Nowadays, Society Promotes An Idea That Everybody Should

Nicholas Carr, author of the novel “The Shallows: What the internet is doing to our brains” explains in his works that media and technology is affecting the way our brain works and is used in our daily lives. Carr states, “The price we pay to assume technology’s power is alienation. The toll can be particularly high with our intellectual technologies. The tools of the mind amplify and in turn numb the most intimate, the most human, of our natural capacities - those for reason, perception, memory, emotion.”(Carr, 211) Carr continues to explain an interesting phenomena that occurred in society within the

The author’s purpose is to show how easily people are influenced by society and those around them.

In the essay What Defines a Meme? ,by James Gleick, Gleick suggests that memes are infecting the world like parasites and sucking the life out of their hosts as known as humans. Gleick’s closing statement contains two questions, “...who is the master and who is the slave?” (Gleick). These questions are asking the audience, are the memes in control of the people or are the people in control of the memes? Gleick explains that memes were around in the Stone Ages and will continue to evolve into the future. Suggesting that perhaps memes have had control over the population since the beginning of time starting with cave drawings and progressing with the internet. Memes are not simply objects or physical beings, but as Gleick would say, they

In, “The Influencing Machine,” author Brooke Gladstone explains that the changing media does not change our brains if we do not let it. This goes against all the fears of technology thus far, essentially making us humans the artificial intelligence.

According to recent psychological studies described in “First Person Plural” the human mind may not be characterized by “I,” but “we.” In other words, there are different individuals with varying desires and motivations that control human decisions within the brain when influenced by certain stimuli. These personas fight for control, such as the self that wants to eat junk food or the self that wants to stay on a

In the article,”Who Holds the Clicker”, Surgeons are doing a surgery on Mario to make him feel a better without the disease. But while doing the surgery the doctors find out that he had OCD which means he had no control over the clicker which controls the amount of electrode. Later on one of the doctor had the clicker to control the electrodes because Mario couldn’t control it. The entire process at the end is basically similar to mind control, which is super unethical. For a doctor to have control of Marios brain without knowing his interests is super wrong. “You can change behavior very, very rapidly. On the flip side of it there's a danger”(Slater). Mario believed that he wasn’t being controlled by someone else which is

Influence is powerful in determining one’s future. Actions behaviors and opinions are all connected to impact of others and the way they shape our views on the world as well as ourselves. Self-Image is dependent on the acceptance of others, thus always changing since one’s morals and ethics do not stay the same as time goes on. Influence of others play a role on how one tends to view themselves and people around them, by either being forced to conform to a country’s lifestyle, completing constant tasks to keep up with society’s demands, or being able to be content with oneself rather than being blinded of the onslaught of constant expectations.

Have you ever stopped to wonder how modern technology has shaped our society, and where it will lead our future of ‘social’ interaction? Have you ever been sitting and listening to the news, when you hear a new story on yet another book being banned for some petty reason, such as ‘protection of children’s innocence’ or ‘offensive content’? Have you thought about where such things will take us and our changing, evolving definition of socializing? If you belong with those who contemplate things, who turn things over in their minds, who don’t allow themselves to use ignorance as a shield from difficult, complex thinking, you may have answered ‘yes’. Knowledge, wisdom, and logical reasoning are important to today’s society, but unfortunately,

In Brave, New World people are being controlled by the government with Soma. Soma is the drug that keeps the citizens in check. The example of how we are alike is that our Soma is simply social media. Everyone goes on to check their likes, followers, or feed. I’ve noticed that I’m also being consumed by social media. Every week after work I quickly pull out my phone to see what’s been happening on my social media. I check the latest fashion trends from New York to South Korea. This is exactly how the government want us to be because this is how they are controlling us. Huxley said, “ People will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.” He is absolutely right. We are made to love technology and we are now losing our capacity to think because of social media or the internet itself.

In Steven Pinker’s article, “Mind Over Mass Media”, the author illustrates the intellectual benefits obtained from mass media and argues that the media doesn’t have a negative effect on our brain. His examples are the great American crime decline not because of new technologies, the predictions that the new technologies would be harmful were wrong. Not only just the crime rate decline but also the I.Q. level rose continuously. With any new media that has emerged some people continually believe that our brain power and skills will plummet. The article points that people need to use new technology with self-control. As the author concludes, that “the Internet and information technologies are helping us manage, search and retrieve our collective

OCD is “a phrase that gets to the existential core of worry, a clenched, demonic doubting that overrides evidence, empiricism, plain common sense” (Slater234). The meme theory states that a meme consists of “everything that is passed from person to person” (Blackmore 37). In “Strange Creatures” by Susan Blackmore and “Who Holds the Clicker?” by Lauren Slater both authors discuss the control humans have over their minds. In “Who Holds the Clicker” Lauren Slater discusses DBS (deep brain simulation), which is a type of psychosurgery in which electrical impulses are sent to certain portions of the brain to control and change the emotions one feels. She discusses both the positive and negatives of deep brain simulation through a specific patient named Mario and also presents the control DBS can have over one’s mind. Similarly, Blackmore in “Strange Creatures” discusses the meme theory, which consists of any idea that is passed down from person to person. Both authors provide information that allows people to draw conclusions relating to why people do not have control over their minds. Even though some people believe that humans do have control over their minds, Blackmore and Slater both successfully portray that in actuality humans do not have any control over their minds because human thoughts and ideas are unoriginal products of external forces, many human thoughts occur at deeper level of consciousness, and

As human beings, each person on earth possesses a desire to belong. In order to meet this need, one must find a way to fit in with a group. Yet somehow, once a group has been joined, humans tend to take on the ideas and opinions of the group without analyzing the situation for themselves. Doris Lessing, in her essay, “Group Minds”, proposes the idea that humans spend their whole life going along with the group because they fail to analyze the reasons behind their actions. While Lessing’s idea is valid, no one has yet successfully implemented her plan.

In today's day and age contemporary society's are built upon the thought of citizen conformity to a prescribed set of values and norms to. This idea of complies to social standards makes one think as to how these norms of fact society as a whole and an individual. The main driving component which draws people too conformity are the desire to be excepted in certain status groups. People fear that if they do not conformity is norms that they will be breaking the social contract therefore been shunned by society at not being able to achieve their personal goals. Further analysis of these forces for conformity in contemporary society it will be shown that these forces produced negative ethical conduct and

True happiness is something every person strives for, but the ultimate question is, how do people find complete happiness in corrupt environments? There is corruption everywhere on the Earth whether people like it or not. Everyone has their own opinions on how just societies should be run, but can a perfect society ever be fulfilled? Unfortunately, not everyone has the same views, beliefs, and morals, therefore, not everyone can always be pleased with the way societies are run. However, happiness can be found no matter the situation, according to ancient philosophers Socrates and his son Plato. Even though unjust societies are unfair, people are still capable of living a happy life.

All humans’ behavior is affected by social influences to some extent. The level of influence will vary from person to person, depending on the several factors, such as self-esteem, their level of self-awareness, morals, and values (Velden, 2007). People do many things to ensure they are accepted by the people in their group and to keep from being ostracized by individuals around them (Kowalski & Westen, 2011). Individuals are usually guided by their own sense of what is right or wrong and will make logical decisions based on this. However, they will sometimes completely push their own individual identity