The Drama of the Gifted Child, by Alice Miller, is about the child who was so aware, consciously or otherwise, of the wishes of his parents and had such a strong desire to fulfill them, that he lost track of himself and his own identity.  It’s about the child who never discovered his “true self” because he was so concerned with pleasing those around him, and the repercussions of that later in life, as an adult.  The book discusses the unconscious wishes of the parent being often unconsciously bestowed on the child, with the child absorbing these wishes and morphing into this different person.  The Drama offers help by explaining the problems and consequences of growing up in this way, and suggestions for steps as to remove himself from the person he is not, and move towards finding his “true identity”. 

Entering any art museum, you will walk down many white washed walls with brightly colored canvases mounted upon them. In the abstract section you will most likely pass a canvas that consists of only two or three large blocks of intense color painted upon it. Looking at these colored blocks, you may or may not experience a sense of sunniness, coolness, tenseness, or relaxation. This is a typical reaction to the works of Mark Rothko[1]. Rothko’s art, using alternately radiant and dark colors, is distinguished by the sustained concentration on pure pictorial properties such as color, surface, proportion, and scale, in order to inspire in his audience profound themes such as tragedy, ecstasy, and the sublime. His images are known to provoke raw human experiences, or what we have learned are primary experiences. Not only do his paintings evoke emotional states, they will not evoke the same emotion in everyone. How is Rothko able to achieve such a reactions and why do the reactions vary? I wish to look at this question from a biological and color-centric point of view, disregarding the I-function’s affect on creativity and variability in the brain.

Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking

Book critique by Tiffany Ngan

"Who wants to live forever?" —Queen

A British secret agent is cryonically (not cryogenically, as generally understood) frozen in 1967 and defrosted thirty years later in the late 90s for the purpose of battling his archenemy and saving the planet from annihilation. Does such a scenario sound familiar? If it does, it is because this plot is that of the popular film Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. While this comedy is based on outlandish and often impossible situations, one might reasonably ask the following question regarding the cryonic freezing of human beings:

Feminism is the constantly evolving, diverse movement that critiques and works to change the power structures that exclude and victimize groups of people. Feminist wave theory is a framework that divides feminism since the nineteenth century into three main waves. Each wave contains wide diversity within itself but all of the waves share the goal of education reform. Education is a structure in our society that can exclude groups or can empower groups. In this paper, I will discuss the field of ecology in a feminist framework. To begin I will explain ecology and the wave framework that I will be using to explore it. I will end with a creative piece inspired by Peggy McIntosh’s Interactive Phases of Curricular Re-Vision: A Feminist Perspective.

The scientific community has long considered the study of feelings to be taboo, a subject too elusive and mysterious to be researched or truly understood. In his book, Looking for Spinoza, Antonio Damasio is able to finally shed some light on what feelings are and why we have them. In the first chapter, Damasio writes that main purpose of his work “is to present a progress report on the nature of and human significance of feelings and related phenomena, as I see them now, as neurologist, neuroscientist and regular user”(Demasio 6.) With this purpose in mind, Demasio proceeds to elucidate the very nature of emotions and feelings, cleverly interweaving his solid scientific research as well as his personal interpretation of Spinoza’s somewhat radical philosophy. Demasio never looses track of the ultimate goal, to connect his scientific knowledge with ideas of great human significance. Thus Spinoza’s spirit is present throughout the book, even in the scientifically descriptive passages. His revolutionary ideas, so far ahead of his time, truly foreshadow what we have now come to understand about our feelings, our minds and ourselves.

Most people have experienced déjà vu, which was translated as “already seen” by Émile Boirac, a French psychic researcher, in the late 19th century (2), at least once in their lives; when partaking in one of the day’s numerous menial activities, we have had an eerie stirring from within us, coupled with the strange feeling that we have done the exact thing before. It is not a feeling of familiarity, but instead a feeling of duplication, a carbon copy of what one has dreamt or seen before. Déjà vu, also called paramnesia, affects upwards of 70 percent of the population, with varying degrees and frequency, and occurs most often in the 15 to 25 age range (1). Being one of these people, I am extremely interested in the implications of déjà vu, as well as in what it can suggest about the functioning of my brain.

Seasonal affective disorder is a disease which effects between 0.4-9.7 percent of the population (2). SAD was originally defined by Norman Rosenthal in 1984 as “the occurrence in autumn and/or winter of at least two episodes of serious depression, which disappear in the spring and summer, and where there are no clear-cut, seasonal, psychosocial precipitating factors” (1). It is characterized by episodes of major depression which often correspond to the winter months. The episodes may vary in duration and severity but must occur at the same time each year. For people suffering from SAD there is no escape from winter. This paper will explore the causes, symptoms and possible treatments for seasonal affective disorder.

Steven Johnson opens a very wide door into the mind but all the reader can see is a foyer of a large estate with several locked doors. Through personal and researched examples he briefly describes each door and what it holds, without opening it for the reader to see. The book is structured so that the audience learns through examples and the author’s personal experiences while he adds facts and historical data to complete a picture.

Attempting to explain the complexity of the brain, he writes in a clear and simplistic manner to target all audiences. Unfortunately, the book is not consistent and oversimplified. Some examples require previous knowledge without which the reader is confused or will not obtain the insight the author describes. Other examples are very clear and knowledgeable and require no further analysis or research.

Book Review- Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life
Emilie Wlodaver

Like Emily Dickinson, Steven Johnson relates many of the behaviors and emotions that people experience day after day to what is going on in the brain in his book Mind Wide Open: Your Brain and the Neuroscience of Everyday Life. He provides compelling evidence through his recounting of experiences with neuroscientists and other advocates of the brain as the organ for behavior. He uses many of his personal experiences to create a perspective that is easier for the layperson to understand and in turn relate to. Often times, the topic of the brain can be intimidating, for it is one of those frontiers for which few, if any, really understand. That is why Johnson’s book is a good first step for those who wish to brave the mechanisms of the brain.

Many people are reluctant to rely on pure science and brain activity to describe behavior. They feel that it is reductionistic and oversimplified and does not account for the differences in personalities or creativity. In many peoples’ opinions, behavior, consciousness, and emotions should be left to the humanities to explain. How anyone could possibly suggest this is beyond me. The brain is one of the most complicated organs in the body. There are so many different things going on that it seems absurd to me that someone could suggest that, for example, philosophy gives a more comprehensive insight into behavior. This is not to say that psychology of sociology or philosophy don’t provide some interesting points, however, neuroscience seems to be more on the path to the truth than these other disciplines.

Johnson does a superb job at relating some of the current research of how the brain is related to behavior in a fashion that is easy to understand and plausible enough to make someone think twice about calling brain=behavior reductionistic. He introduces the reader to a population of avid advocates of brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and neurofeedback by testing their research proposals on himself. For example, he goes to Joy Hirsch, director of Columbia University’s Brain Imaging Group, to carry out his proposal to view the areas of the brain that are activated during moments of creative thought. What they discover through means of the fMRI scans is that indeed, certain areas of the brain are activated more during creative thought than when a person is reading or staring blankly at a checkerboard. One question remains unanswered, however. It doesn’t seem too hard to understand that certain areas of the brain are more activated during different activities. What is a difficult concept to grasp is if each of our brains posses similar mechanisms, what accounts for individuality and differences in opinion and ideas?

Many people are still reluctant to attribute all of their emotions and feelings to the idea that the brain is made up of different modules that all play a certain role in the creation of these behaviors. To this, Johnson writes, “To include biological perspectives in discussion of human society by no means eliminates the validity of other kinds of explanations. What people like E.O. Wilson have proposed is not biological determinism, but rather biological consilience: the connecting of different layers of experience, each with its own distinct vocabulary and expertise, but each also possessing links up and down the chain.” (Johnson, p.213) Each different perspective and discipline adds a new layer to the meaning of life. Understanding the functions of neurochemicals and hormones can only provide more insight into the vast unknown a potentially be of assistance to create a more coherent world and a better understanding of peoples’ actions.

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