As I traveled back from Belarus last week I glimpsed a photo of a gorilla in a magazine.
I recognised the gorilla’s facial expression as one of anger, and noticed that we share a great deal of similarity with other primates in how we signal emotions through facial expressions. This got me thinking:
The universality of facial expressions [1] was noted by Charles Darwin in his book “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals”. Darwin believed that expressions were innate in human nature, and as an anecdote he pointed out that the congenitally blind have similar facial expressions to other individuals. This was later supported by studies in the 1960s by Paul Ekman who found that apart from slight differences in facial morphology it was possible to apply a Facial Action Coding System [2] to evaluate many animals expressions. This strongly suggests that they could not have been learned, and instead may have evolved because they were signifiers of evolutionary fitness.
Adaptive function is normally given as the primary reason for the existence of shared facial expressions. For example: the widened eyes and raising of the brow in the facial expression of fear or surprise increases the field of vision and the speed of moving the eyes which helps finding and following threats, while the wrinkled nose and mouth of the facial expression of disgust limit the intake of foul-smelling and possibly dangerous air and particles. Likewise, when angry, furrowing the brow prevents too much light from entering the eyes.
As well as expressions formed from adaptive functions, others such as the “eyebrow flashing” greeting ease social bonds. Another facial expression, the smile is commonly thought of as being derived from the submissive “fear grin”, although I believe it could have also arisen in status hierarchies to distinguish between the aggressive baring of teeth used externally and the more muted dominance required in intimate/familial group hierarchies. This is similar to how intimacy often requires vulnerability (e.g. back scratching, kissing, tickling, etc.)
Emotions get contained in facial expressions because we are conscious of their usual context. For instance, just as a lion may bare its teeth, or a gorilla can puff out its chest and furrow its brow, a human when confronting another might mimic predatory facial expressions to evoke the fighting abilities of those animals in the minds of their opponent. These symbolic aggressive or dominant displays would then in turn cause unconscious fight or flight responses in other animals depending on the status hierarchies that they percieve themselves as belonging to. While this seems believable as a reason for shared facial expressions when you consider the symbolic meaning and role of animals in some tribal societies, due to the prevalence of similar facial expressions in less self-aware animals I think it is unlikely that it is the primary reason.
Additionally, a facial expression with an adaptive function can become more distinctive and exaggerated in order to fulfill a primarily socially communicative function in a social group. For example, an interesting form of signalling happens when a facial expression is used as a metaphor in a context in which it loses its adaptive function, such as how when concentrating or showing uncertainty we often squint as if trying to see something in greater detail.
We share facial expressions with a number of primates due to a series of reasons that likely evolved alongside our emotions. A cross-cultural consistency of the combinations of facial movements exists that make up expressions of “disgust,” “fear,” “joy,” “surprise,” “sadness,” and “anger” [3]. These expressions were premammal and primal or filial, while emotions like shame and pride evolved in group settings later on as a form of social signalling.
There’s been a lot of buzz on RESTful Web Services [1] and yet there are still far too many developers that believe they may implement it by simply using a Rest class provided by their favourite framework.
I wonder if this has been helped by the obtuse or long-winded articles that are out there on the web and so here is my attempt at explaining the concept as concisely as possible:
Building a RESTful web service requires that you (a) make your API stateless to help cacheability. And also requires that you stop building the same concepts that already exist in HTTP as part of your API and instead build a uniform API [2] that inherits the HTTP Interface [3] by (b) treating URLs as resources, (c) implementing CRUD using the HTTP methods POST, GET, PUT, and DELETE; and additionally using POST for operations with side-effects such as financial transactions, (d) using the HTTP response codes and header data correctly, and by (e) identifying and interconnecting resources by URIs in the responses, hence being hypertext-driven (HATEOAS).
[1] http://roy.gbiv.com/untangled/tag/rest
[2] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2796371
[3] http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2616.txt
Groups often create feedback loops. At their worst they represent a mob that snuffs out any individual intelligence within. At their best they’re greater than the sum of their parts.
It has been shown that the collective intelligence held by a group is (a) positively affected by having a large number of socially-sensitive members whom are able to accurately read each other’s emotions, and (b) negatively affected by overbearing leaders that are reluctant to cede the floor to let others talk [1]. Groups which contain sensitive, participative members are intelligent, productive groups.
In many organisations if you privately ask somebody their opinion it does not match the opinion they give in public. For fear of ramifications many will act against even their most rational beliefs. Less sensitive individuals are more likely to be non-participative when they see that they will (1) need to defend themselves against overbearing members of a group, or (2) perceive their opinion as high risk in comparison to the group’s traditional value of security. On the other hand, more sensitive individuals are more capable of weighing the costs involved and participating.
Immediately, there are two concrete actions which if taken could help mitigate the first issue:
Unfortunately, the second issue is more significant and its solution requires a long-term shift to a more positive, innovative culture. In a company, I believe this has to be tackled on a personal level by acknowledging that we employ others for their talent and experience and that therefore we make better use of each other’s abilities when we give credence to their fresh opinions on old decisions. I assert that If you actively encourage employees to constructively challenge each other and to take ownership of their own ideas each individual employee will find it easier to participate and the collective intelligence of the group should increase.
As a manifesto:
Your responsibility is to encourage each other’s capacity to act independently. Your responsibility is to empower each to hold their own values and opinions with confidence. Your responsibility is to stand by them when they act decisively. Your responsibility is to trust them and their ideas. Your responsibility is to stop them when they say they are “still acclimatising”, act pessimistic or make light of feeling forced into unproductive work. Test uncertainty; don’t live life paralysed by doubt! Listening, understanding others, and being a cautious judge is wonderful but when you believe that something is right you should assert this with diplomacy and certitude, not simply for yourself but for those around you.
Put your faith in great people and let them know they are not alone. Through the empowerment of others create positive change.
[1] http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/12/19/group_iq
In order to motivate groups to take ownership, be creative and produce their best work, we must align individuals into a team vision [1].
In concrete actions
These abstract directions should also be pursued