Outdated Thinking

 

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Amo kay di man mabangbang.

Stupid dislikes the opposite. It is simple analogy: Those who dislike the sharp-minded ones are the ones who are threatened by intelligence.

We are now a society where being in control is everything and where being intelligent, being right, fixing things, and being honest is downright offensive. If you are honest and tell the truth you are destroyed for doing so. If you lie, play the game, stick together with those in power you are set for life (Thompson, 2022).

There are still people who want to stay in power but with the information age in full blast, they can NOT thrive and will then become bitter about the accomplishments of the “common” people who are better and learned than them.

Take for example on the content of their ideas: They still cling to the old beliefs which are outdated. They do not realize that the repository of knowledge is at the tip of everyone’s fingers. They insist on the good old ways without thinking that barriers are already broken.

We call this as outdated thinking. According to ludwig.guru, this is the capacity to stick to ideas that were once widely accepted but are now considered to be outdated or incorrect.

Cognition is dynamic. That is the reason why massive studies on the different sciences are encouraged to fit the thinking process to real-time facts.

Cognitive dynamics increase in crystallized abilities: the ensemble of abilities associated with people’s understanding of their environment and context, particularly crystallized intelligence (accumulated knowledge spanning across procedural, technical, job-related, and experiential knowledge) (Cattell, 1963; Kanfer & Ackerman, 2004).

When not looked into by the individual, entropy in the cognitive process will happen. The person will then despise those who display synchronicity of intelligence as they come up with the demands of time. Thus, educational leaders are being taught to acquire the 21^st century skills needed to thrive within this specific period.

Therefore, it is within the individual’s deliberate practice to cope with the dynamics than grimace on those who are doing so.

Look at the fashion industry: Before, designers were careful on the color harmony but with the advent of global mix of cultures, any color can be mixed with others. Sportswear is paired with formal wear (sneakers on suits) these days.

If you sense that you’ve had enough, do not blame others for honing their cognitive skills especially if they are doing it for the greater good.

 

 

Not Limiting but Liberating

 

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Mas gana baja kun kuyang?

Isn’t it funny when a group of people sees intelligence as some sort of a malfunction? Are they trying to point out that stupidity is better?

Intellectual functioning is determined by many factors. However, a primary source of this capacity is mental ability or "intelligence”. Intelligence refers to the ability to reason, plan, think, and communicate. These abilities allow us to solve problems, to learn, and to use good judgment.

When the ability to reason, arrive to a wise decision and think become difficult, it is understood that the person is having significant limitations in intellectual functioning. But with the aid of an adult or a professional, the limitations can then discarded to wider possibilities. Thus, the importance of education where holistic competencies are developed.

There is a long-held belief that average people are happier than smart people. Society, by statistical necessity, needs to focus on the majority and is therefore built and designed for "the average" (Jabeen, 2020). With this concept, there are those who grimace on intellectuals and accuse them of persecuting the average people by pushing them to their limits.

Harvard researchers emphasize the importance of cultivating intelligence, as they reinforce each other and lead to optimal brain and cognitive health. Because cognitive health is increasingly recognized as a key component of overall health and wellness (Bart et al., 2018).

A brain training activity doesn't always have to tedious and stressful. Much research has found that creative outlets like painting and other art forms, learning an instrument, doing expressive or autobiographical writing, and learning a language also can improve cognitive function based on a Harvard Health Publishing article.

It has been proven that learning poverty is happening at present especially in the local scene where result of large-scale assessments glaringly place us among the least learners.

This learning poverty will increase when people are not encouraged to think and learn. This will erode economy and values in the future.

It is NEVER a mistake to aim for intellectual development. Mediocrity which leads to stupidity is.

Deliberate

 

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Waya matunong!

Thinking as part of the cognitive process needs to be practiced. This has brought wide attention among educators when they realize the entropy of it when digital distractions came. They realized that even the teachers are experiencing cognitive disruptions due to the entry of the internet and the features it brought about.

Cognition involves internal mental processes—all of the workings inside the brain, including perception, thinking, memory, attention, language, problem-solving, and learning (Cherry, 2022).

This is the current issue among psychologists and educators: Is learning decay present with cognitive disruptions?

Improving thinking skills is a life study and one that is definitely worth pursuing. Thinking is the pinnacle of the accumulation of knowledge and experience. The question is, how can we continue improving thinking skills?

The science of thinking underscores DELIBERATE PRACTICE as one of the ways to attain the goal of thinking clearly which will then proceed to reflective, analytical and critical thinking. Meaning, it is the person who deliberately perform tasks and gain experiences that allow the individual to THINK.

Deliberate practice refers to a special type of practice that is purposeful and systematic. While regular practice might include mindless repetitions, deliberate practice requires focused attention and is conducted with the specific goal of improving performance (Clear, 2023).

Aside from the repetitive things that people do these days like scrolling on social media sites, individuals must be aware of the focused attention they are doing. Like are they exposing themselves to reading books and reflecting on the ideas presented? In this manner, the goal of improving cognition can be attained.

However, while genetics influence performance, they do not determine performance. We must not confuse destiny with opportunity. Genes provide opportunity. They do not determine our destiny. We can design our future by starting where we are.

Parents and educators must also be aware of the deliberate practice they are exposing their children with. We might be the reason why thinking is not happening in their heads.

The decay of thinking must be avoided. Deliberate practice among the adults can be radiated to the young.

 

Problematizing the Mind

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Kinopya tanan!

There is a current movement among the literati and other academicians that Artificial Intelligence (AI) must not be considered as intelligence at all. The Guardian (2023) reported: The early AI systems were heavily dominated by rules and programs, so some talk of “artificiality” was at least justified. But those of today, including everyone’s favorite, ChatGPT, draw their strength from the work of real humans: artists, musicians, programmers and writers whose creative and professional output is now appropriated in the name of saving civilisation.

At best, this is “non-artificial intelligence.”

Critics have pointed out that intelligence is not just about pattern-matching. Equally important is the ability to draw generalizations and argue on aspects inconsistent to prior knowledge.

There are people we know who are so dependent with the ideas and concepts they copy from sources to the point that they sound intelligent. Yet the core of the matter is that they are only copying such ideas and feigning it as theirs.

Cognition is a term referring to the mental processes involved in gaining knowledge and comprehension. Some of the many different cognitive processes include thinking, knowing, remembering, judging, and problem-solving (Cherry, 2023).

Thinking is a developed skill which requires a lot of mental calisthenics for the brain to be attuned to the cognition process. If the individual is not exposing the self to thinking processes, it won’t reach the level of critical thinking. If all are ideas are copied and pattern-matched, we cannot also consider that as intelligence per se. It can be considered as a skill and not a product of cognitive process.

Cognitive distraction happens when multitasking interferes with the processing of information in the brain, like when we scroll social media sites while we are supposed to be engaged in a discussion.

Disruptive effects of distraction on recall of words, objects and events, also on visual processing, category formation and other cognitive tasks are caused by the habit of “gadget use”. The ability to think and develop intelligence will then be adversely affected.

We only can reach the level of cognition when we won’t get lazy enough to have mental workouts. 

Becoming a Voyeur

 

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Pila kaw ka oras nagsuyong sa selpon?

You think that they are not active on social media since they are not posting anything. But they are there, scrolling and looking at each mistake others do on the virtual spaces. These are the modern-day voyeurs. They are the social media voyeurs.

A social media voyeur is the one who lurks in the shadows and uses social media as a means of peering into the lives of others (Fazio, 2014).

This one goes online to get the scoop on what’s going on with everyone else. Often these people will scroll through their news feed for hours, or you might find them following the accounts of multiple people especially those who have celebrity status.

Manochikitsa (counselling site in India) reported: Psychologically, voyeuristic tendencies can be driven by a desire for control, a sense of escape, or the fulfilment of unmet fantasies. The digital age has facilitated voyeuristic behavior by providing anonymity and accessibility through webcams, social media platforms, and explicit content dissemination.

When can we say that we are now falling into this category? Through self-assessment, and focused self-observation, you may notice that you are scrolling social media sites even if you are eating, attending a meeting or during conversations. When manners and social etiquette will be set aside in exchange of the sheer entertainment of knowing what others are doing, something is already wrong.

Is there an effect to the brain of doing this?

Social media-addicted individuals show poor skills in controlling or inhibiting their responses. Another aspect that deserves to be mentioned is the lack of attention. The constant lack of attention produced by the internet results in a phenomenon that some have explained as “distracted from distraction by distraction” (Abreu, Nabuco, ND).

Research studies suggest that people who are constantly online activate regions associated with language, memory, and visual processing in a lower intensity, that is, they do not display much activity in the prefrontal area.

Therefore, cognitive control processes will be hampered.

There is a need for awareness on this matter. The one who grimaces on such feedback and be on denial mode is already manifesting traits of addiction. Addicts do not accept that they are.

Instead of consuming too much information and become a voyeur to the lives of others, one can make the social media as a platform to create, inform and recreate. The mind is dependent on the individual who nurtures or damages it.

Your Actions are Your Prayers

 

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Gusto ko mabright, madato… o gusto ko magkugi, para mabright hasta madato?

There are people who consume too much information and process them. They will then possess a confidence based on the things that they know. Yet, one can wonder if the set of knowledge in one’s head would be enough to see others differently.

Developing one’s intelligence is a goal. There is nothing wrong about it. But what is the deeper meaning of acquiring such? Which will bring us to the discourse of INTENTIONS rather than goals.

Intentions according to Tumblin (2022) are the reasons behind what you do (i.e. the action). One’s actions naturally follow from one’s intentions.

But isn’t this the same with motivation?

Intention is what (the thing) you want to create and motivation is how you feel about what you're going to do or create (Ruelle, 2016). Therefore, intentions are deliberate while motivations are attached to feelings.

While intentions are deep, there are those who stop doing the things they do since their feelings changed. They become unmotivated. Those with strong predisposition continue the task deliberately. They WILL to do it.

Which goes back to query: What is your deliberate intent to consume information? Isn’t this to process them and create an output for the greater good? If not, what? Pure entertainment and self-consumption? Then, is your intention clear that you need to be well-informed to be a better public servant or leader?

Still, the reactive personalities will then retort: What is it to you? They will then remind us to mind our own business.

There are also those whose intentions are bad. That is the reason why our moral compass must be attuned well.

In a spiritual concept, our intentions and actions are our prayers.

According to Henderson (2022): Prayer and the power of intention are fundamentally one and the same thing; processes in which your mind has a particular focus: a healing, a desire, or an intervention of some kind.

Spiritual individuals, those who touch base with their core, are always reconciling their actions with their intentions. Those who are relying more on motivations oftentimes go astray.

 

Freedom or Something Else?

 

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Di siguro kun pinyangga nan bata pa!

Is freedom absolute? This question comes to mind when some people make “freedom of expression” as the excuse for their social media posts. But think about this: When you hurt, malign and cause someone emotional distress, can your “freedom” be still considered as an excuse?

The Constitution says that freedom of expression is the freedom for us all to express ourselves. It is the right to speak, to be heard, and to participate in political, artistic, and social life. It also includes the ‘right to know’: the right to seek, receive, and share information through any media.

While the right to freedom of expression is fundamental, it is not absolute. This means it can be limited in exceptional circumstances. Speech that encourages violence and discrimination against people (e.g. intentional incitement to racial hatred), should be prohibited.

Also, categories such as incitement, defamation, fraud, obscenity, child pornography, fighting words, and threats are not within the bounds of this freedom.

Which brought us to wonder why people hide behind this excuse when they post violent and unbecoming words on social media. Is this a symptom of a psychological disturbance or even some sort of mental illness?

Berne (1970) theorized recognition hunger as the need to be noticed or to receive attention and acknowledgement, which can only be supplied by another human being. It is a need for a sense of belonging and a feeling that other people know you exist in the world.

There are individuals in our social ecology who will post “catchy” or even “violent” contents (like cursing) hiding behind the freedom of expression concept. They sometimes fail to understand that the ulterior motive is to satisfy their need to be noticed and recognized.

A need for approval now and then may be part of human relationships, but seeking others’ approval every step of the way may signal an emotional challenge (Fergusson, 2022).

Bright Quest reveals that the signs and symptoms of borderline personality disorder (BPD) include extreme emotions and mood swings, a constant fear of being abandoned, a strong need for validation from others, unstable relationships, a shifting sense of self, feelings of paranoia and suspicion, and a chronic and uncomfortable sense of emptiness.

When feedback come to us that we are posting too much “edgy” content on social media and we hide behind the excuse of freedom, we have to examine our character-traits as well. We might be on the verge of being unstable.