My mother died on Saturday, 11 October 2003. We had found out that she had breast cancer in April of 1998. But, I knew that death was a part of life and that these things were inevitable. There was nothing unfair about it. We knew the cancer would take her life long before it actually did.
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Archive for the ‘Essay’ Category
Regarding the Death of my Mother
Monday, June 20th, 2005Dreaming in REM and NREM Sleep
Thursday, March 24th, 2005I wrote this during the second semester of my senior year at Johns Hopkins University for Sleep, Dreams and Altered States of Consciousness with Dr. Richard Allen.
Dreaming in REM and NREM Sleep
Carlos Macasaet
200.368 – Sleep, Dreams and Altered States of Consciousness
Dr. Allen
24 March 2005
The most fascinating part of human sleep, at least to writers and poets is dreaming. Sleep in humans is characterised by five distinct brain states, stages one through four, collectively referred to as non-REM (NREM) sleep and REM or rapid eye movement sleep. The term stage W is often used to refer to the wake state. REM sleep is characteristically different from NREM sleep in that the brain activation patterns more closely resemble brain activation in the waking state. In addition, humans experience muscle atonia during REM sleep, which is not present in NREM sleep. When researchers first studied this phenomenon, they noticed that when woken, subjects reported dreaming during REM sleep. This led to the theory that REM is responsible for dreaming. However, it had also been observed that dreams could occur during NREM sleep as well. Further research has shown that dreams occurring in REM sleep are quantitatively and qualitatively different from dreams occurring in NREM sleep. This paper will investigate those differences as well as the underlying brain mechanisms that accompany dream production.
Artificial Intelligence from a Psychological Perspective
Monday, December 13th, 2004I wrote this during the first semester of my senior year at Johns Hopkins University for Minds, Brains and Computers with Dr. Paul Smolensky.
Carlos Macasaet
13 December 2004
050.109 – Final Paper
The ultimate chapter of Haugeland’s Artificial Intelligence: The Very Idea addresses the issue of artificial intelligence from a psychological perspective. That is, it attacks the same problem from the opposite direction as the preceding chapters. It starts with real people as its goal and works backwards, theorising about how one may conceptualise certain aspects of human mental functioning that are not immediately relevant to the problem of cognition. Many problems that involve artificial intelligence approaches to a solution such as speech and handwriting recognition do not require one to implement concepts such as emotion or self-concept into the system in order to solve the problem successfully. However, these are concepts that are important to intelligence that have so far been left out of artificial intelligence research either because of their irrelevance to specific problems or because no way has been found to model such concepts.
On Carrying a Red Fuzzy Purse
Wednesday, March 3rd, 2004I wrote this during the second semester of my junior year at Johns Hopkins University for Social Psychology with Dr. Stephen Drigotas.
Carlos Macasaet
Dr. Stephen Drigotas
200.133 – Norm Violation Paper
3 March 2004
On Carrying a Red Fuzzy Purse
Introduction
Social norms are a thing that we seem to overlook, yet something that plays a rather significant role in our lives. I imagine that many norms or conventions arise out of practicality, for example, facing a certain direction in the elevator. After that, I suspect that they become conventions out of a combination of social comparison and social learning. When we do not know how we are supposed to behave in certain situations, we look to others for cues on what to do. Also, once we have seen how others behave, we are more likely to imitate them if there were no adverse social consequences. It is probably also important to note whose conventions we follow. It is probably the case that we are more likely to follow conventions of people that are similar to us or people that we look up to.
Like a Quality Violin, Philip Marlowe Gets Better with Age
Wednesday, April 9th, 2003This was written during the second semester of my sophomore year at Johns Hopkins University for Hard Boiled Fiction and Film Noir with Dr. John Irwin.
Carlos Macasaet
Dr. John Irwin
220.399
9 April 2003
Like a Quality Violin, Philip Marlowe Gets Better with Age
The years 1967 – 1976 witnessed the rise of a neo-modernist movement in American film. The films depicted confused characters wandering aimlessly through situations beyond their comprehension and control. They were self-reflexive and analysed the relationship between representation and reality. This ‘Hollywood Renaissance’ in turn witnessed a resurrection of film noir. (Spicer 130-133) Following the creation of two other retellings of hard-boiled detective fiction, The Long Goodbye in 1973 and Chinatown in 1974, writer David Zelag Goodman and director Dick Richards collaborated in 1975 to tell the story of Raymond Chandler’s Farewell, My Lovely (1940). Although the film is set in the same 1940’s America as the novel, it differs from other film adaptations of hard-boiled detective fiction. The classic antecedent films noirs to Farewell, My Lovely such as The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep and Edward Dmytryk’s adaptation of the same novel, Murder, My Sweet, focus on the ethical paths the protagonists chose and the moral decisions they face while unravelling mysteries in a seedy and corrupt world. However, Farewell, My Lovely goes beyond testing Marlowe’s mettle in a morally ambiguous environment. It tells the story of a man searching for meaning in a dynamic world where the only constant is death.
Chandler’s View of Chivalry in a Modern City
Wednesday, March 5th, 2003This essay was written during the second semester of my sophomore year at Johns Hopkins University for Hard Boiled Fiction and Film Noir with Dr. John Irwin.
Carlos Macasaet
Dr. John Irwin
220.399
5 March 2003
Chandler’s View of Chivalry in a Modern City
In The Big Sleep (1939), Raymond Chandler constantly compares the protagonist, Phillip Marlow, with a knight. We see this on the first page when Marlowe observes the stained glass window portraying a knight lackadaisically liberating a nude lady from the ropes that bind her. Marlowe comments that inevitably he will have to help the knight in the window to free the lady because the knight does not seem to be trying hard enough. However, Chandler makes it obvious that Marlowe is striving for an ideal that cannot exist in a modern world of corruption. How does Chandler define chivalry and the ideals of a romantic age in a modern-day Los Angeles that Phillip Marlowe fails to fit into?
The Final Image in Les Quatre Cents Coups
Wednesday, October 23rd, 2002This essay was written on 23 October 2002 for Introduction to the Study of Film with Linda Delibero during the first semester of my sophomore year at Johns Hopkins University.
Carlos Macasaet
Ms. Linda DeLibero
061.140 – Midterm Essay
22 October 2002
The Final Image in Les Quatre Cents Coups
In Les Quatre Cents Coups, François Truffaut exploits the medium of cinema to touch the audience in a novel way. In the film, he challenges the viewer to react morally outside the scope of the film. He culminates this in the final scene in which, during a soccer game Antoine escapes from incarceration.
How to Fulfill Your CS Major Writing Requirement Or, At Least Half of It
Wednesday, December 5th, 2001This creative essay was written for Introduction to Fiction and Poetry Writing with Joshua Malbin during the first semester of my first year at Johns Hopkins University. It was intended to be a personal review of the class.
Carlos Macasaet
December 5, 2001
IFP — Writing Assignment 11
How to Fulfill Your CS Major Writing Requirement Or, At Least Half of It
First, discard the notion of hating English that you’ve harbored throughout high school and take confidence in your ability to write essays. Forget the fact that you got a D on your first essay for Rites of Passage freshman year. Don’t worry that you got C’s on all the rest of the essays even after your teacher promised you that your writing would improve. Don’t worry that you averaged a C on all your essays in history and English sophomore year. Instead take comfort in the fact that you got your first A on an essay when you discussed the Economic Development of New York in the Mid-Nineteenth Century in the second semester junior year. Besides, you got A’s on all (four) of your essays senior year. Having done this, you will immediately discard the notion of taking Expository Writing which would introduce you to academic composition through a variety of essay types.
Brave New World Reflective Essay
Friday, April 20th, 2001This essay was written on April 20, 2001 while I was in 12th grade at Winchester Thurston school for English Class with Chantel Acevedo.
Carlos Macasaet
April 20, 2001
English 12 — Brave New World Reflective Essay
The Internet is a revolutionary new medium that has provided people the world round a new medium of communication. In “cyberspace” as the Internet has been nicknamed, everyone can have a voice and it is relatively easy for one person to reach a very large audience. In addition to revolutionizing the way messages are broadcasted, cyberspace has also revolutionized peer-to-peer communication. E-mail and instant messaging have become a very convenient method of communication for many people, oftentimes replacing the use of telephones and conventional postal mail. However, the new methods of communication emerging on the Internet have also created a new communication medium for criminals. Many criminals have found e-mail to be a safer method of communication as opposed to the telephone as it is impervious to wiretaps. Instances of criminal use of cyberspace include espionage and drug trafficking. Cyberspace has also led to the rise of a new form of crime — cybercrime. Such crimes include child pornography and online stalking.
Surveillance on the Internet
Friday, March 16th, 2001This was my Senior Research Paper written on March 16, 2001 while I was in 12th grade at Winchester Thurston School. My advisor was Maurice Bajcz.
Carlos Macasaet
Dr. Naragon and Mr. Bajcz
Senior Research Paper
16 March 2001
Surveillance on the Internet
The Internet has presented citizens around the world with a new medium with which to communicate. The Internet also referred to as cyberspace has truly developed into a new kind of space. In this space, everyone can have a voice. Unlike real space, in cyberspace, it is very easy to reach a large audience without having to seek out the services of a publishing agency. The Internet has also revolutionized peer-to-peer communication. E-mail and instant messaging has provided a faster, more efficient and often more convenient form of peer-to-peer communication. However, along with new methods of communication, has emerged a new medium for criminals. Criminals have found it easier and often safer to communicate via e-mail as opposed to the telephone as this avoids the possibility of wiretaps. Such instances of criminal use of the Internet include instances of espionage, and drug trafficking. The Internet has also led to the creation of a new kind of crime — cyber crime.
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