How do you feel about the Hypno-Tube.
FrY
Regular
You know the one that sits in your room,
Is it not that hard to believe that all those sounds and colors are put your conscious mind into a state of deep relaxation
Like a hypnotist putting your conscious mind at ease with trance.
Bam, you now have suggestions and specific meme that implant in or minds. Then replicate through everyday talk, like a self replicating virus.
Next thing you know your cruising down the road and taco fails new beef and bean roll has trickled from are subconscious into conscious focus due to the mind virus meme of an advertisement has been playing in the background all week.
I'm just sayin dat TV & RadiO aint playin.
Is it not that hard to believe that all those sounds and colors are put your conscious mind into a state of deep relaxation
Like a hypnotist putting your conscious mind at ease with trance.
Bam, you now have suggestions and specific meme that implant in or minds. Then replicate through everyday talk, like a self replicating virus.
Next thing you know your cruising down the road and taco fails new beef and bean roll has trickled from are subconscious into conscious focus due to the mind virus meme of an advertisement has been playing in the background all week.
I'm just sayin dat TV & RadiO aint playin.
Comments
It can be a powerful tool for learning, although it doesn't compare to reading a book. In practice it is used more like a billboard/opiate. I think that a black out lasting a week may solve allot of human problems, but most people seem too hypnotized to give a shit. I hope that the emergence of the internet as a median will eventually smarten people back up again, but if it hasn't in the last 10 years, it never will.
I think it has come to a point where people will become more and more manipulatable because there reality is based on manipulated coding.
Like if you taught a dog to react just one way in specific situations through conditioning, once you influence how an animal acts you just create a new set of manipulating mind viruses based off of previous programming to further restrict the dog ability to conclude rebellion.
I'm just saying there have been breakthroughs in psychology and neuro sciences, also add in the the recorded understanding of human behavior in the past. And you got yourself some manipulative assholes with a very large list on ways to influence your train of thought without out ever facing you.
Error: LSD is part of my job.:)
I agree, but that said there could be a point where the median runs away from the people in charge. Reality is becoming increasingly artificial and controllable, but that works both ways. If you are sick of the politics/commercial reality then you can change the chanel to Scarface and make pretend you are a gangster. While the amount of connectivity between people allows for information and conditioning to go viral in a very effective way, it doesn't nessisarily have the stability to keep people fully domesticated.
Society seems to be getting more violent and more hedonistic, and while it provides a diversion from humanities real problems, it also undermines the kind of society getting shoved down our throats since pre-school to an extent.
I think it is just a race between which demographic comes out on top.
I don't think the any one cabal of fatcats is behind it all, but the median itself is too powerful to put into the hands of the kind of people who are running it presently. I think it's a cultural problem, not a conspiracy. That could be said about 99% of humanities fuckups. Slave labour wasn't a conspiricy back in the day; it was a cultural trend.
Well thats the thing, it not just one person, its a company like a group trying to make a profit, and all the large media outlets, be it TV, Internet, radio, VCR and touchtone telephone are allowed free reign on what gets implemented into your mind.
I just don't like it, and I have seen examples of it that are not for the good of anybody except to the person paying to have the subliminal manipulation planted into modern media, hell its in old movies too, but with practice the last couple decades have allowed for improved technique.
These computers do the same thing. Cause LEARNING, most people do spend their time on when they use it. They go on 'Youtube' and watch music videos or porn. Then 'flame' people on forums. That's about it... but hopefully as time goes on things become more clearer then maybe you guys will actually realize what has been going on in you're own backyards!
But I find TeeVee/Radio useless because the programs are all propaganda and brainless nonsense. Hell, some of them even are designed to look(emphasis) intellectual.
About a month ago, I got a letter from Cablevision, informing me that my monthly rates were about to increase. At that point, I evaluated the situation, as follows. I watch only about 3 hours of television per week. The rest of the time, it's just on as background noise, while I am doing something on the computer. There are only two shows that I like to tune in to regularly - The Daily Show and The Colbert Report - which adds up to about 20 minutes of actual programming. However, lately, I've just been going to the (seemingly legal) sites that stream the funniest clips from those programs the very next day.
With that in mind, I made the call.
- Hello, this is Frank, how may I help you?
- I would like to cancel cable.
- What do you mean?
- I don't want to pay for cable TV anymore.
- Really? Have you heard of our low introductory offer for premium channels, such as HBO and Cinemax?
- I think, maybe, I am not being very clear.
- Ms. Paley, let me ask you, where do you intend to get television service?
- I don't intend to get television service.
[about 30 seconds of silence]
- Well what about news?
- I like to read the newspaper, and I visit a lot of Internet sites. Also, there's NPR, which I stream to my computer. For free.
- Well what about movies and original programming?!!
- The New York Public Library has a very large assortment of movies on DVD, and Amazon sells collections of entire seasons of pretty much all the shows. You heard of Amazon, haven't you? And the library? Do you know where the library is Frank?
[more silence, and I'm becoming less amused and more annoyed]
- Sports! What about sports!?
- Do you remember when Cablevision had that huge dispute with the Yankees, and I couldn't get the YES network for about a month while they were working out the details of their contract? Well, that's when I started listening to baseball on the radio, and realized that I actually prefer it that way!
This went on for a little while longer. But eventually, he informed me that I would be added to a special "watch list" of people who cancel cable without an explanation. And with that ominous warning, I was allowed to break free.
I was very surprised that this was such a huge ordeal. Who was this guy? Why did he take it so personally? Maybe he recently bought Cablevision stock. But what did my measly 50 dollars a month mean for their bottom line anyway? Plus, I am still shelling out a huge chunk of cash each month for digital phone and Internet service. In the next few weeks I realized why he was so upset. Essentially, I was putting into question the very foundation of our society.
Week 1: I lose 3 pounds. This is unexpected, because I am not dieting, and I am not exercising. I compare the ingredients in the shampoo that I always buy with those in the generic brand, and opt to buy the generic brand. Same deal with other toiletries and groceries. (Do I really need green tea extract in my soap? No, I don’t). Strangely enough, I find myself thinking "why am I buying another black dress, I know I have one just like that at home" at the checkout counter of Club Monaco. Also, I am extremely adamant against seeing the latest Matthew Mcconaughey movie. Total savings at the end of the week add up to about 150 dollars.
Week 2: I lose 2 more pounds. My ICC 3-minute blitz rating goes up by almost 200 points. I read "The Visual Display of Quantitative Information" by Edward Tufte, and construct a "data rich" statistical graph to analyze my professional/academic/personal accomplishments and goals. Recalling something that my Professor mentioned in class a month ago, I decide that it might be fun to prove the trinomial revision identity geometrically.
Week 3: I stay up later at night, but I am more alert during the day. I become more disgruntled with current events. I get especially upset when people say stupid things. Particularly, if those people happen to be elected political officials. I realize just how powerful television really is at subjugating the masses. I decide that someone should publish a pamphlet. I call my friend at the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA students are the go-to people when you decide to change the world), and he suggests that I blog about it, and poll the public for some links (i.e. supporting evidence in the form of valid research).
I conclude that television is an extremely effective and powerful way of controlling, manipulating, and distracting the American people. It works in three very basic and obvious ways:
1. Making you the passive observer of current events.
When you watch television, you become a passive observer of news. When this happens, your cognitive processes slow down, and you absorb information before you have a chance to process it. In this way, television makes your brain a soft and squishy sponge, perfectly willing to internalize all the misinformation that is propagated to further somebody else's agenda. When you become an active seeker of news (as you are when you browse websites, read newspapers, or talk to other people) you are more likely to question and analyze the content before believing that it is true. If your co-worker tells you that the guy in the next cubicle is stashing weapons of mass destruction under his desk, you are likely to ask for proof; but if a TV news anchor tells you something similar, you will probably go on thinking that it is true.
2. Making you a consumerist whore.
Even if you turn your set off during commercials, you are still constantly being bombarded with advertisements on a very subconscious level. You can't buy the things that you need to make your life better, but television is extremely successful at convincing you of the exact opposite. Your husband will not love you more if you cut your hair like Jennifer Anniston, there is no difference between a Hyundai and a Mercedes, and there is nothing in the world that will make you look like an underwear model.
3. Distracting you from the real problems.
Television is able to distract you from the real problems (in your life, in the world) by either presenting you with irrelevant and superficial problems that will divert your focus, or by providing enough instant gratification to make you forget about your drab and wretched life. Someone on television tells you that two guys in San Francisco want to get married, and you are so distracted by this attack on your ideals that you conveniently forget that there is a war, in which many innocent people are dying. Or you spend your evenings watching attractive people doing exciting things, and this escapism prevents you from facing reality and making positive changes in your own life. (By the way, there is nothing wrong with seeking entertainment, but television creates a routine of dependency that inadvertently results in a state of false complacency).
Finally, here are some really stupid things that people tell me when I suggest that they too break free, and cancel their cable TV service.
How will my son ever make it to the major leagues if he can't watch pro ball games on TV?
This is quite asinine. From an entirely statistical point of view, I can say with relative certainty that your son will never make it to the majors. But besides that, Joe Dimaggio never watched baseball on TV. Neither did Sandy Koufax. They went out and PLAYED baseball. If you plop your kids in front of the TV for 3 hours every evening, you might make them overweight and dimwitted like baseball players, but you certainly won't increase their chances of becoming professional athletes. If you really want to give your kids a chance at a career in sports, make sure that physical activity is an integral part of their (and your) daily routine. Take them to a real baseball game instead, at least that way you can all get some fresh air.
I watch CNN. Where will I get my news? How will I know what is going on in the world?
This is probably the stupidest thing that anyone has ever said to me. You will certainly not know what's going on in the world by watching CNN, or any of the other major news channels. Nor will you become more informed about the world and people around you by watching local news. This is supposed to be the information age, so why are so many people still relying on such a primitive source of news? You can probably get more relevant content from reading Talking Points Memo for 5 minutes than you can from watching CNN all day long. And if you wish to stay away from such blatantly partisan sites, you can always turn to the more traditional AP outlets on the web. Even reading CNN.com is better than watching it on television, because it give you a chance to go back and take note when the reported information is stupid or just plain wrong. Television news never gives you enough time to have a “wait a minute there” moment.
What will I talk to my coworkers about the next day? They all gather and chat about American Idol, and I don't want to be a social outcast.
Well, your coworkers are obviously idiots. And, instead of encouraging this sort of behavior, you should make an effort to change the culture. Have confidence in your decision. This is just like high school. When you do something odd, do it with unwavering self-assurance, and everyone else will follow your trend.
My hope is that there will be a massive social and cultural move away from television. The benefits of such a change will be tremendous. We will become smarter, more informed, and less prone to commercial manipulation. We will not stand for lies and misinformation from our government, we will take action and effect change. We will eliminate credit card debt, and pay off our mortgages faster. Our kids will eat more fruit and do better on standardized exams. We will become global participants, and won't need to tell foreigners that we are Canadian when we visit their countries. We will use less oil. We will get to work on time. We will have better relationships with friends and family. We will make better music, write better books, and develop better software. Just for starters. Pardon my naïve optimism, but I really think that remarkable progress can be achieved very quickly, if you too decide to cancel cable.
awesome
I think the reason why she lost several pounds is because of the lack of fast-food advertising. lol
It was a good read nonetheless.
Although the definitions are vague and somewhat misleading, the word "addiction" usually refers to a psychological or physical dependence on a particular experience that must be repeated in order for a person to be comfortable. Usually, we think about this in terms of chemical addiction, which occurs when the addict's chemical of choice reorganizes the nervous system so that it requires the presence of that chemical to operate smoothly.
Of course, not all addictions are chemical. Any behavior that leads to a pleasurable experience will be repeated, especially if that behavior requires little work. Psychologists call this pattern "positive reinforcement". This is what we mean, technically speaking, by addiction. In this sense, television certainly fits into the category of an addictive agent.
When you watch TV, brain activity switches from the left to the right hemisphere. In fact, experiments conducted by researcher Herbert Krugman showed that while viewers are watching television, the right hemisphere is twice as active as the left, a neurological anomaly. The crossover from left to right releases a surge of the body's natural opiates: endorphins, which include beta-endorphins and enkephalins. Endorphins are structurally identical to opium and its derivatives (morphine, codeine, heroin, etc.). Activities that release endorphins (also called opioid peptides) are usually habit-forming (we rarely call them addictive). These include cracking knuckles, strenuous exercise, and orgasm. External opiates act on the same receptor sites (opioid receptors) as endorphins, so there is little difference between the two.
In fact, strenuous exercise, which produces the nominal "runner's high"- a release of endorphins that flood the system, can be highly addictive, to the point where "addicts" who abruptly stop exercising experience opiate-withdrawal symptoms, namely migraine headaches. These migraines are caused by a dysfunction in opioid receptors, which are accustomed to the steady influx of endorphins.
Indeed, even casual television viewers experience such opiate-withdrawal symptoms if they stop watching TV for a prolonged period of time. An article from South Africa's Eastern Province Herald (October 1975) described two experiments in which people from various socio-economic milieus were asked to stop watching television. In one experiment, several families volunteered to turn off their TV's for just one month. The poorest family gave in after one week, and the others suffered from depression, saying they felt as though they had "lost a friend." In the other experiment, 182 West Germans agreed to kick their television viewing habit for a year, with the added bonus of payment. None could resist the urge longer than six months, and over time all of the participants showed the symptoms of opiate-withdrawal: increased anxiety, frustration, and depression.
The signs of addiction are all around us. The average American watches over four hours of television every day, and 49% of those continue to watch despite admitting to doing it excessively. These are the classic indicators of an addict in denial: addicts know they're doing harm to themselves, but continue to use the drug regardless.
Recent studies on laboratory rats show that opioid-receptor stimulants induce addictive behaviors. The evidence is conclusive: all opioids are addictive! Even the ones your body produces naturally. The television set works as a high-tech drug delivery system, and we all feel its effects. The question is, can an addiction to television be destructive? The answer we receive from modern science is a resounding "Yes!"
First of all, when you're watching television the higher brain regions (like the midbrain and the neo-cortex) are shut down, and most activity shifts to the lower brain regions (like the limbic system). The neurological processes that take place in these regions cannot accurately be called "cognitive." The lower or reptile brain simply stands poised to react to the environment using deeply embedded "fight or flight" response programs. Moreover, these lower brain regions cannot distinguish reality from fabricated images (a job performed by the neo-cortex), so they react to television content as though it were real, releasing appropriate hormones and so on. Studies have proven that, in the long run, too much activity in the lower brain leads to atrophy in the higher brain regions.
It is interesting to note that the lower/reptile/limbic brain correlates to the bio-survival circuit of the Leary/Wilson 8 Circuit Model of Consciousness. This is our primal circuit, the base "presence" that we normally associate with consciousness. This is the circuit where we receive our first neurological imprint (the oral imprint), which conditions us to advance toward anything warm, pleasurable and/or protective in the environment. The bio-survival circuit is our most infantile, our most primal way of dealing with reality.
A person obsessed with the pursuit of physical pleasure is probably fixated on this circuit; in fact the Freudians believed an opium addiction was an attempt to return to the womb. We could logically deduce that such addictions occur when higher brain functions are anesthetized and the newly dominant lower brain seeks out pleasure at any cost. Taking this into account, television is like a double edged sword: not only does it cause the endocrine system to release the body's natural opiates (endorphins), but it also concentrates neurological activity in the lower brain regions where we are motivated by nothing but the pursuit of pleasure. Television produces highly functional, mobile "bio-survival robots."
Herbert Krugman's research proved that watching television numbs the left brain and leaves the right brain to perform all cognitive duties. This has some harrowing implications for the effects of television on brain development and health. For one, the left hemisphere is the critical region for organizing, analyzing, and judging incoming data. The right brain treats incoming data uncritically, and it does not decode or divide information into its component parts.
The right brain processes information in wholes, leading to emotional rather than intelligent responses. We cannot rationally attend to the content presented on television because that part of our brain is not in operation. It is therefore unsurprising that people rarely comprehend what they see on television, as was shown by a study conducted by researcher Jacob Jacoby. Jacoby found that, out of 2,700 people tested, 90% misunderstood what they watched on television only minutes before. As yet there is no explanation as to why we switch to the right brain while viewing television, but we do know this phenomenon is immune to content.
For a brain to comprehend and communicate complex meaning, it must be in a state of "chaotic disequilibrium." This means that there must be a dynamic flow of communication between all of the regions of the brain, which facilitates the comprehension of higher levels of order (breaking conceptual thresholds), and leads to the formation of complex ideas. High levels of chaotic brain activity are present during challenging tasks like reading, writing, and working mathematical equations in your head. They are not present while watching TV.
Levels of brain activity are measured by an electroencenograph (EEG) machine. While watching television, the brain appears to slow to a halt, registering low alpha wave readings on the EEG. This is caused by the radiant light produced by cathode ray technology within the television set. Even if you're reading text on a television screen the brain registers low levels of activity. Once again, regardless of the content being presented, television essentially turns off your nervous system.
In addition to its devastating neurological effects, television can be harmful to your sense of self-worth, your perception of your environment, and your physical health. Recent surveys have shown that 75% of American women think they are overweight, likely the result of watching chronically thin actresses and models four hours a day.
Television has also spawned a "culture of fear" in the U.S. and beyond, with its focus on the limbic brain-friendly sensationalism of violent programming. Studies have shown that people of all generations greatly overestimate the threat of violence in real life. This is no shock because their brains cannot discern reality from fiction while watching TV.
Television is bad for your body as well. Obesity, sleep deprivation, and stunted sensory development are all common among television addicts.
So I hope we've firmly established that television is an addictive drug, one that is no better than opium, heroin, or any other opiate. Television is just as (and possibly even more) harmful to the body-brain as every other drug. But there's one big difference. All other drugs apparently pose a threat to the established social order. Television, however, is a drug that is actually essential to maintaining the social infrastructure. Why? Because it brainwashes consumers to throw money at the gaping void of their meaningless, terror-filled lives. And by brainwashed, I mean they've been hypnotized using very subtle and established techniques which, when coupled with television's natural effects on brain waves, make for the most ambitious psychological engineering ruse ever concocted.
Psychophysiologist Thomas Mulholland found that after just 30 seconds of watching television the brain begins to produce alpha waves, which indicates torpid (almost comatose) rates of activity. Alpha brain waves are associated with unfocused, overly receptive states of consciousness. A high frequency alpha waves does not occur normally when the eyes are open. In fact, Mulholland's research implies that watching television is neurologically analogous to staring at a blank wall.
I should note that the goal of hypnotists is to induce slow brain wave states. Alpha waves are present during the "light hypnotic" state used by hypno-therapists for suggestion therapy.
When Mulholland's research was published it greatly impacted the television industry, at least in the marketing and advertising sector. Realizing viewers automatically enter a trance state while watching television, marketers began designing commercials that produce unconscious emotional states or moods within the viewer. The aim of commercials is not to appeal to the rational or conscious mind (which usually dismisses advertisements) but rather to implant moods that the consumer will associate with the product when it is encountered in real life. When we see product displays at a store, for instance, those positive emotions are triggered. Endorsements from beloved athletes and other celebrities evoke the same associations. If you've ever doubted the power of television advertising, bear this in mind: commercials work better if you're not paying attention to them!
An addictive mind control device . . . what more could a government or profit-driven corporation ask for? But the really sad thing about television is that it turns everyone into a zombie, no one is immune. There is no higher order of super-intelligent, nefarious beings behind this. It's the product of our very human desire to alter our state of consciousness and escape the hardships of reality.
While AdBusters has their highly ineffectual TV Turnoff Week, I'd like to announce a campaign of my own. Starting next week, we will celebrate what I like to call TV Pawn-Off Week. I encourage you all to sell your televisions, and use the money to buy some books.
We're living in a Brave New World, only it's not so brave, or even that new. In fact, it's starting to look more and more like the Dark Ages, with the preliterate zombie masses obeying the authority of the new clergy: Regis Philbin and Jerry Springer.
good read, thanks
Yeah you can say I don't pay attention to the tube, or it is on just for noise. The in truth is when you are not consciously analyzing what you are seeing and hearing your sub conscious adsorbs it in a more direct fashion.
Ok now you have that piece of information that is replicating itself in your head, until it forms and idea. This idea can pop out when you see a something that associates with the idea that has been forming. For example you see a Taco bell sign. And all week the TV has been shouting taco bell this taco bell that, and every time you hear it it creates meaning behind the idea. So when you do see something taco related you think taco bell.
Even with popculture if you watch and analyze the characters but are saying things like, look how stupid this is, I don't like this, What is this crap, you are still letting it influence you on a emotional level therefore associating the meme to other emotions/ideas in your subconscious for the purpose of setting up a formula to allow the pop culture meme or any meme, to pop back into your conscious based on what you are influenced by in daily life.