Author: Matt Hyer

Test Yourself

In Daniel Pink’s chapter “Empathy,” he describes empathy as
the ability to imagine yourself in someone’s position and know what they are
feeling. He starts off the chapter by describing a scene and then saying that a
sign of empathy is yawning, as contagious yawning is a primitive empathetic
mechanism. Now it may be the fact that I barely got 3 hours of sleep last
night, or maybe I’m just a really empathetic guy; but either way I yawned quite
a lot during that passage.

At the end of the chapter I decided to do the exercise entitled “Test Yourself.” The
individual exercises were somewhat short, so I picked a couple of them. First I
took the empathy test, which measured empathy based on a series of questions. A
lot of these questions had to do with the process of things, and how we thought
about different things. The score was out of 80, with the average male score
being a 30 and the average female score being a 24. As the scores get higher,
it indicates less empathy. I scored a 33 on the test, which means that I am
slightly less empathetic than the average male.

This result was actually surprising, as I consider myself an empathetic person in
most areas. But as I thought more deeply about the results I came to the
conclusion that I am very empathetic person on some issues and very not
empathetic on other issues.

For the second activity I took a second test where you are shown videos of people
smiling, and you have to determine whether their smile is genuine or not. This exercise
allows you to read facial expressions and use different clues about muscles in
the face to determine whether the smile is real. I got 16 out of the 20 faces
correct, which shows that I am fairly good at recognizing facial features and
reading people’s emotions.

Daniel Pink’s definition of empathy is very important, and after doing some of these
activities, I will be more aware of its effect on everyday life and attempt to
show more empathy towards others.


Dedicated To…

After reading Daniel Pink’s chapter “Meaning,” I decided to
do the Dedication section at the end which asked to write a short dedication
about two people in your life who have really influenced you. Even though it’s
very unoriginal, I feel that nobody in my life has done as much for me as my
mom and dad. So I wrote my dedications about them.

Dad- Throughout my life my dad has supported me through all
my endeavors. He was my biggest fan in sports, and spent countless hours
throughout my childhood coaching my baseball and basketball teams. He is a naturally
quiet person, but he offers a world of wisdom and is always there for me when I
need him. I hope to retain the values he has taught me and grow up to have the
same integrity and honest he has. He is one of my best friends and has had a
huge influence on who I am today.

Mom- My mom is truly one of the nicest and most caring
people I know, and she has spent the last 18 years grooming myself and my
sister to have these same attributes. She has taught me the values of kindness
and perseverance, and demonstrates them in everything she does. It seems that
out of all the people I know, she takes the brunt of me when I’m not too
pleasant to be around. In doing this, she is always open and welcoming, and I
can always go to her to talk about life. I love my mom and she has shaped me
into who I am today.

There are so many people I can think of off the top of my
head that have had an influence in my life, but I would being doing a disservice
to my parents if I didn’t put them first. I feel that out of all the things in
your early life that shapes you, the most important thing is the family that is
around you, and my parents have done all they could and more to impart their
wisdom and values upon me.

This whole section is about meaning, and focuses a lot on
the pursuit to find the meaning of life. I feel it is a parent’s duty to put
their children in an environment which facilitates freedom so their children
can find their true meaning. My parents have done this, in addition to raising
me with the good values that they believe in, and I am truly thankful for that.


He Didn’t Know

So I read Daniel Pink’s “Story” section a couple days
ago and I really found a couple of the excercises at the end very interesting.
I decided to pick the activity “mini saga,” where the objective is to write a
50 word story that is short in length but has a beginning, middle, and end. It
is actually a lot harder than it looks, but hopefully I captured some emotion
in my 50 words.

He was a lively boy and never backed down from anything. He grew
up to be a big strong man with a loving wife and two beautiful kids. He served
his county. It would only be a year. He said goodbye, but he didn’t know it’d
be the last time.

Image countesy of http://www.snowmobileforum.com/lounge/3844-american-soldier.html


Reebok Who?

For this “do it yourself” homework that Dr. Hunter assigned us, I figured I would
think outside of the box a little and do some research on something that is
engineering based, and also has some good applications to what I am really
interested in.

In high school I played basketball and when you talk about basketball it’s more
than a sport, it’s actually a lifestyle. This ranges from clothes you wear,
music you listen to, and very importantly, shoes you wear. As a basketball
player and a connoisseur of good shoes, I am always on the lookout for the
newest and flashiest shoes. I the classic Jordan’s and Nikes, and every now and
then some Adidas, but one company I don’t think of when basketball shoes are
the topic is Reebok.

But Reebok is becoming a prominent shoe worn in gyms throughout the United States
with the continued release of the Zigtech. The Reebok Zigtech uses new
technology (this is how it relates to engineering) to reduce wear and tear on
key leg muscles by up to 20%.

This new technology was produced by Bill MgInnis’  team of Reebok engineers. MgInnis is a former NASA engineer and used similar “space technology” in the creation of this revolutionary shoe. He describes the technology of the shoe as “Traditional energy return is focused only on the vertical impact of the heel strike. In contrast, ZigTech is designed to transfer energy horizontally along the zig-zags so the athlete gets that energy back in the
forefoot.”

By reducing the amount of wear and tear on the muscles, the shoe allows athletes
to train longer and harder. It also protects against common stress injuries
such as shin splints, which is a very common and nagging injury among
basketball players (I have had them and they are not fun).

So next time you go out on the court and you see somebody wearing Reeboks, don’t judge them and write them off as a scrub, rather appreciate their taste in modern
engineering and support of new innovations.

Image courtesy of http://searchdiscovered.com/?dn=zigtechbasketball0.tk&pid=7POV4K08T&_=1319729508


My Inspirations

As I said in my previous blog, I am currently a mechanical engineering major, and although this isn’t set in stone, my inspirations have come from engineers or innovators of some sort.

My first inspiration comes from a physicist and inventor named Robert
Goddard. He attended Worcester Polytechnic Institute and received a BA in
physics, following this with a MA in physics from Clark University. He even did
research at Princeton University later in his career.

 A magnificently brilliant man, Goddard is credited with building the first liquid fuel rocket. More than his actual physical contributions to physics, he showed the world that rockets were possible, and this allowed others to take his ideas farther and eventually send
a man to the moon. Although the name nowadays is synonymous with space travel
and rocketry, Goddard did not enjoy this recognition until after his death in
1945.

Goddard is now given sufficient credit for his contributions and is considered one of the most successful innovators of the 20th century.

My second inspiration comes from a lesser known name, but one that
has particular personal relevance to me. Kevin Plank, an entrepreneur and business is now one of the most successful CEO’s in the United States with his athletic apparel company, Under Armour.

Plank started this process as a football player for the University
of Maryland. (Now, as I mentioned, I am especially fond of Plank because he is
a UMD grad, and I am originally from Maryland and spent my whole childhood as a
UMD fan. I even saw Plank driving his Maserati to one of the football games!).
He had a problem with sweating, and while looking for a new material to wear
besides cotton shirts, he stumbled across an alternative material. Plank
marketed his new product with past teammates gone to the NFL, and eventually
caught his break after an ad for his product appeared in ESPN magazine. Plank
took the opportunity and ran with it, making Under Armour one of the most
successful apparel companies in the United States.

Although Plank is an entrepreneur, his product is a work of engineering, and this paired with his marketing skills, is a combination to be marveled at.

One of the great American inventors and my third inspiration is Henry Ford, and engineer and business man who is known for his success in mass production and his company, Ford Motor Company.

Ford started out as an engineer for Edison Illuminating Company, and then through personal ventures came out with his first invention, the quadricycle. Following this Ford worked for the Detroit Automobile company, and he eventually created the Ford Motor Company.

In 1908 the Model T was introduced, which provided Americans
with an extremely durable and relatively cheap way to buy a car. This was
because of the assembly lines they were produced on which distributed labor and
cut overall costs. Later on in his career Ford also introduced the Model A
which also turned out to be very successful.

Ford not only created these vehicles, but was a pioneer in
the automotive industry, and much of today’s success with cars and public
transportation can be originally credited to Ford. He was a great engineer, and
forged the way for the automotive industry today.

Images courtesy of http://www.picturehistory.com/product/id/4463, http://www.entreprenant.us/2010/10/14/fortune’s-40-under-40/, and http://qualitystudents.com/strategies-for-success/inspirational-quotes/inspirational-quote-henry-ford-faster-horse/


Different Roads

When I think of the future, it’s like a looking for a lighthouse in the middle of a foggy night. Sometimes it becomes clear when the light is facing you, but then it circles around and all is dark. I have some very general ideas about what my future will likely hold, but these are just blueprints, and in life a lot of things don’t go as planned.

All throughout school I have excelled at math and science, so naturally I decided
to take that path when deciding on college. Here at Georgia Tech, I really couldn’t
think of studying anything other than engineering or some kind of science. I
suppose I am also following in the footsteps of my father, who went to Rutgers
University and is now a systems engineer for a Navy program called Aegis. At
this point in my life, I would be extremely pleased to work on something of
that nature in my professional career, but circumstances are always changing.

When I applied to Tech, I really had no discernable idea of what I wanted to do
outside of general engineering, and followed the lead of hundreds of others and
put down undeclared engineering. Over the next couple months after I was
accepted, I started to think, “What do I enjoy doing?” Well I like math and
science which narrows it down to basically every type of engineering major.
Then I thought about the shop engineering class I took my junior and senior
year, and how much enjoyment I received from fiddling around and building
things. I then thought back to when I was younger (and had a lot more free
time), and how I used to always be trying to build a go cart or some other
simple little toy. I figured that because of all this I should try out
mechanical engineering.

I really like the fact that mechanical engineering is such a broad discipline,
and allows for crossover and involvement with many different topics. It allows
for creativity and hands on projects, and that really sparks some interest in
me.

Whichever road I end up going down I really want to make an impact on something. The way I think about it there is no point in doing something if you are not going to do it well, and if it doesn’t have an effect on something. I wish to excel at whatever it is I come upon, and with this mentality I will reach my goal of having an impact.

As unclear as this blog appears, my overall goal is quite clear. I am just
deciding which path I want to take to there. I might change my mind on the type
of engineering I want to do, or even decide I want to do something different
all together. But I believe this is part of the overall process, and will
eventually lead me to my ultimate goal to make an impact on something. As
Charles DeLint said, “The road leading to a goal does not separate you from the destination; it is
essentially a part of it.”

Image countesy of http://traff-advertazer.com/?fp=D5dP5vy8Vz0hY3oNG%2FS8pLsW8RQS7PXFfah7kr4FuvilV2ZA68vOy0PRdmd8Y1NGYeyDnjc5dWWVVOVchtAeiw%3D%3D&prvtof=4VHD8nttv0tdM5l743gFYm6ymAOk3%2F0pYW5PQiMTyMnPv5QhygBuNW3rh5FTV1Z%2FdCl9skpgW6gMU1ZLH7bhJW0aX0FVdoGWpkeeRRXak84%3D&poru=1qSaLJQC3KwFH1XH%2FPBM7pP%2FUmFxY4oEkuNgQWKR%2B%2BgjmY38Qn2uEW8TlFgpjbU8cA3PNXLRYj50F7Q%2FGyBBEg%3D%3D&cifr=1&id=421


Invention Mob Process

In the beginning, our teacher gave us some very broad guidelines which involved making
a project, similar to the ones that Ze Frank’s, using the idea of collaborative
process. This basically means that she wanted us to involve different, random
people, bringing them together through our project, and eventually compile it
into a final product of some sort. The day she asked us to do this, we all
brought in small knick-knacks that we were supposed to use as inspiration.
These included an original song, a pair of Kanye West “stunna shades,” a paper
airplane, and a paper ninja star.

At first, we tried to incorporate all of these objects into our project, but then decided on the song and the sunglasses. The
song was very meaningful and heartfelt, written about loneliness. Through
collaborative thinking, our group came up with the idea to make a music video centered
on the song. This idea was derived from the “stunna shades.”

Our group brainstormed ideas for the music video and first began to go with the
idea to act out the music video with us as the actors. But as we dove deeper
into that idea, we found that it would be increasingly difficult to incorporate
the collaborative process of other people into our project with that method.
Our breakthrough came when one of the group members had the idea to model our
music video of The All American Rejects “Dirty Little Secrets” video, where the
video consisted of screenshots of people holding up their secrets on a small
piece of paper. This was the perfect idea for our project as it allowed for
creativity and other people could contribute to it. We changed the idea a
little bit for our project, and decided to allow the participants to each take
a lyrical line from the song and draw their feelings or thoughts.

This idea ended up working very well, as we received some very well thought out and
meaningful drawings from some of the participants. Others did not spend as much
time on their drawings, but the still meant a lot and helped to contribute to
our final product. Overall, we had a very meaningful project and process that
met the guidelines our teacher set and also involved a great deal of creative
thinking.


Invention Mob Update

So our invention mob project is due next week, so it is time
for an overall update our group’s status. First of all, our group is centering
our project on a song, made by one of the group members, and we are using this
as a way for different people to give their input and really make this a
collaborative project. To do this, the lines of the song were split up divided
among our four members. Each of us went around our dorms (at least I did), and
asked people if they would draw a quick doodle of what each lyric meant to
them. In my experience most of the people I asked were very willing to help me,
but were a little hesitant when I said I needed to film them holding their
piece of artwork. All of these small clips are going to be edited and put
together to go along with the song as a music video. Overall, my experience
collecting pictures and input from other people has been a pleasant experience,
and hopefully once we work out the other smaller aspects of our project we’ll
have a great final product!

Image courtesy of http://forthewinter.deviantart.com/art/Cute-Doodles-191784556


Boom.Headshot.

Today I read Daniel Pink’s chapter entitled play. In the
chapter he talks about the importance of different activities such as joyfulness,
laughter, humor, and games in people’s lives.  According to Pink these activities help to
stimulate parts of the right brain that enable things such as the ability to
place situations in context and combining different perspectives into new
alignments. At the end of the chapter, Pink listed many different activities to
do to “play” as he says. I chose the option entitled “Get Your Game On,” which consisted
of playing a videogame and looking at some videogame websites. Now unlike most
of the population at Georgia Tech, I am not a big fan of pc games such as WoW
and others. This may be caused by my lack of exposure to them or just the fact
that I don’t like them. Either way, I have an Xbox in my dorm room so I decided
to play some Call of Duty black Ops. I really enjoy this game because of the
real life aspect of it. As you’re playing, you feel as though you are walking
through the destruction riddled streets of some Middle Eastern country, or
hiking through the snow in Northern Russia. The idea that the things in the
game could actually happen makes it that much appealing and pleasing to me as a
gamer. As I played the game I was very focused, yet I was relaxed and haviing fun as I used my right brain.

Pink also gives a list of gaming websites to try visiting so
I tried and visited one of them. I scrolled through some of the game reviews
and videos, and then one video caught my eye. The video documented a bunch of
games trying to recreate a Call of Duty map and have a paintball battle on it.
From the M4 paintball guns to the incredibly realistic scenery, the video
looked like a shot out of the game. It was fascinating to watch and looks like
something I would definitely love to try!

This chapter gave me a new outlook on games and their actual
importance. They really are not a waste of time and can have some redeeming
value, in contrast to what my mom has been saying for the past 10 years.

Image courtesy of http://www.shuttervoice.com/12419/call-of-duty-black-ops-highlights-of-multiplayer-game-mode.html


Cannons and Explosions!!!!!

Today I read Daniel Pink’s “A Whole New Mind,” and in the certain chapter I read, he focuses on an idea called symphony. Pink describes symphony as being able to put together pieces and synthesize seemingly unrelated things into something. Symphony is combining different attributes or elements that don’t have anything to do with each other to make somthing brand new and spectacular. He further describes it as looking past the specific pieces and focusing more on the whole picture. This is a very interesting concept, however, as instinct tells us to focus on detail and every part that makes up the whole. Yet if we take Pink’s approach, it leads up a whole new road with different possibilities and outcomes.

After I read Pink’s chapter, he lists a number of accessible activities to do which demonsrate the idea of symphony. I selected th option of literally listening to a symphony play, Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture to be more precise. Like alot of Tchaikovsky’s work it is extremely powerful, with very full brass sounds which emulate power and strenth. Yet this version has a special twist to it. Near the end of the overture, Tchaikovsky actually incorporates real cannons and explosions into his piece. The product is astounding, bringing the piece to a whole other level. Although one might not identify classical symphonies and cannons together the combination is incredible, evoking such overwhelming emotions. The effect makes you feel as though you are watching the explosions outside of Moscow as the Russian army holds off Napolean and his army. This combination of two completely unlike elements and making it into something fantasmic is exactly what Pink talk about, and Tchaikovsky does it to perfection.