Hrong-Ray Lin
Expository Writing BD
164003765
Paper One Draft One
The brain and the mind work in unusual ways that people would not assume living through ordinary, repetitive day to day life. In Daniel Gilbert’s essay “Immune to Reality,” he proposes theories as to how the mind and brain work unconsciously, and why our emotions and feelings function the way they do. He disputes that every human being contains a psychological immune system which works to shield us from horrible experiences that threaten our happiness. When experiencing a traumatic event, our psychological immune systems responds by “cooking up the facts”, meaning taking the facts of the situation and turning the negative aspects of it and turning them into positive views.
Gilbert says that within us all is a psychological immune system, which serves the purpose to protect us from “grave threats” which represent “large-scale assaults on our happiness” (Gilbert 139). When a situation is threatening our happiness, an individual is determined to fight for the security of their happiness, even if it means having to lie to ourselves to find it. Gilbert refers to this process as cooking the facts, a subconscious behavior that can only be successful if the individual is unaware of the process. …show more content…
Daniel Gilbert’s Little Triggers theory says that to get past a great defense, in this case the brain, one must be unnoticeable and blend in as if nothing were different. Gilbert talks about strategies “based on the idea that the best offense is the one that fails to trigger the best defense” (Gilbert 136). It is possible for our minds to devise these little triggers to sneak past our brain to give us the ability to complete tasks we would usually be prevented to do. People with a loss of vision have been known to do this in order to “see” and “envision” things without physically doing so with their
Expository Writing BD
164003765
Paper One Draft One
The brain and the mind work in unusual ways that people would not assume living through ordinary, repetitive day to day life. In Daniel Gilbert’s essay “Immune to Reality,” he proposes theories as to how the mind and brain work unconsciously, and why our emotions and feelings function the way they do. He disputes that every human being contains a psychological immune system which works to shield us from horrible experiences that threaten our happiness. When experiencing a traumatic event, our psychological immune systems responds by “cooking up the facts”, meaning taking the facts of the situation and turning the negative aspects of it and turning them into positive views.
Gilbert says that within us all is a psychological immune system, which serves the purpose to protect us from “grave threats” which represent “large-scale assaults on our happiness” (Gilbert 139). When a situation is threatening our happiness, an individual is determined to fight for the security of their happiness, even if it means having to lie to ourselves to find it. Gilbert refers to this process as cooking the facts, a subconscious behavior that can only be successful if the individual is unaware of the process. …show more content…
Daniel Gilbert’s Little Triggers theory says that to get past a great defense, in this case the brain, one must be unnoticeable and blend in as if nothing were different. Gilbert talks about strategies “based on the idea that the best offense is the one that fails to trigger the best defense” (Gilbert 136). It is possible for our minds to devise these little triggers to sneak past our brain to give us the ability to complete tasks we would usually be prevented to do. People with a loss of vision have been known to do this in order to “see” and “envision” things without physically doing so with their