Sunday, September 13, 2009

Changing Conceptions of the Self

14 comments:

  1. What is the supposed model for human nature/self?

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  2. In other words, we naturally try to be what we are expected to be by society. Without knowing that we are trying?

    I don't like this quote.

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  5. I don't know if this directly relates but if not maybe it can add to discussion.

    According to a site I found called ChangingMinds.org, they have the theory that the likelihood a person will respond to social influence will increase by the following:

    Strength: how important the influencing group of people are to you.

    Immediacy: how close the group are to you (in space and time) at the time of the influence attempt.

    Number: How many people there are in the group.

    This can be known as the "Social Influence Model."

    In terms of the quote, i don't particularly believe that it is in any way universal. Very situational.

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  6. Modern society now days has impose a model of how we should act,think and related to it,without remembering (maybe on purpose) that each individual have their own perspective and concept of how we should behave and live our own life.

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  7. I feel that society has an affect on how we identify with ourselves. But once we grow into individuals without influence, then thats when I feel people can truly find "self"

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  8. She woke up with no evidence of life besides her breathing and a distant search of self. The judges of conscious culture condemned her attitude as being apart from the human ethics. How could human foundations dictate the color of her immoral soul? Cloistered with no sun, she found herself looking for social parameters.

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  9. I agree with Kavilla- I believe we are very much set into the world and forced along a track (go to school, get a job, get married, etc.) We have been told that this is the norm- anything against this path is considered strange.

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  10. What I'm understanding from this quote is that your surroundings (culture, people, trends, etc.) really influence the self and sort of set the standard.

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  11. The way that I understand the author of this quote is that he is saying we are what we tell ourselves we are and what society tells us we are.

    I agree with this to a certain extent. I agree with mind over matter-what we conceive of ourselves is what we become and also we unconsciously absorb the rules and boundaries of what society has collectively envisioned for us to be.

    Additionally, in my experience when I was 16 I had an older friend who was very much into psycho analysis and he introduced me to the idea that I was unknowingly being conditioned to be what my parents and society wanted me to be-and that we all are, in fact, until we become conscious of this reality. Since then I have lived by the quote that I discovered somewhere "question everything".

    The concept of my own self is always changing and I like this. It is a constant focus of mine to be conscious of this evolving of my self. I have gone in many directions in my life thus far trying on different hats just for the experience of it. Thus far these directions are sometimes within what is acceptable to society and sometimes not acceptable.

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  12. I think this quote is pretty accurate. We see ourselves how we think society sees us. We define our relationships and the things we do by what we see others do. We probably don't like that we're so easily influenced by society and we'd like to think we're all individuals (which we are) but we still define ourselves, at least subconsciously at some level, by what we think others think.

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  13. it's hard to find out what the self truly is because we are so greatly influenced by society. and on a postmodern note, what does "truly" actually mean? who's to define the objective truth when truth is seemingly a collection of subjective opinions?

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  14. Maybe the author is implying-

    We can play a key role in improving the way our society exists through constant changing of the individual mind.

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