Comments for Medical Biophysics GSU (@UofT)

Comment on Web 2.0 and Open Learning by Cale

Cale — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:56:17 +0000

I agree, I think there will be some sort of hook eventually. Maybe universities figure a similar thing that happened to the music industry might happen to them so they are trying to get ahead of the curve? This might be a realistic fear, since pretty much any student with a recording device could publish there lectures online anyway. Why not start charging a per lecture fee?

On that note anyone interested in the NCET course – there is a new version starting March 16th (so you can take it in real time) and ask questions etc. Follow that link in the body of the post and sign up soon if you’re interested!

Comment on Web 2.0 and Open Learning by Greg Anderson

Greg Anderson — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:58:59 +0000

I’ve often wondered about this, since I came across “iTunes U”, in which entire lectures from many courses can be downloaded for free. In my experience, no university or college does anything altruistically (nor does a company like Apple), so there must be a perceived hook somewhere. It’ll be interesting to see where this leads.

Comment on MBP St.Paddy’s Day Pub Night 2010! by Greg Anderson

Greg Anderson — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 21:16:23 +0000

The poster should probably list who to buy the $5 tickets from…

Comment on Top 10 moments of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics by Sam O

Sam O — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:33:43 +0000

Great post Firas! Perhaps the best post yet on this website, must have been the flame and pride of BC that carried you on this one!

Tessa Virtue? Fantastic name!

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Sam O

Sam O — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:35:10 +0000

I did…I thought it was spam….why it wasn’t?

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Greg Anderson

Greg Anderson — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:46:53 +0000

I don’t know who erased the Jon Bon Jovi comment, but it certainly wasn’t me – I would never censor the greatest singer/songwriter of the 20th century!

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Peter Leimbigler

Peter Leimbigler — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 04:47:49 +0000

Sure thing. If this were real life, I’d break eye contact and say that my question was just me trying to reconcile cultural differences in eye contact with the research results.

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Greg Anderson

Greg Anderson — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 03:35:22 +0000

Sorry – I wasn’t clear in my last comment. I wasn’t saying that eye contact is less common in Asian cultures – I was just making a random example of ‘how’ things could be different between two cultures.

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Peter Leimbigler

Peter Leimbigler — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 23:29:39 +0000

If eye contact is less common in Asian cultures than in Western cultures, why would Asians derive more emotional cues from the eyes than the mouth?

These East-West differences in facial examination might have influenced emoticon design. Westerners emote with the mouth:
:/ :S
Easterners emote with the eyes:
^_^ -_- <_< o_O

Another MBP student (multi-gen Canadian) and I (1st gen white/Asian) once decided to frown at each other. She turned down the corners of her mouth, I lowered my eyebrows, and we both got confused.

Comment on Culture And Facial Recognition: More Than Meets The Eye by Greg Anderson

Greg Anderson — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 19:31:47 +0000

Good question Cale. My guess is that it stems from an early social construct in which, for instance, it would’ve been considered rude to look someone directly in the eye (or some other variation), and this social construct continued in some form to the present day.

I forgot to add that Asian participants in this study were more readily able to determine if they had seen an Asian face before more so than a Caucasian face, and vice versa for the Caucasian participants. Interesting, no?

Here’s a good question: what about Asians raised in North America, and Caucasians raised in Asia? I wonder how they would respond in this study.