Assignment MT 6.2

The human mind is an incredibly complicated thing. No single metaphor will fullfill its every possible discription. Two common metaphors are that the mind is a printing press and a computer. Certain things are hidden and also highlighted by these. The printing press metaphor hightlights our a strong memory and do not erase things well, large amounts of information, and that we are impressionable. Humans usually have a good memory, even if we try to forget something it is hard for us to do fully. We can try to forget something but it always has the ability to come up again. Just like with a printing press, you can never get rid of the impressions in the page. We can also store large amounts of information like a book from the printing press can. And the most important thing is that we are impressionable. We are impressed by the things that happen around us everyday, these things make us who we are just like a printing press creates a book. Something that is hidden in this metaphor is the use of images. Printing presses generally on print words and the human mind most often deals with images, sounds, or smells rather than words. I think that this is one thing that the mind is a computer metaphor does better than the printing press. A computer has the abilty to do all that a printing press can and store images. Like the printing press the computer can store lots of information, have a good memory that is hard to erase, and can be programmed just like the impressions of a printing press. However this metaphor still lacks the smell and sound senses of the human mind.

Assignment MT 6.3

The metaphors that we find in the quotes from "Current Ideas about How the Mind Works," are about how our minds function. The first one is that our brain is a washing machine. It goes on to say that "Serotonin is the water that flows in at certain times and is flushed out." This qoute continues to say that as long as enough water flows in and out the machine works fine, but depression in our mind is like not getting enough water into the machine. Another metaphor is that depression is an out of tune radio. "You just simply have to adjust the dials. When you learn to bring about this mental tuning, the music will come through clearly again and your depression will lift." In that line there is another metaphor besides the radio, "your depression will lift." They use the word lift as if depression is a weight holding down on you. These are just a few of the metaphors used in these quotes.
These metaphor do have consequences. The mind is a very complex thing and many people do not understand how it works. By using these metaphors people may believe that depression is a very simple issue and easy to solve. This may not be a good thing because people could possible ignore someones depression assuming that it will just go away. If people do this they may not get the treatment they need to come out of their depression. I can not say wether these are good metaphors for depression, because I do not know much about it, but I think that we need to be careful when describing things such as this. People must know the seriousness behind these issues, if they are taken too lightly they may go unattended to.

Assignment MT 4.2

The difference between thinking about a person's unusual behavior as a disease and a spiritual problem is all in what you want to believe. If you want to believe that a person is behaving differently because of a spiritual problem you will, if you want to believe that a person is behaving differently because of a disease you will. It may not even be what you want to believe it may be what your forced to believe. People of the 1500's did not have the knowledge of such things that we do now, so they, in fear of the unknown, believed that it was the devil. I call it fear because we all fear the unknown, its human nature, and christians want people to fear the devil so they blame these types of events on the devil. Veiwing the strange actions as a possession of the devil can cause consequences for the sick. If the person is acting differently and someone simply prays for them and expects results, the person will not get the treatment they need and often will not be healed. However, veiwing the stange behavior as an illness may not be good either. If the person really is possesed by the devil, and we try to treat him or her medically, the also will go untreated. The human mind is a complicated thing, I do not believe we will ever fully understand diseases such as this. We will never know the truth of the causes of the treatments of these events. What will change is how we react to them by how we veiw them. If we veiw it as possession, we place blame on the person possessed. If we veiw it as illness we feel sympathy for the person ill.

Assignment MT3.3

Metaphors can have the ability to affect the way that we think, but I do not think that they affect us as much as it may seem. They do alter the way that we speak and the words that we use, but I feel that they do not change the meaning of what we say. If you take a metaphor literally, as the person says it then it is not a metaphor. When someone says a metaphor you generally know what they mean by it and are able to understand what they mean by it. Just tonight i heard someone say "Thats how I roll." This person did not mean that they roll like a wheel or a ball, they meant "that is the way I am." I knew what they meant, by using the word roll it did not change what i thought about the sentence.

Assingment MT1.2

The metaphor of anger as dynamite, I feel is a pretty strong metaphor. Dynamite catches the intensity of the emotion or anger. It explains the loss of control that anger can give some people. It is hard to control an explosion so therefore its hard to control anger. I think using dynamite to explain anger is pretty good metaphor. In Blake’s “A Poison Tree” Blake offers another metaphor for anger, a tree of poison. Blake’s metaphor lacks the intensity of anger that dynamite has, but it has other points that it highlights. His metaphor shows the sense of revenge that often comes with anger. His anger comes with wanting to avenge the foe’s actions upon him. He shows how over time anger can grow, how if not dealt with it can grow dangerous, such as his foe dying from eating an apple from the tree. If this metaphor was widely used which it could be we would say things such as
“I grew angry with him.”
“Anger grew inside me like a tree.”
“The anger grew widely in my head.”

Assignment MTintro.2

The most common definition of the word technology is the application of science, especially to industrial or commercial objectives. If Goody was to redefine the word technology to include writing it would be similar to this, the application of a tool to complete an objective. I do not agree with Goody that writing is a technology, it is a tool but not technological. Technologies are developed using a science, a science that can be tested and proven, words can not be tested and proven. You can not prove that any word means what the dictionary says it means, you just take the dictionary’s word on it. If it were a science you could prove that that word means what the dictionary says it means. Since writing is not a science it is not a technology.

Assignment 4/3

Advertising today is all about sex. They suggest that everyone’s image must be sexually attractive with a perfect figure and style. The image that I chose is out of Sports Illustrated the magazine for American Express credit card. The add is of a man holding a child. The man is wearing nothing but a swim suit and is what society views as attractive, having large muscles and perfect face. The man is at the beach sitting on the tale of his car, the scene is attractive in itself. Everyone enjoys a day at the beach; therefore the advertising people give you the image that their product will give the consumer the situation or image that they want.
These images obviously affect people’s image of them selves. People are surrounded by these images everyday all day. Advertising is all around us everywhere we look, they of course only have what society calls attractive people in them. Because of this people strive to be like the people on the adds and even go to the point of altering their bodies with plastic surgery. The idea of plastic surgery alone proves that people are affected by these images. These images show what society accepts, without these images people would not know how to alter their body with plastic surgery, we would not know what is attractive.