FS101.30 Katie Conway

I really enjoyed learning about mindfulness meditation. I hadn’t done much thinking about meditation other than in the Buddhist sense, with enlightenment, so I was sort of confused when Prof. Knupsky said we would be talking about it. However, this meditation is so applicable to us. I really like the idea that you don’t have to have some large goal in mind to achieve when you meditate, but that you can just do it for your wellbeing. It makes me think of that procrastination quote from Sunday Morning, “you don’t need to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” Sort of like, you don’t need to be trying for enlightenment and total understanding, but you can just do it to clear your head and relieve stress. It seems so much approachable, and I would defiantly consider doing it. The only thing is that I really don’t see how I would stay awake if I closed my eyes and concentrated on nothing…

I don't know if I ever would've said this when we started FS, but I am really going to miss watching Sunday Morning. I know that some of the segments aren't geared towards our age group, but they always did a good job of telling me something I didn't know. Like last week, I had no idea that the solar decathalon was in existence, and I was so impressed with it! I was really glad I got to see that segment, and learn about some enviornmental strides college students are making. And even if I watch it on my own, I still won't get the comments and ideas from everyone, which help me think about the segments in different ways. The truth is tho that I probably wont see much of Sunday Morning again, becuase I don't think I can wake myself up on a Sunday morning for that. If by chance, I wake up at 10:30 on some Sunday tho, I'll definatly tune to CBS.

I really enjoyed talking about dreams on Tuesday. Someone brought up that the brain is known as the final frontier, and that’s an interesting idea. We each had our own opinions as to what a dream is worth, and it gave me different ways to interpret my own dreams. It’s interesting that human beings have always dreamt, but we still don’t have a lot of insight as to what they do or what they are. In class we would throw out our different interpretations, but we couldn’t really say that any were right or wrong. I wonder when research will discover what dreams really are.

I was looking around on Google to get a better understanding of what an IQ test is. I gathered that it is an attempt to predict educational success; high IQ scores get students into gifted programs and low IQ scores get students into special ed classes. After reading about Paradox 2 in the article from Scientific American Mind, this just seems irrational. Paradox 2 stated that although there is a 9-15 point increase in the IQs of todays children than of children from 2 generations ago, if reading levels and writing ability were compared side-by-side by two people from each of these generations, neither would be significantly better or worse. That is to say that they both did relatively the same in school, and today’s student with the high IQ did not excel in school any better than the lesser IQ student from two generations ago. Pardox 2’s conclusion is that IQ gains are not really gains of intelligence. Even if today’s generation can perform better on tests (and I wonder if the No Child Left Behind Act has anything to do with that), they do not necessarily have better reasoning skills or a better repertoire of general knowledge. It seems irrational to separate students by IQ scores after reading Paradox 2. Also, recall that the podcast on IQ compared it to hard work. It has been proven time and again that hard work can lead to great achievement. Furthermore, if someone is placed in a class for high IQ students it does not necessarily mean that he or she will become an outstanding student. There are students who go to really good schools who end up dropping out and not getting good jobs just as there are hard working students who make the best of their failing school systems and end up with exceptional careers. To tie this into FS, it is just like October Sky: the Rocket Boys all worked hard with their meager resources at a school that didn’t believe in them and they all made it out of Coalwood. It doesn’t matter what their IQs were, what mattered was that they took charge of their education and they had constant determination.

I am really excited to be starting the commentaries. I think that often, we only talk about issues after they escalate. To clarify: Ashley talked about violence. That kind of topic isn't brought into the lives of us that don't typically encounter violence until something violent happens either close to home, in the media, in a movie, etc. Having these commentaries is a good way for us to talk about issues that concern us and are relevant to us in more of a preventive way, as opposed to reactive. (I hope that made sense). Also, there are so many issues that we would like to see changed in the world. Therefore, it's interesting to see what people choose to do their commentary on. I really enjoyed the ones this week, and I look forward to hearing next weeks. Have a good weekend!