Environmental Psychology (And my lack of understanding)

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Knee that Bends

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« on: January 28, 2018, 07:10:18 am »
I just wanted to see what you all think of this idea. This is a quote from "Personal Space: The Behavioral Basis of Design" by Robert Sommer. Special to me personally, because he is my grandfather.

"[Man] will adapt to hydrocarbons in the air, detergents in the water, crime in the streets, and crowded recreational areas. Good design becomes a meaningless tautology if we consider that man will be reshaped to fit whatever environment he creates. The long-range question is not so much what sort of environment we want, but what sort of man we want." -Robert Sommer

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Sommer

A little background, Sommer is a [retired] professor of environmental psychology at UC Davis, and this is from his most well known book, which talks about how our surroundings affect us and our minds. Very interesting stuff imo.

This idea that we should build our surroundings to shape man, instead of shaping it to fit man I find to be very fascinating. For example, Sommer argues that classrooms should not be designed the way they are, fitting as many people in rows, with a teacher at the front, but instead a more "informally arranged" fashion. He believes this makes students more attentive, increasing how much knowledge said students take in. At times I start to feel like some ideas get criss-crossed. The theory seems to bend towards being utilitarian, not designing our environment to be pretty or comfortable but instead useful, yet he states we should make classrooms less "rigid". He has also commented about the positive effects of street art (and he himself is an artist). Does art and a more relaxing form of building design oppose his original idea of designing our surroundings to better ourselves?

I of course am not an expert on the subject, or even psychology and sociology in general, but I would like to see what other people think of this. I haven't done enough research myself, but I leave that boring stuff to you plebs  ;D Since I was very young my grandfather's works have puzzled and amazed me. When my mother was born, they were living on the grounds of a mental institution where my grandpa was testing the effects of guided LSD trips on schizophrenic patients. He's also a known expert on mushrooms, especially psychedelic mushrooms, and has interviewed multiple psychologically "unique" people in prison, including everyone's favorite cultist Charles Manson. So if you have any interest in the author of this quote, ask anything, I've got some crazy stories!  ;D ;D

"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

Madness

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« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2018, 05:25:00 pm »
Very cool, KTB.

I'll probably have more thoughts later when I'm not being perpetually distracted but:

- Places of the Heart: The Psychogeography of Everyday Life
- The Benefits of Urban Trees, The Japanese practice of ‘forest bathing’ is scientifically proven to improve your health, How Trees Calm Us Down
- In my fourth year Memory & Learning psychology class, we studied how individuals retain information. But despite the wealth of research we were expected to digest, the great irony was that no university class is taught as per the research. It was something I brought up a number of times and was ridiculed for. For instance, research shows that context-dependent memory (where you are, how you feel, etc, etc) has a large impact on retention, specifically that students perform better on tests in the same room in which they studied the material yet we wrote our mid-terms/exams in the gymnasium. Plenty of other analogous strangeness in traditional pedagogy.
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Knee that Bends

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« Reply #2 on: January 28, 2018, 07:08:19 pm »
specifically that students perform better on tests in the same room in which they studied the material yet we wrote our mid-terms/exams in the gymnasium. Plenty of other analogous strangeness in traditional pedagogy.
This cracks me up, it's almost as if they were trying to prove it to you by f***ing you over. Good stuff, madness
"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #3 on: January 29, 2018, 03:39:18 am »
Not sure I agree. It would suck to be one of the maladapted ones (which I guess I am).

Knee that Bends

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« Reply #4 on: January 29, 2018, 04:37:22 am »
Not sure I agree. It would suck to be one of the maladapted ones (which I guess I am).
What would you have changed about your school or life that you think would've made you more adapted to our world?
"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #5 on: January 29, 2018, 04:52:56 am »
Not sure I agree. It would suck to be one of the maladapted ones (which I guess I am).
What would you have changed about your school or life that you think would've made you more adapted to our world?
Well, more focus on interpersonal relations/manipulation would help, but I can't change my genetics. Allergies and autoimmune/inflammatory issues are on the rise in Western countries, so something is definitely wrong if you ask me.

Knee that Bends

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« Reply #6 on: January 29, 2018, 05:07:28 am »
Fair enough. Sadly, our public school system based on Ishual. Shame.
"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #7 on: January 29, 2018, 05:28:36 am »
Fair enough. Sadly, our public school system based on Ishual. Shame.
Yeah, haha. Actually I was kind of a prodigy as a kid, but wasn't allowed to skip classes because of "social difficulties" or something. I feel like wasted potential sometimes, and I'm sure I'm not the only one!

Knee that Bends

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« Reply #8 on: January 29, 2018, 05:51:06 am »
The equalization of students kinda sucks both ways. There's people like you who were held back from their potential, and there are kids that are more intellectually challenged (not just talking about mental illness, or even ADHD, etc.) who have a harder time processing information and need more time or energy to learn a given subject. The way we put all students on an equal playing field hurts both sides, only benefitting the less and less common 'average' student. The question is how students can be split up by a means other than just age, without making the 'lesser' students be forgotten or branded as "stupid", etc. That's my personal opinion. You may notice I often comment on the suckage of modern american or world culture, yet almost never actually have a solution  ;D
"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

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« Reply #9 on: January 29, 2018, 08:36:32 pm »
"The long-range question is not so much what sort of environment we want, but what sort of man we want."

Brilliant.

Largely to the same effect as the opposite - either way we shape ourselves. I just think its a great idea in reverse - seems more meaningful.
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Knee that Bends

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« Reply #10 on: January 30, 2018, 06:36:40 am »
I love when people say something expected, and then turn it on its head. Bakker does this well (as he should, what is philosophy if not just turning normal shit into mind-breaking shit) 
"And I renounce..." He trailed, warred with errant pas­sions. "I renounce my wife."
His eyes fell upon Esmenet, stricken upon the floor. My wife!
"Noooo," she wept and whispered. "Pleaaase, Akka..."
"As an adulteress," he continued, his voice cracking, "and a... a..."
His face a mask of nimil, he turned without leave, began walking back the way he came. The Men of the Tusk stared at him dumbstruck

TaoHorror

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« Reply #11 on: January 30, 2018, 02:56:30 pm »
Not sure I agree. It would suck to be one of the maladapted ones (which I guess I am).
What would you have changed about your school or life that you think would've made you more adapted to our world?
Well, more focus on interpersonal relations/manipulation would help, but I can't change my genetics. Allergies and autoimmune/inflammatory issues are on the rise in Western countries, so something is definitely wrong if you ask me.

We're "too clean" is the current thinking. Dishwashers yielding auto-immune issues ( our body has nothing to attack ). But I'm no expert, just the messenger.
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Wilshire

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« Reply #12 on: January 30, 2018, 05:59:00 pm »
We're "too clean" is the current thinking. Dishwashers yielding auto-immune issues ( our body has nothing to attack ). But I'm no expert, just the messenger.

This comes from the well known fact that an immune system that does not have to fight off diseases is a weak one.

Surrounding ourselves with sterile environments makes us more susceptible to anything that gets through that net.
Dishwashers, as you suggest, clean dishes very well. There is some evidence that indicates that exposing children to fewer and fewer bacteria, viruses, etc., leads to malformed immune systems. This is a somewhat documented affect for allergies in general, and might be extrapolate further to other autoimmune disorders.

But I think "too clean" is confusing phrasing. I suspect you mean in terms of sterilizing our personal environments - hand sanatizer, dishwashers, bleach everything to oblivion. But not, as it kind of implies given this conversation, 'too clean' in the sense that dumping billions of pounds/gallons of toxins into the water we drink, air we breath, food we consume, is actually a good thing.
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« Reply #13 on: February 01, 2018, 09:14:13 pm »
Weird tangent here. I have dandruff and extremely dry skin. Runs in my family on my dads side. My dads Dr. told him to only was your hair every 3 days and shower every other day(in the winter, not a problem in the spring through fall). I've noticed that while I have gotten a cold here and there, I haven't caught the flu, when every other member of the family has.

I thought it nasty at first. I was a two time a day showerer most of my life. After work and in the morning. It was a hard change for me. I do clean off with a rag and wash my face on days I don't take a shower. But, no dandruff at all, and with using lotion, my skin has been itchy, scaly free all winter. Call me a hippie, but its had positive effects on what was intended and also not catching the flu when everyone else around me has.
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