Perception and prejudices

[Coelho]

Have you ever stopped to analyze how does our mind percieves the world? It basically tries to extract, from the bulk of informations that we percieve, things known to it.
For example, let say someone have posted a picture of a bud, and im looking at it. How does i know its a picture of a bud? The picture is just a lot of coloured dots. How does my mind links this set of coloured dots with that soft, scented, tasty, green and beautiful thing we call a bud? Well... when i look at the picture for the first time, my mind searches its memories and try to find the memory which better fits with that image im seeing. Ive seen many buds, and my mind knows the "general form" of a bud, so when i see the picture, my mind finds that the image fits very well with the image of a bud. So, it concludes that its a bud.

Note that this system is fallible. Because when we have some perception of a thing, the mind will seek the memory (or a set of pieces of memories "glued" together, making a mental image) which is more alike the perception. Even if they dont fit perfectly, the mind will conclude that what its percieving is what the mental image refers to. For example, let say a people from a very distant and primitive civilization sees a plane flying. It never did see any planes, and dont know what it is. But it have seen birds, and also metals. So, he will conclude that he did see a metal bird.

And our minds uses this way of thinking for everything. For example, people tends to believe and accept as right things that agree with its preconceptions. And tends to disbelieve or think its wrong things that disagree with its preconceptions. No matter how absurd this things may sound for another people. A sad example of this is the lots of people who actually believes that the aboveofinfluence is the truth.

Also, thats the reason because i think its useless to discuss religion/science/belief/disbelief. Because i know i will not change anything. If a people agree with me, its because it already agreed before, so nothing new. We all think we are right, and that what we believe is the right. But there is so many of us, each one with their truth. How to know if there is really a truth? And even if there is, each one will percieve it through its own filters, through its own preconcetpions, so what one sees like the truth may be what one sees like wrong.

:stoned:

Coelho Reviewed by Coelho on 07-14-2007. Perception and prejudices Have you ever stopped to analyze how does our mind percieves the world? It basically tries to extract, from the bulk of informations that we percieve, things known to it. For example, let say someone have posted a picture of a bud, and im looking at it. How does i know its a picture of a bud? The picture is just a lot of coloured dots. How does my mind links this set of coloured dots with that soft, scented, tasty, green and beautiful thing we call a bud? Well... when i look at the picture Rating: 5

[Inferius]

Break off the filter baby

[MajMike]

Sometimes we know the reason(s) we do things, and sometimes not.

"We like to flatter ourselves with the false claim to a more noble motive; but in fact we can never, even by the strictest examination, completely plumb the depths of the secret incentives of our actions." Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)