Developing Critical Thinking Essay -- Critical Thinking Reflection

A person is not born as a good critical thinker. The first thing that is needed is a level of maturity having the ability to conceptualize and understand the world (Boss, 2010). The skills that are associated with a person that has good critical thinking are: Analytical Skills: recognize and evaluate arguments to filter through to the truth. Effective Communication: ability to listen, speak, and write effectively. Research Skills: ability to gather, evaluate, and create supporting evidence. (Boss, 2010) In teaching critical thinking, Dr. Chan and Dr. Lau (n.d.) explain good critical thinking, â€Å"as the foundation of science and a liberal democratic society. Science requires the critical use of reason in experimentation and theory confirmation. The proper functioning of a liberal democracy requires citizens who can think critically about social issues to inform their judgments about proper governance and to overcome biases and prejudice.† A person with a level of maturity that is able to be research issues, through being analytical, and done by using good communication skills can be considered a good critical thinker. In my life, I have gone from not being a good critical thinker to getting much better as I have matured. In my younger years I used many of the resistances to critical thinking. The one that I used most often was distraction. This was especially true when I was in college for the first time. Many things were able to distract me from focusing on the tasks at hand. Now in my forties returning to school I have more clarity around the goals and this lets me accomplish the tasks more easily. I can listen, analyze, and research the issues more quickly and with more focus to accomplish the mission then in ... ...t created the universe before the big bang? God might not be just a figment created by religion but could be the ultimate creator of all that we see. Works Cited Boss, J. (2010), Think: Critical thinking and logic skills for everyday life (1st ed.). New York: McGraw Hill. Chan, J. & Lau, J. (n.d.). Module: about critical thinking. Retrieved from http://philosophy.hku.hk/think/critical/ct.php Goleman, D. (2001). Daniel Golemen: emotional intelligence. Thinkers. Charter Management Institute. Retrieved March 10, 2012 from http://go.galegroup.com.ezp-02.lirn.net/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA85608627&v=2.1&u=lirn_crevc&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w Hasan, M. (2012, January 9). God need not be the enemy of science. New Statesman [1996], 141(5087), 19. Retrieved from http://go.galegroup.com.ezp-02.lirn.net/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA279138538&v=2.1&u=lirn_crevc&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w Developing Critical Thinking Essay -- Critical Thinking Reflection A person is not born as a good critical thinker. The first thing that is needed is a level of maturity having the ability to conceptualize and understand the world (Boss, 2010). The skills that are associated with a person that has good critical thinking are: Analytical Skills: recognize and evaluate arguments to filter through to the truth. Effective Communication: ability to listen, speak, and write effectively. Research Skills: ability to gather, evaluate, and create supporting evidence. (Boss, 2010) In teaching critical thinking, Dr. Chan and Dr. Lau (n.d.) explain good critical thinking, â€Å"as the foundation of science and a liberal democratic society. Science requires the critical use of reason in experimentation and theory confirmation. The proper functioning of a liberal democracy requires citizens who can think critically about social issues to inform their judgments about proper governance and to overcome biases and prejudice.† A person with a level of maturity that is able to be research issues, through being analytical, and done by using good communication skills can be considered a good critical thinker. In my life, I have gone from not being a good critical thinker to getting much better as I have matured. In my younger years I used many of the resistances to critical thinking. The one that I used most often was distraction. This was especially true when I was in college for the first time. Many things were able to distract me from focusing on the tasks at hand. Now in my forties returning to school I have more clarity around the goals and this lets me accomplish the tasks more easily. I can listen, analyze, and research the issues more quickly and with more focus to accomplish the mission then in ... ...t created the universe before the big bang? God might not be just a figment created by religion but could be the ultimate creator of all that we see. Works Cited Boss, J. (2010), Think: Critical thinking and logic skills for everyday life (1st ed.). New York: McGraw Hill. Chan, J. & Lau, J. (n.d.). Module: about critical thinking. Retrieved from http://philosophy.hku.hk/think/critical/ct.php Goleman, D. (2001). Daniel Golemen: emotional intelligence. Thinkers. Charter Management Institute. Retrieved March 10, 2012 from http://go.galegroup.com.ezp-02.lirn.net/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA85608627&v=2.1&u=lirn_crevc&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w Hasan, M. (2012, January 9). God need not be the enemy of science. New Statesman [1996], 141(5087), 19. Retrieved from http://go.galegroup.com.ezp-02.lirn.net/ps/i.do?id=GALE%7CA279138538&v=2.1&u=lirn_crevc&it=r&p=GPS&sw=w

Explication of “a Birthday Present” by Sylvia Plath

George B 11/18/11 Explication of â€Å"A Birthday Present† by Sylvia Plath For many readers, the draw of Sylvia Plath’s poetry is distinctly linked to her life as well as the desire to end her life. As Robert Lowell states in the forward of Ariel, â€Å"This poetry and life are not a career; they tell that a life, even when disciplined, is simply not worth it† (xv). â€Å"A Birthday Present†`, written by Plath in September of 1962 and hauntingly recorded in her own voice on audio in October of that same year, is just one of the many poems that comprise the collection titled Ariel.Its allusion to suicide is unmistakable. Its main theme is the escape from life that death provides. Plath’s life as well as her desire to end it is well documented, primarily because she has chosen to record her tormented existence in her prose and poetry. M. D. Uroff states, â€Å". . . she put the speaker herself at the center of her poems in such a way as to make her p sychological vulnerability and shame an embodiment of her civilization . . . we should reconsider the nature of the speaker in Plath’s poems, her relationship to the poet, and the extent to which the poems are confessional† (104).The novel, The Bell Jar, chronicles her college years and first attempt at suicide, and her poetry, primarily in the collection in Ariel, provides glimpses into her state of mind. She interjects herself into her work so deeply that it is unmistakable that the speaker in the poetry is Plath herself. With that firmly in mind, explicating this poem becomes a quest into the months that preceded her taking her own life on February 11th 1963. A symbol used in the poem â€Å"A Birthday Present† is the veil: The veil and what it may conceal is a theme that permeates the poem in multiple forms.In line 1 when the speaker says, â€Å"What is this, behind this veil, is it ugly, is it beautiful? † The speaker continues in the successive lines to question not only what it is but for whom it is for. In line 16, â€Å"Now there are veils, shimmering like curtains† and in lines 17 and 18 veils are compared to the light translucent material that covered the kitchen window as well as the misty air in January one would imagine she saw from her flat in England. And once again in lines 55-57 when she says â€Å"Only let down the veil, the veil, the veil.If it were death I would admire the deep gravity of it, its timeless eyes. † Here she wants to let down the veil and face it head on, and in the case of death, embrace it. This is certainly not the first time that the speaker has entertained the notion of ending her life. The speaker mentions in line 13 and 14 that she does not want a present as she is only alive by accident and in line 15, â€Å"I would have killed myself gladly that time any possible way. † Plath herself had a botched suicide attempt in her past that she used as a plot point in her novel, Th e Bell Jar.Biographer Caitriona O ‘Reilly chronicles the incident in 1953 after Plath finished a guest editorship at Mademoiselle in New York City. After prescription sleeping pills and Electroconvulsive therapy to combat depression, Plath attempted suicide through an overdose of sleeping pills (356). The accident, as the speaker refers to it, directly relates to the fact that she was found alive and nursed back to health: at least physically. There is also an aspect of what is expected from society of the speaker of the poem.Women in the 1950’s were expected to get married and procreate, not getting seriously interested in education and careers. These things would prevent a woman from leading a happy and normal feminine life (Bennett 103). Bennett also speaks of this, â€Å"Like most women in the 1950s†¦ Sylvia Plath appears to have accepted the basic assumptions of this doctrine or ideology even though she knew that in many respects they ran counter to the sprin gs of her own nature†Ã‚  (103). This certainly flew in the face of what Sylvia Plath was about.The speaker in the poem seems to lament this in lines 7 and 8, â€Å"Measuring the flour, cutting off the surplus, / adhering to rules, to rules, to rules. † Likewise, â€Å"Is this one for the annunciation? / My God, what a laugh† (9-10). Certainly, the ideals of society put forth in these lines, a woman’s place is in the kitchen and the comparison to the virgin birth of Christ, are an impossibility for an educated and tormented Plath. The speaker seems to have no other choice than ending the suffering.In the poem, there is a conflict concerning the end of the speaker’s life. In lines 21-26 the speaker is in essence asking for the relief of death and references the religious theme of the last supper in line 26, â€Å"Let us eat our last supper at it, like a hospital plate. † Line 27-29 states the problem with the present that is wanted, â€Å"I kn ow why you will not give it to me, / You are terrified/ the world will go up in a shriek, and your head with it,†. The speaker continues to lobby for relief, â€Å"I will only take it and go quietly. You will not even hear me open it, no paper crackle, / No falling ribbons, no scream at the end. / I do not think you credit me with this discretion† (Lines 33-36). The shame attached to suicide is overwhelming, not necessarily for the victim but those left to deal with societal pressures associated with it. The speaker seems to take this into account as she contemplates the act; it is more important that those left behind are unscathed than the torture that the speaker is going through. Discretion is more important than directly confronting the underlying problems.Finally, the speaker appeals to the giver’s sense of duty when she describes how her death has been occurring incrementally but not nearly as quickly as she would like. The use of words like motes (small p articles, like the dust particles that can be seen floating in the sunlight) and carbon monoxide (deadly despite being undetectable by smell or sight) described as sweetly breathable in the lines 37-43 are used to show how the speaker has suffered for years from invisible or nearly invisible things for quite a long time: â€Å"To you they are only transparencies, clear air,† (Line 37). Let it not come by word of mouth, I should be sixty/ By the time the whole of it was delivered, and to numb to use it† (Lines 53-54). The speaker is frustrated by the gift bearer insistence that death come slowly; the speaker cannot wait that long. â€Å"A Birthday Present† essentially reads like a suicide note trying to reassure those left behind that death is really a grand relief. Lowell elegantly sums it up: Suicide, father-hatred, self-loathing—nothing is too much for the macabre gaiety of her control.Yet it is too much; her art’s immortality is life’s deg radation. The surprise, the shimmering, unwrapped birthday present, the transcendence â€Å"into the red eye, the cauldron of morning,† and the lover, who are always waiting for her, are death, her own abrupt and defiant death (Forward xiv). Defiant in death as she was in life, one can only hope that Plath has found what she was missing.Works Cited Bennett, Paula. My Life A Loaded Gun, Female Creativity and Feminist Poetics. Boston: Beacon Press, 1986. Lowell, Robert. â€Å"Foreword. †Ã‚  Ariel. New York: First Perennial Classics, 1999. xiii-xvi. Print. O ‘Reilly, Caitriona. â€Å"Sylvia Plath. † N. p. , n. d. Web. 10 Nov. 2011. ;lt;http://www. us. oup. com/us/pdf/americanlit/plath. pdf;gt;. Plath, Sylvia. â€Å"A Birthday Present. †Ã‚  Ariel. New York: First Perennial Classics, 1999. 48-51. Print. Uroff, M. D.. â€Å"Sylvia Plath and Confessional Poetry: a Reconsideration. †Ã‚  The Iowa Review  8. 1 (1977): 104-115. JStor. Web. 16 Nov. 201 1. ;lt;http://www. jstor. org/stable/20158710;gt;.

What Is Synesthesia Definition and Types

The term synesthesia comes from the Greek words  syn, which means together, and  aisthesis, which means sensation. Synesthesia is a perception in which stimulating one sensory or cognitive pathway causes experiences in another sense or cognitive pathway. In other words, a sense or concept is connected to a different sense or concept, such as smelling colors or tasting a word. The connection between pathways is involuntary and consistent over time, rather than conscious or arbitrary. So, a person experiencing synesthesia doesnt think about the connection and always makes the exact same relationship between two sensations or thoughts. Synesthesia is an atypical mode of perception, not a medical condition or neurological abnormality.  A person who experiences synthesthesia over a lifetime is called a  synesthete.   Types of Synesthesia There are many different types of synesthesia, but they may be categorized as falling into one of two groups: associative  synesthesia and projective synesthesia. An associate feels a connection between a stimulus and a sense, while a projector actually sees, hears, feels, smells, or tastes a stimulation. For example, an associator might hear a violin and strongly associate it with the color blue, while a projector might hear a violin and see the color blue projected in space as if it were a physical object. There are at least 80 known types of synesthesia, but some are more common than others: Chromesthesia:  In this common form of synesthesia, sounds and colors are associated with each other. For example, the musical note D may correspond to seeing the color green.Grapheme-color synesthesia: This is a common form of synesthesia characterized by seeing graphemes (letter or numerals) shaded with a color. Synesthetes dont associate the same colors for a grapheme as each other, although the letter A does appear to be red to many individuals. Persons who experience grapheme-color synesthesia sometimes report seeing impossible colors when red and green or blue and yellow graphemes appear next to each other in a word or number.Number form: A number form is a mental shape or map of numbers resulting from seeing or thinking about numbers.Lexical-gustatory synesthesia: This a rare type of synesthesia in which hearing a word results in tasting a flavor. For example, a persons name might taste like chocolate.Mirror-touch synesthesia: While rare, mirror-touch synesthesia is notewort hy because it can be disruptive to a synesthetes life. In this form of synesthesia, an individual feels the same sensation in response to a stimulus as another person. For example, seeing a person being tapped on the shoulder would cause the synesthete to feel a tap on the shoulder too. Many other forms of synesthesia occur, including smell-color, month-flavor, sound-emotion, sound-touch, day-color, pain-color, and personality-color (auras). How Synesthesia Works Scientists have yet to make a definitive determination of the mechanism of synesthesia. It may be due to increased cross-talk between specialized regions of the brain. Another possible mechanism is that inhibition in a neural pathway is reduced in synesthetes, allowing multi-sensory processing of stimuli. Some researchers believe synesthesia is based on the way the brain extracts and assigns the meaning of a stimulus (ideasthesia). Who Has Synesthesia? Julia Simner, a psychologist studying synesthesia at  of the University of Edinburgh, estimates at least 4% of the population has synesthesia and that over 1% of people have grapheme-color synesthesia (colored numbers and letters). More women have synesthesia than men. Some research suggests the incidence of synesthesia may be higher in people with autism and in left-handed people. Whether or not there is a genetic component to developing this form of perception is hotly debated. Can You Develop Synesthesia? There are documented cases of non-synesthetes developing synesthesia. Specifically, head trauma, stroke, brain tumors, and temporal lobe epilepsy may produce synesthesia. Temporary synesthesia may result from exposure to the psychedelic drugs mescaline or LSD, from sensory deprivation, or from meditation. Its possible non-synesthetes may be able to develop associations between different senses through conscious practice. A potential advantage of this is improved memory and reaction time. For example, a person can react to sound more quickly than to sight or may recall a series of colors better than a series of numbers. Some people with chromasthesia have perfect pitch because they can identify notes as specific colors. Synesthesia is associated with enhanced creativity and unusual cognitive abilities. For example, synesthete Daniel Tammet set a European record for stating 22,514 digits of the number pi from memory using his ability to see numbers as colors and shapes. Sources Baron-Cohen S, Johnson D, Asher J, Wheelwright S, Fisher SE, Gregerson PK, Allison C, Is synaesthesia more common in autism?, Molecular Autism, 20 November 2013.Marcel Neckar; Petr Bob (11 January 2016). Synesthetic associations and psychosensory symptoms of temporal epilepsy. Neuropsychiatric Disease and Treatment. National Institutes of Health (NIH). 12: 109–12.Rich AN, Mattingley JB (January 2002). Anomalous perception in synesthesia: a cognitive neuroscience perspective. Nature Reviews Neuroscience (Review). 3 (1): 43–52.Simner J, Mulvenna C, Sagiv N, Tsakanikos E, Witherby SA, Fraser C, Scott K, Ward J (2006). Synaesthesia: The prevalence of atypical cross-modal experiences. Perception. 35: 1024–1033.