Lights, Camera, Action

TED Talk: Instinct

4 Comments      Leave a comment.

1. on June 18, 2011 at 12:04 amLouise L Said:
   

   You mentioned that blinking was instinct, then wouldn’t that make breathing an instinct too? You have the same amount of control over blinking as breathing. How about heartbeat, does that count? The difference between heartbeat and breathing is that you can choose to hold your breath but you can consciously choose for your heart to not beat. I think heartbeat would just be considered as how your body was built to run, like digestion. Where is the line drawn? Or are heartbeats and digestions also considered instincts? It does meet all the criteria in that book Instincts. Also like birds with flying, would walking be an instinct in humans too? If we never seen anyone walk as a baby would we still instinctively straighten up from crawling?

   Some people talk about having a sixth sense like the sense of doom feeling like something bad is going to happen as instinct. Isn’t it true that animals some animals seems to instinctively know when disasters are going to strike? Would stories about cats refusing to go on ships that are going to sink or animals behaving erratically before earthquakes be because of instinct?

2. on June 19, 2011 at 9:20 pmtalonsiris Said:
   

   Good job Leanne,

   You’re great with the speaking and the recording was super clear and clean. The powerpoint could have had less words and a more quiet background, I think. It’s not important to have so many points on one slide.

   Your topic is quite interesting, and you did an amazing covering many aspects of it. I loved the Displacement Activity part, as I had never heard of it before. You could have elaborated more, and perhaps dug deeper into the brain process of your topic.

   I have to say, I think I am on the side of nurture, to a certain degree. As you stated, there are several instinctual activities of the human, such as sleep, blinking, and might I add, the will to survive. However, in our world, nurturing is definitely of more importance. People lose the will to survive, they deprive themselves of sleep… the list goes on. But it is not all negative. Predatory animals become best friends with their prey, and people show amazing selfless acts of kindness in the most dire situations. In fact, I think we should be able to nurture all the violence out of people. Humans already have so much control, so why can’t we control our own emotions?

   Anyways, it was an awesome to listen to!

3. on June 20, 2011 at 2:33 pmEmily Said:
   

   Hi Leanne!
   First of all, I like your topic. Instincts are very interesting. I like the way you compared Nature vs. Nurture, and gave arguments supporting both sides. I congratualte you or maintaining impartiality.
   One thing, though: you said once how hunger wasn’t an instinct, but later on you said it was.
   Well written and well spoken!
   ~Emily

4. on June 22, 2011 at 5:14 pmKelsey Said:
   

   Hey Leanne!
   I found your TED talk very interesting. I enjoyed learning more about instinct and some of the arguments for and against it. There were two things that I think you could improve upon.

   One was the length. It was very short and left me with a fair amount of questions. However your public speaking is obviously very practiced(as if I didn’t know) and your eye contact with the camera was amazing. Number two was that you spoke rather quickly and at some points the slides went quite fast. Other than that it was really enlightening. Good Job!