Showing posts with label Facial Expression. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Facial Expression. Show all posts

June 8, 2016

Shockingly Hungry

So a funny part of my personality is that I can be a little bit of a joker sometimes.

I am a study of human nature, so it can be fun just to get a rouse out of people, by doing something unexpected or even shocking. 

Today, going through the airport with my daughter, the TSA security lines were a lot better than what had been advertised lately.

As we get through and are getting our stuff together, my daughter says to me (around breakfast time now): "I'm hungry, can we get something to eat?"

So, I jokingly turn to her with a serious face on and say, "But you already ate yesterday!"

This strange man next to us, stops dead in his tracks overhearing what I said, and gives us the craziest look.

So what do I do having a ball with this?

I repeat even louder and with more emphasis, "Why do you need to eat again?  You already ate yesterday!!"

I am having to hold myself from cracking up laughing as I know this guy is listening and I almost can't wait to see his facial expression. 

I look at my daughter who gets it and is playing along and she is also pretending and putting on a sour face like she can't have any food today.

The guy looks like he is about to explode and say something, but decides I suppose to just make a real disgusted kvetchy face and move on.

I was sort of disappointed that he didn't want to help (in his mind) this kid and say something like, "How can you do that--and not feed her every day?"

I would have admired him for actually caring enough to try to help and intervene for someone else, even a stranger. 

But I guess the pent up shocked look will have to surface for today's human antics. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
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February 1, 2015

It's What You Can't Say

So I saw this game called Taboo when doing the grocery shopping today. 

(This one is the Jewish edition.)

Having never played this before, I looked it up and learned that it's a word game, where you have to give clues to the other team for them to guess a word, but you can't use the "taboo" words on the card. 

So for example, if the word is baseball, then some of the taboo words may be sport, pitcher, hitter, etc. 

So this is not an easy game per se. 

Thinking about the premise of the game though, I started to reflect that this isn't just a game, but in real life isn't so much of our interactions with others not about what we can say, but also the "taboo" things that we can't.

How many times do you want to tell someone off and explain what a jerk they have been acting lately or say your real feelings on a topic that you may feel passionately about, but it's somehow taboo to get into those things--you don't want to offend, be "politically incorrect", or perhaps you just think others may not agree with you or understand your point. 

What do we do? 

We "beat around the bush"--we express our dissatisfaction or disapproval or the opposite, with facial expressions, non-verbal cues, or perhaps we take a deep breath, hold back, or mince our words, so as not to somehow cross a social boundary of some sort. 

We want others to know us, accept us, respect us, and truly like us, but we can't always really be ourselves fully, because our words or feelings may be seen as taboo. 

In the end, sometimes we're discreet and "hold our tongue" and occasionally we blurt out what we really think and maybe are proud we did or are sorry for it afterwards--but wouldn't it be great if we could just be ourselves--without fear or retribution.

It shouldn't be taboo! ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
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January 31, 2015

You Can't Hide Your Feelings


You can try to hide your feeling, but it won't work...

Your emotions are now an open book to anyone with facial-recognition software, such as from Emotient, Affectiva, and Eyeris.

This video from Emotient shows examples of Dr. Marion Bartlett demonstrating very well how the system is able to pick up on her expressions of joy, sadness, surprise, anger, fear, disgust, and contempt. 

From broad displays of emotion to subtle spontaneous, natural displays, to micro, fast and involuntary expressions, the system detects and clearly displays it. 

Described in the Wall Street Journal, the software, in real time, successfully uses "algorithms to analyze people's faces" and is based on the work of Dr. Paul Ekman, who pioneered the study of facial expressions creating a catalog in the 1970s with "more than 5,000 muscle movements" linked to how they reveal your emotions. 

A single frame of a person's face can be used to extract 90,000 data points from "abstract patterns of light to tiny muscle movements, which get sorted by emotional categories."

With databases of billions of expressions from millions of faces in scores of countries around the world, the software works across ethnically diverse groups. 

Emotion-detection has a myriad of applications from national security surveillance and interrogation to in-store product marketing and generally gauging advertising effectiveness, to helping professionals from teachers to motivational speakers, executives, and even politicians hold people's attention and improve their messaging.

Then imagine very personal uses such as the software being used to evaluate job applicants or to tell if a spouse is lying about an affair...where does it end?

Of course, there are serious privacy issues in reading people's faces unbeknownst to or unwanted by them as well as possibilities for false positives, so that people's feelings are wrongly pegged or interpreted. 

In the end, unless you wear a physical mask or can spiritually transcend yourself above it all, we can see you and soon we will know not just what you are feeling, but also what you are thinking as well...it's coming. ;-)
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October 31, 2013

Pain is Relative

I've always found it a little strange when the doctor (or nurse) asks you, "On a scale of 0 to 10, how much pain are you in?"

Why?

Because pain (like many emotions) is relative to our understanding of it. 

To me, when someone says a 10 for pain, I think of someone under the most excruciating pain--like when someone, G-d forbid, is being tortured. 

However, someone else may think of 10 as just being really sick and uncomfortable. 

That's why I like this graphic that is used to level-set what each number in the scale represents. 

Using this simple graphic, our definition of pain is not purely subjective, but rather each person can look at the faces and expressions and see how they relate to them. 

Of course, the goal on the right for zero pain is a great goal, even if not always achievable. 

In a sense this is a very basic personal architecture--where you have your "as-is" on the scale and your "to-be" which is your goal. 

Then the doctor and patient work together to figure out a transition plan on how to get there (medicine, rehabilitation, healthier living, etc.). 

While pain is usually just a symptom, it is a beginning to get at the root cause of what is bothering us and needs to be fixed. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
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April 20, 2013

Don't Stampede On Others' Feelings

I took this picture of a cow stampede when hiking in the mountains. 

The cows first came up to us all friendly and then after staying for a little bit, decided to bolt off across the open field.

Together--it was like a mini stampede. 

It reminded me of a situation recently, where I felt bad that I had stampeded (albeit inadvertently) on someone's feelings.

We received a delivery--actually a new couch (the other one we were replacing was really uncomfortable and it was high time to go). 

At one point, I was taken a little aback when the delivery man asked me, admiring it--"How much was it?"

Not wanting to really say specifically, I just said nonchalantly, "Oh, not so much."

But the man pressed on and said, "No really, how much was it?"

I was a little uncomfortable, but I figured he's just making conversation, and honestly it wasn't extravagant  so I say in a round figure what it was. 

Then I see his face go dark, and I realized what had accidentally happened.

It was perhaps a bit much for this nice man (although I really don't know his situation, but just his facial expression).

Anyway, I felt terrible and proceeded to say something light and then we chatted for a little bit. 

I think it is important to feel for all people--trying to make the best with what G-d provides and deal with everyday tests and challenges.

We are all people--and at any moment--what befalls one, can befall anyone, so we must be grateful for each and every blessing, for however long G-d grants it. ;-)

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)


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