Morgan Myer's Archive

For this last post I knew I wanted to talk more about the whole “ego vs id” idea. So, of course I decided to be really scientific and youtube it. After searching through some ridiculous results, lucky for you, I found this jewel of a video. This vintage video (it’s the link at the bottom of the post) from who knows how long ago is not only hilarious, but I think actually does a great job in describing Freud’s basic beliefs. According to Freud’s model, the ego is the organized, realistic part of us, the id is more of the primal pleasure part that tells us what we want and when we want it (usually NOW), and the super ego is the reasonable voice in our head telling us what not to do.

I think this model is really interesting, and describes what I have always grown up with calling my “conscience” or Jiminy Cricket. Instead of one voice telling you what is right, there are two battling voices trying and pulling you two different ways. I have really only known this as my conscience and the Devil trying to tempt me. Freud instead calls it the id and superego.

But clearly this is not what Freud believes. You can thank this video for giving such a creepy picture of this model and the two different voices that can be heard from them- one reason driven and one soley pleasure driven.

Click on the link below, leave your favorite quotes in the comment section, and enjoy. For example, get excited to hear this-“David, what are you doing with your sister in the basement?”

Id, Ego, & Superego Video

One theory that has really caught my eye lately is Festinger’s social comparison theory. In his theory  he states that “people compare themselves to others because for many domains and attributes there is no objective yardstick to evaluate ourselves against, and other people are therefore highly informative”

Yardstick, clearly made me think of Boomstick, which made me want to talk about the Rangers. And with everything going on right now, how could I not?

I have a been a Texas Rangers fan for as long as I remember. I love learning about the players, researching stats, and going to games. One interesting thing is the idea of sports and how it reminded me of the social comparison theory. Every time you read stats, anytime you talk about players, they are always being compared to others. Sports is all about performance. If you follow sports you constantly hear something like the following: Lets look at Josh Hamilton’s batting average compared to Derek Jeters. (Lets be for real, Hamilton is infinitely better, but that is besides the point)

I wonder if this idea of performance that we see on the TV leaks into our everyday life, starting as kids. I remember as a kid hearing my dad yelling at the TV if a player failed, or saying that one player was much better than the other. What if this encourages us to look at those around us and compare? Maybe we are influenced by others more than we think.

I remember as a kid always wanting to watch the cartoon TV show The Jetsons. The flying cars that drove themselves, the closets that dressed whoever stepped inside, and the moving sidewalks always fascinated me and could keep my attention for hours. I remember wishing that the world the Jetson family lived in was real life, seeing as it was a lot more interesting than my parents’ Chevy Suburban and plain brick house. Well, it seems thanks to artificial intelligence, the world the Jetsons lived in could be right around the corner, at least when it comes to cars.

According to our book, artificial intelligence (AI) is defined as a “special branch of computer science that investigates the extent to which the mental powers of human beings can be captured by means of machines.” People who only believe in weak AI believe that a computer will only ever be able to simulate the human mind. On the other hand, believers of strong AI believe that a computer could actually duplicate the mind. This idea of artificial intelligence was first tested by Turing with an experiment where a computer and an actual human response were alternatively given to an interrogator. If the interrogator was unable to consistently determine the human response, the computer, according to the test, could be said to think. Nowadays, studying the idea of artificial intelligence has been taken over by Google, and what an interesting experiement it has been. Copy and paste the link below to read an article from only a few days ago about how Google has created a car that can drive itself. Yes its been tested, and yes it works.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/10/science/10google.html

How crazy is that? The idea of strong artificial intelligence is closer than we think. How do you feel about the idea of cars driving themselves? Do you think a machine will make less mistakes than a human?

This semester I am taking a class entitled: “The Psychology of Religion”. While I went into this class expecting it to be another ACU class taught about how Christ can shape our psychology, I was very wrong. We are instead studying all different religions and how psychology can affect whether or not a person even has religious beliefs. I have connected History of Theories to this class a lot especially in our dicussions lately about free will.

In Psyc. of Religion we have discussed a lot of factors about religion. For example, because I was raised in the southern protestant church I have much different beliefs than a girl born into an Islamic country. Now of course I could not choose what family I was born into, so did I technically “choose” my belief system? And that girl that was raised in an intense Muslim community did not “choose” to be raised there. The idea that we do not fully have free will when deciding our religious morals really blew my mind. Thinking of all the different factors and acknowleding how much of my beliefs are based off of how I

In the class we are reading this book entitled “The Fabric of Faithfulness.” I encourage everyone to go pick it up, it is honestly one of the most interesting books I have ever read, and I feel is very applicable to every college student’s life.

(Now that you know what it looks like, you have no excuse not to grab it next time you are in the bookstore.)

So basically this book talks about how do we connect what we believe to how we live. And I think this is a huge issue for countless college students. They are wrestling with the ideas that they have been taught since childhood and have to learn how to implement them into the rest of their lives. Do we really have free will, and if so how do we act out what we each believe.

So as we continue to talk about the idea of free will, I propose we do not just talk about the normal topics, but instead we venture out and ask the hard questions, even about religion. I think ACU is a great place for students to push their boundaries and ideas of how they got their religion and dig deep.

The allegory of the Cave was a class discussion that I really found extrememly fascinating. The idea that we are all living in a false reality that is completely accepted by everyone around us is amazing, because even though Plato wrote that hundreds and hundreds of years ago, I feel like in today’s society it has never been truer.

The first thing I thought of when I heard the phrase “living in a false reality” was the idea of modern day beauty. Every where you turn, men and women alike are  being bombarded with ads upon ads showing scantily clad models displaying any product you can think of. Nowadays “sex sells” is even being applied to items such as cleaning supplies and deoderant. Magazine covers show us what we are supposed to look like and everyone not only goes along with it, some even devote their life to figuring out ways to make their body look like the people on TV. Beauty is a trait that is embraced and even idolized by countless people. Entire cultures differ on what can be defined as “beautiful”, however in America it can be once again pretty much defined in the phrase “sex sells.” I am not a feminist or hardcore womens rights by any means, but I am someone who prefers natural beauty the way God made us, not the beauty is portrayed in our culture nowadays. And I know a lot of guys and girls that feel the same way.

This is a completely false reality, and the youtube video I am attaching is proof. This is a short film made by the brand Dove when a few years ago they started a “Real Beauty” Campaign for women. They made it their goal to show women the outside of the cave, taking the risk that would get torn apart for it. Which ironically enough, I think a lot of women still refuse to admit how unrealistic our society has become with beauty standards, thus showing Plato’s theory to be true. And this false idea of beauty is thrown at us starting at a very early age. I remember one time I heard that if Barbie was real life she literally wouldnt be able to support herself because her measurements are so ridiculous. So I did a little research and found that a standard Barbie doll is 11.5 inches tall, giving a height of 5 feet 9 inches at 1/6 scale. Barbie’s vital statistics have been estimated at 36 inches (chest), 18 inches (waist) and 33 inches (hips). According to research by the University Central Hospital in she would lack the 17 to 22 percent body fat required for a woman. So I don’t understand how you can deny the faslehood of it, especially after seeing this video. Photoshop, pounds of make up, and even re-shaping human features, are just a few tricks used by editors to make models look “beautiful”. The body we see in a magazine, if edited enough, could literally be impossible. 

I hope we never forget the allegory of the cave, and instead of accepting the truth everyone else sees to be true, we take a look outside for ourselves.

Click the link below for the video:

Model to Billboard