico, no? Para mí, inconcebible.

Sin estar 100% segura si quería o no hacerlo público o liberarlo al Universo - como prefieran llamarlo -  necesitaba hacer algo conmemorativo en este día en particular que esté por fuera de un archivo de Word guardado en el escritorio de mi notebook desde hace ya 4 años.

Tampoco estaba segura si debía escribir esto en inglés o castellano asíque decidí que salga como salga. 

Es tanta la incertidumbre que me genera escribir este post que hasta tiemblan mis manos al escribir pero si así sucede es porque así tiene que ser. No hay otra.

Hace EXACTAMENTE 5 AÑOS, en este mismo día SÁBADO hace apenas unas horas para ser más precisa ocurriría un evento TAN DESAFORTUNADO en mi vida que es hasta el día de hoy que no lo entiendo. Lo ACEPTÉ (-lo aceptaste? Estás segura?) pero no lo entiendo (NO LO ENTIENDO)

Solía tener un alumno particular los días SÁBADOS de 11.30 a 13. Era un alumno que iba regularmente a tomar clases al Instituto donde trabajo y luego de unos años decidió continuar conmigo. 

No me voy a hacer la exclusiva en esto pero estoy casi segura que TODOS tenemos mínimo a una personita guardada en nuestro corazón que es ÚNICA, que IRRADIA LUZ, que es ÍNTEGRA. No sé como explicarlo pero me entienden seguramente. Bueno, él era esa personita.

Había empezado a deconstruir ese día pero se me estaba haciendo muy largo por no querer omitir detalles asíque decidí borrarlo y limitarme a compartir algo de las tantas cosas que le apasionaban que era la música. Éstos eran algunos de sus temas favoritos de algunas de sus bandas favoritas y de una frase de una de ellas se hizo un tatuaje. Les dejo las letras:

• HASTA ACÁ NOS AYUDÓ DIOS - Las Pastillas Del Abuelo
• NORTE - De La Gran Piñata
• STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN - Led Zeppelin
• THANK YOU - Led Zeppelin

"-Flabbergasted me hizo aprobar el FCE, Profe.

-Que dirá de mí si con solo esa palabra aprobaste?

-That you are a great teacher."

5 years on and I'm still flabbergasted. 

I miss you. 

Rest In Peace.

AESOP'S FABLES - Prometheus and the making of Man; Grief and his Due

Since this outlandish quarantine began I've decided to resume some of my favourite hobbies. One of these is READING, obvs.

I'm such an avid reader that I even have an account on GOODREADS. I set it up a couple of years ago and it's been so helpful for me because it helps me organise my books digitally in three shelves: read, currently reading and want to read and keeps me motivated with the addictive READING CHALLENGE.

One of the many books I've read this year is AESOP'S FABLES. Gosh, it's been a heart-warming pleasure delving in those pages. Absolutely gorgeous read. I seriously recommend it if you haven't read it.

I have difficulty choosing my one-and-only favourite fable so I've opted to rewrite two instead. In a future post - or an updated version of this one - I might include even more.

Grief and His Due

When Jupiter was assigning the various gods their privileges, it so happened that Grief was not 

present with the rest: but when all had received their share, he too entered and claimed his due. 

Jupiter was at a loss to know what to do, for there was nothing left for him. However, at last he 

decided that to him should belong the tears that are shed for the dead. Thus it is the same with Grief 

as it is with the other gods. The more devoutly men render to him his due, the more lavish is he of 

that which he has to bestow. It is not well, therefore, to mourn long for the departed; else Grief, 

whose sole pleasure is in such mourning, will be quick to send fresh cause for tears.

💗💗💗💗💗💗

Prometheus and the Making of Man


At the bidding of Jupiter, Prometheus set about the creation of Man and the other animals. Jupiter, 

seeing that Mankind, the only rational creatures, were far outnumbered by the irrational beasts,bade 

him redress the balance by turning some of the latter into men. Prometheus did as he was bidden, 

and this is the reason why some people have the forms of men but the souls of beasts.

Empathy and Fear

Given the horrendous episodes of violence in the USA which the black community have been suffering these past few months and even and regrettably longer than that, I haven't stopped thinking about us as human beings. We always preach to be ONE RACE while there are still people, communities, villages and even cities which do not bear to live among people who are different... DIFFERENT, really? WE ARE HUMAN BEINGS, where is the difference in that? Oh, right. I see: difference in social status, difference in religious beliefs, difference in sexual orientation, difference in the COLOUR OF SKIN.

If not by lack of education, how can anybody ever feel disgust, rage or indifference towards another human being just because they do not look alike, think alike, love alike? This is OUTRAGEOUS. I cannot conceive it.

Education within the family and education in school should be available to everyone everywhere for free. Kids need to learn the basics on empathy and kindness in their families and in their schools. Governments should do anything and everything in their power to make people feel they BELONG as ONE.

Not to make it too long, tedious or repetitive, the topics that I wanted to address today given in the title of this post are cleverly narrated through a monologue given by Oliver Bird in the extraordinary FX series called LEGION. If you haven't watched it, give it a try. You don't have to love superheroes but rather be interested in mental illness and psychology.

The show has an interesting way of telling the story through brief introductions showing amazing images and Jon Hamm or Oliver Bird (character's name) in this clip narrating different psychological concepts in relation to mental illness such as empathy and fear for example.

The following quote is taken from IMDB site and the clip is taken from YOUTUBE. It's the beginning of EPISODE 4 - SEASON 1 and the analogies narrated are in relation to the aforementioned concepts.

Enjoy.

[first lines]

Oliver Bird : Good evening. We are here tonight to talk about violence, or maybe human nature. We are here to talk about human nature. Wait, a quote. A great philosopher [Friedrich Nietzsche] 
once wrote; 

'In times of peace the warlike man attacks himself.' 

This is the root of all our problems, and by this, I mean we. We are the root of all our problems, our confusion, our anger, our fear of things we don't understand. Violence in other words, is ignorance. Figure your shit out, that's what I'd say. 

There are two kinds of stories we tell our children. The first kind; 'Once upon a time there was a fuzzy little rabbit named Frizzytop, who went on a quantum fun adventure, only to face a big setback, which he overcame through perseverance and by being adorable.' This kind of story teaches empathy. Put yourself in Frizzytop's shoes, in other words. The other kind; 'Oliver Anthony Bird if you get too close to that ocean you'll be sucked into the sea and drowned.' This kind of story teaches them fear, and for the rest of their lives, these two stories compete. Empathy and fear. 

And so I bring you tonight's play, the work in five acts about a fuzzy little bunny, who got too close to the ocean. And what happened next, let us begin.

Oliver Bird's monologue

Cupid and Psyche - a beautiful MYTH turned into a Sleep Story

For over a year now, I've been having trouble sleeping at night. Doing some research online I found out this outstanding website (also a mobile app) called CALM which not only has helped me sleep much better every night but also it has instilled in me a new found love for meditation, relaxation and breathing techniques to ease my anxiety levels at times.

There is a section in this website/app designed exclusively for SLEEP STORIES. They go from well-known fairy tales, to travel stories and even myths all of which are adapted to make anyone go to sleep. It has worked WONDERS for me ever since I started listening to these.

Such is my fascination with them that I've already listened to all of them more than once and I can now share with you, on a regular basis, some of my favourites:

Today's favourite is a Greek MYTH called "Cupid and Psyche" written by Apuleius in his book "The Golden Ass". Being five pages long, it would be very long for a single blog post so I share the PDF which you can easily read online, download or even print.

I hope you like it as much as I do. Pretty soon, I'll be sharing some other favourite sleep stories from this fantastic website.

Give it a try and let me know your thoughts in the comments!

See you soon!

Stay safe :)

Do people have FREE WILL?

It's been a while since my latest blog post but here I am again with a new essay I've written for a course in NEUROECONOMICS (Introduction To Neuroeconomics: How The Brain Makes Decisions) I'm currently working on using COURSERA

One of the peer-graded assignments I had to do was to write about the topic of FREE WILL with the prompt: Do people have free will or is it an illusion? Is neuroeconomics the death of free will? The word limit was 500 so this is it. I hope you like it and feel free to leave a comment and share it with other people.

These views are my own. No copyright infringement. Sources are cited at the end of the essay.

We are made to believe that for those of us who live in a democracy we have such freedoms as  freedom of speech or freedom of religion to name a few but the real question to discuss here is whether or not we have free will.

When I started thinking how to approach this question I thought of more than one perspective to consider it from. Two of these will be taken into account: the religious/moral perspective and the psychological perspective.

To begin with, some people who believe in God and Catholicism have no second thoughts when stating “God gave you FREE WILL” meaning, in my opinion, that you are free to choose what you want to do. Nonetheless, digging deeper into this notion can lead to further inquiries such as: how free any individual can be to choose what they want to do without feeling guilty, remorseful or selfish in religious terms right? There is plenty to be said about this concept in religion but I will leave you with this excerpt I took from Wikipedia discussing the concept of FREE WILL in the Roman Catholic Church:

The Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church asserts that "Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will".[1] It goes on to say that "God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. God willed that man should be 'left in the hand of his own counsel,' so that he might of his own accord seek his Creator and freely attain his full and blessed perfection by cleaving to him.""[2]

Secondly, psychology being a science which studies people and their behaviours brings a new light to religion not being the only field capable of explaining choices. Considering this matter, there are professionals in the field who try to explain the way in which the brain functions when faced with a decision to make. Doctor Danil Razeev made a compelling argument discussing this topic. This is his lecture on it: "Can Neuroscience Measure Free Will?". Another opinion on the subject matter wrote an editorial on the web and this is an excerpt I found to be quite interesting:

“How can a person make self-determined choices, make sense of the world, and even self-actualize when neuroscientific evidence seems to indicate that our brains are making decisions before we even realize it? Are we claiming responsibility for events that have little or nothing to do with conscious intention?” [3]

All things being considered, it is my personal opinion that the notion of free will is subjective to the person and the place where they live, the governments they have and the desire each of them have to do what they feel is right for them as long as it does not forfeit another individual’s right to do and act the same way.

Citations:

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will_in_theology “Roman Catholic” third paragraph , end of quotation 34

[2] ] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will_in_theology “Roman Catholic” third paragraph , end of quotation 34

[3] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/proceed-your-own-risk/201311/do-we-have-free-will Paragraph 10 - Editorial written by Seth Schwartz Ph.D.

Why is justice boring and useless and stupid?

The following is an OUTSTANDING explanation from Professor John Holbo on the Coursera Online Course about Reason and Persuasion regarding Plato's Republic. One of the Dialogues refers to Thrasymachus and the way in which he perceives and explains the notion of JUSTICE.

Below, you'll read Holbo's down-to-earth terrific explanation:

1) Justice is politically and socially non-explanatory. Studying justice doesn't help you understand how things work around the place. Because they don’t work justly. Life is unfair, kid! Thus, if you want to understand life, study not-fair.

2) Justice is personally undesirable. Practising justice is no way to get ahead in business or anywhere else. It’s a risky, thankless pain.

By contrast, injustice is interesting, useful and smart. Which brings us the flip-sides to 1 and 2.

3) Injustice is politically explanatory. Most of what happens in politics and society, in life, happens because someone is taking unfair advantage of someone else. This is the norm, not the exception.

4) Injustice is personally desirable. Pursuing injustice gets you what you want.

This is complicated because 2) and 4) are more like rules of thumb. (Think about why that is.)

But really this is complicated because of

5), make sure to call it 'justice' when you are pursuing injustice. And call what the just people are doing 'unjust', for good measure. (It's safer that way!)

Consistent with 5, you should label this theory of injustice 'a theory of justice'. And I think that's pretty much what Thrasymachus does.

Personality is an illusion

Throughout generations, people have always found various ways to generate, maintain, or even break personal relationships. Attitudes, behaviour and personality traits are all synonyms to define one individual in relation to another. Whether these attributes are fictitious is still to be revealed.

To begin with, the first social circle toddlers are introduced to is family. They are nurtured not only with basic needs such as food, clothing and hygene but also with values which involve behaving accordingly in certain situations with different social groups. These characteristics will accompany them during their early elementary school years when they are exposed to diverse personality types and start to be influenced by some more than others.

Furthermore, children continue growing up both physically and emotionally and, as a result, their bodies as well as their feelings change - wat they used to feel and how they used to behave at an early age are no longer a reality. This is the time when they develop into teenagers and as such they experience a wide range of emotions that they had not been aware of before - the interaction with parents changes dramatically whereas the close-knit group of friends becomes sacrosanct.

Finally, with the coming-of-age, young adults begin a new challenge when they step out of high school, and delve into university life and, in some cases, working life as well. While their basic feelings and personal traits remain, society at large makes these individuals adapt to a rapidly-evolving world where major fluctuations occur in their attitudes towards their families, friends or peers.

To sum up, even if we as individuals carry a set of traits with us from our early years, our social surroundings will inevitably force us to decide how we need to behave which, in turn, will create, preserve or destroy who we are supposed to be.

The use of technology in current relationships

Following the sequence of Essays being written for the IELTS course I attended in London last January, I give you my... third one?  Or is it the fourth one? I've lost count already. I hope you enjoy it. Share it, like it, comment on it or just let it be... LOL

Nowadays, the way many people interact with each other has changed because of technology. In what ways has technology affected the type of relationships people make? Has this become a positive or negative development?

The introduction of technology in our everyday lives has deeply influenced not only how the world is seen but also how individuals affect one another.

One way in which people have been changed is by the use of personal computers, smartboards and even mobile phones in the classroom. The number of schools implementing these devices as learning tools is growing exponentially. This means that, more and more, teachers and students are both becoming active participants in the classroom, giving the opportunity for students to debate or even challenge sources regarding a specific area of knowledge.

Another way in which these developments have modified people's behaviour towards each other is in the field of family relationships. Even though technological devices such as mobile phones can bring families together, they can sometimes cause family feuds which may result in drastic outcomes such as leaving the family home. What's more, online gaming has been gaining adepts at such a young age that it makes it even more complex for parents to have a simple day-to-day conversation.

Finally, students at university or even young adults who are beginning to become more independent find, in the use of smartphone applications, an outlet to socialise and, eventually, on some occasions, to find a life partner.

Overall, considering the dangers that technology may pose in people's lives, the benefits outweigh the limitations.

Being involved in the Arts makes people feel better.

As promised, my beloved blog readers, here I am (come and take me... LOL https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OVIPgbFh6M) giving you my second Essay Assignment while attending the preparatory course for Cambridge IELTS Exam.

Nowadays, people get too stressed trying to make ends meet every month. The opportunity for participating in activities outside work creates a sense of fulfillment that changes people's mindsets. Art can be said to have amazing effects on most people. What needs to be considered is  "the remaining few".

Let's start by stating that any kind of artistic expression is always welcome when the need to release energy is present in any individual. Examples can be found in several famous people such as Van Gogh, Poe, Da Vinci, to name a few. They didn't have an easy life so they discovered that channeling their emotions through Art would help them feel better.

Conversely, the constant criticism, being in the spotlight, or even having the feeling that it is never enough, makes other people feel frustrated or even depressed leading, in some unfortunate cases, to fatal outcomes. Such are the cases of famous celebrities either on TV or in films.

All being said, given the fact that Art is considered a positive outlet for expressing feelings and boosting self-esteem in people, there are still some issues that need to be taken into consideration as well. Nonetheless, I still encourage the promotion of Art as a means to develop people's confidence and a sense of bliss.