SciArt Writing
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Memory, Photography, and the Human Brain
There has been a good deal written about the similarities of the camera to the eye as well as the computer to human memory. What I would like to do is clarify the uniqueness of the human brain from camera technology and at the same time show the similarities between brain function, photography and cognition.
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Manipulated Photographs, Manipulated Memories
To study the phenomenon of false memories, a study was conducted to see if manipulated photos could be used to insert a false autobiographical memory into a participant’s personal history.
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The Science of Gear Acquisition Syndrome
When something rewarding or negative happens, we change our behaviors to increase the likelihood of reward and decrease the likelihood of harm. This type of learning is called behavioral reinforcementand it is pivotal to helping humans survive in the world.
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The Decisive Moment and the Brain
As a photographer, you will sooner or later bump into the phrase the decisive moment. The decisive moment is a concept made popular by the street photographer, photojournalist, and Magnum co-founder Henri Cartier-Bresson. The decisive moment refers to capturing an event that is ephemeral and spontaneous, where the image represents the essence of the event itself.
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How Artificial Intelligence Reconstructs Our Minds and Lives Using Our Photos
AI software analyzes digital images to reconstruct and map out the architecture of the brain. I will also show how the same software uses digital photos from social media sites to stitch together 3D models of entire cities. I will end by showing how this very type of AI analysis is used to reconstruct an individual’s personal information as a way of predicting human behavior.
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Instagram and Anxiety of the Photographer – Part II
The Avant-Garde movements of the 1910s, the 1960s, and the 2010s (via mobile photography) have not only changed photography but did so by further integrating technology with art, allowing photography to become unbound from its predecessor, unbound from space, and unbound from time as we once knew it.
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Instagram and Anxiety of the Photographer – Part III
The radical Avant-Garde utilized technology and irony to break continuity and reveal hypocrisy. Now, both technology and irony are the underlying forces of pop-culture. Technology is seen as both solution and problem. By definition, the problem is not the solution.
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Philosophy of the Selfie
The selfie may be only pixel deep, but it is a way for us to preserve our sense of self. Selfies are, in a way, their own mirrors: they show our image for the world to see as we want to be seen, and they safeguard against the fear of losing control of our minds and lives.
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Nostalgia and the Collapse of Imagination
Photography emphasizes nostalgia to visualize and understand a future that we cannot—or try not—to imagine. The ever-increasing use of retro nostalgia within the space of photo sharing may collapse ability to imagine a coherent future by altering the region of the brain that forms autobiographical memories.
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Photography and the Feelings of Others: From Mirroring Emotions to the Theory of Mind
Our ability to identify with and imagine someone else’s point of view is deeply ingrained into the architecture of our brain. Photography plays a unique role in triggering the network of brain regions that underlie empathy.
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Racial Justice Through the Lens of Science, Poetry, and Photography
Racial bias is well documented in photography—consider, for example, photographers’ inability to capture and expose darker skin tones with film. Within the emulsion of film, the chemicals that recapitulate light, is inherent social bias. There’s a distinct prejudice within the algorithms of our digital imaging technologies.
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Science Writing
Read more of Joshua’s scientific writing.