Top: The two vertical lines are straight
Bottom: “The Wife and the Mother-in-Law”
By: Ali Ismail
Telephone: 0778-842 5262 (United Kingdom mobile)
SEEING IS NOT BELIEVING
Watch out: your senses are not to be trusted despite appearances
Ever since I joined the staff of this organ I have been struck by the differing perceptions of reality presented by Bangladeshi politicians when summing up the state of that country.
For example the Awami League version of Bangladeshi society and what is to be done is not congruent with that of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, and both are different from the view held by the present American administration.
Why is this? The answer, of necessity, is rooted in fundamental human nature. Everything a man perceives is filtered through his own unique genetic patterns and mixed and merged into his past experiences. Therefore, it follows that the AL’s recipe for the ailments of Bangladesh differs from that of the BNP.
When I studied psychology (mostly experimental psychology) at university the field of perception played a large part in the syllabus. I remember that during the first year, which was called the Foundation Year, the audience was treated to a famous optical illusion called “The Wife and the Mother-in-Law” in which a picture that looks like a young woman turns out to be an old woman when seen in another fashion.
Later on, during the specialised years, there were other illusions such as the equally famous Muller-Lyer and the Grecian Vase/Two Faces one.
Because of the youthful character of the students and the undoubted fact that the lecturers used to hold things back for fear of misuse the deep lessons arising from these mistakes in perception were omitted from our course.
Whatever, I suppose nobody will deny that the way we see or otherwise apprehend people and things directs our judgements thereof. It is an everyday observation that person A who gives a good first impression to person B does not do so with person C. Clearly, person B’s interpretation of person A differs from person C’s.
What I am getting at is that human perception is not stable and reliable. The reality is quite the reverse. Our perceptions are volatile and untrustworthy. Furthermore, like so many other aspects of our lives, how we interpret things (such as the state of affairs in Bangladesh) can be and are controlled by third parties with vested interests in shaping how we think.
For example, at an academic level, with the Muller-Lyer, we saw in an earlier article of mine that how a straight line is presented affects our judgement of how long it is. Fins going one way make it seem shorter and fins going the other way make it seem longer.
For various reasons Western researchers have probed and invented to the point where hapless students of psychology have literally hundreds of psychological illusions to consider when studying perception. Many if not most are visual and there are auditory, tactile and even olfactory ones.
In these days of political correctness it is appropriate to reach back to a time when writers were not constrained by that atmosphere. The renowned philosopher William James writing in the pre-politically correct era of the late 19th century wrote:
“Any quality of a thing which affects our sense organs does more than that: it arouses processes in the hemispheres which are due to the organisation of that organ by past experiences, and the result of which in consciousness are commonly described as ideas which the sensation suggests. The first of these ideas is that of the thing to which the sensible quality belongs. The consciousness of particular material things present to sense is nowadays called perception. The consciousness of such things may be more or less complete; it may be of the mere name of the thing and its other essential attributes, or it may be of the thing’s various remoter relations. It is impossible to draw any sharp line of distinction between the barer and the richer consciousness, because the moment we get beyond the first crude sensation all our consciousness is a matter of suggestion, and the various suggestions shade gradually into each other, being one and all products of the same psychological machinery of association. In the directer consciousness fewer, in the remoter more, associative processes are brought into play.”
We see then that perception is a multi-faceted and complex phenomenon and not to be taken for granted at all.
One simple experiment that anybody can do at home is to prepare three bowls of water at cold, tepid and hot temperatures. If one sticks fingers in the hot and tepid bowls the tepid bowl seems cold; however, if one sticks fingers in the cold and tepid bowls the tepid bowl seems hot.
This shows that, far from being some kind of absolute measure, the way we interpret the world depends entirely upon context. The standard of non-paying hospital care in Bangladesh has to be considered in terms of the general Bangladeshi environment. The same standard of treatment and diagnosis in the NHS may lead to staff dismissals.
Also, when it comes to human rights and associated matters I submit the subject has to be taken in the general context of the conditions in which people live in the place where the happenings have occurred.
For example, in Pakistan it is usual for the police to administer thrashings to people who disturb the peace. One Pakistani told me that after getting a police beating the victim is frequently incapacitated for about a year. He did a graphic imitation of the zombie-like behaviour of such a person.
In a Western country a policeman who commits an unnecessary battering on a member of the public is well on the way to having his warrant card torn up in his face by his superiors.
The difference is that the “ground rules” in Pakistan are highly different from those of a Western country.
Another simple experiment that one can perform without any equipment at all is simply blinking in bright sunlight. If one blinks rapidly one will notice brief green flashes which last much less than a second just after opening the eyes. The reason is that when the eyes were closed they were seeing red through the eyelids; however, as soon as the eyes were opened again they saw green because green is the complementary colour to red.
In other words, when one is accustomed to something one is also naturally adjusted to the polar opposite. When a man is short of water and is thirsty he gravitates towards water. When he is bereft of light he maximises his receptivity to light by dilating his retinas.
Similarly, when one’s life is “nasty brutal and short”, as is the case in the Third World the world over, the mind is sensitised towards and driven towards “the good life” which no doubt plays an enormous part in explaining the risks and trauma migrants undertake to get into advanced countries.
With regard to the now highly publicised arrests of prominent people in Bangladesh for alleged corruption, one has to take into account that the caretaker government is probably influenced mightily by the example of other countries where the rule of law is almost as straight as a school ruler and where corruption is something one reads about in the foreign news sections of newspapers.
To expect the standards of Finnish statesmen in Finland in the context of South Asia may, possibly, be over-rigorous and taking cross-cultural importations a tad too far.
Just consider: In say, a typical Scandinavian country, the judge and other court officials are all removed from personal considerations of the court case at hand. In the Third World objectivity is difficult if not impossible to attain.
In our part of the world “the personal touch” is everything. All things are done personally with subjective feelings attached. Everything and everybody is treated separately and uniquely. There are few generalised and universally applicable rules governing everybody.
Therefore, I am putting forward that this caretaker government adjusts its perception of politicians in recent times in Bangladesh in terms of the Bangladeshi context which is subjective and personal – not objective and impersonal.
Even the very concept of honesty is subjective. Just as a straight line can be made to look bent by putting it against a certain kind of background (the psychologists call this “figure and ground”) an honest man can be made to look dishonest by presenting him in a certain way to the general public.
Just think of any Third World leader who has been hounded out of office by the Western powers collectively. He has had pretty bad publicity hasn’t he? Well, pro-Western leaders in the Third World do the same kind of behaviour, if not worse, with little to no bad publicity.
As one American statesman put it: “He may be a SOB but he is our SOB.”
Therefore, I say, think carefully about how your judgements have been influenced by third parties before joining in the Establishment’s mass condemnations.
We see then that perception is a multi-faceted and complex phenomenon and not to be taken for granted at all.
One simple experiment that anybody can do at home is to prepare three bowls of water at cold, tepid and hot temperatures. If one sticks fingers in the hot and tepid bowls the tepid bowl seems cold; however, if one sticks fingers in the cold and tepid bowls the tepid bowl seems hot.
This shows that, far from being some kind of absolute measure, the way we interpret the world depends entirely upon context. The standard of non-paying hospital care in Bangladesh has to be considered in terms of the general Bangladeshi environment. The same standard of treatment and diagnosis in the NHS may lead to staff dismissals.
Also, when it comes to human rights and associated matters I submit the subject has to be taken in the general context of the conditions in which people live in the place where the happenings have occurred.
For example, in Pakistan it is usual for the police to administer thrashings to people who disturb the peace. One Pakistani told me that after getting a police beating the victim is frequently incapacitated for about a year. He did a graphic imitation of the zombie-like behaviour of such a person.
In a Western country a policeman who commits an unnecessary battering on a member of the public is well on the way to having his warrant card torn up in his face by his superiors.
The difference is that the “ground rules” in Pakistan are highly different from those of a Western country.
Another simple experiment that one can perform without any equipment at all is simply blinking in bright sunlight. If one blinks rapidly one will notice brief green flashes which last much less than a second just after opening the eyes. The reason is that when the eyes were closed they were seeing red through the eyelids; however, as soon as the eyes were opened again they saw green because green is the complementary colour to red.
In other words, when one is accustomed to something one is also naturally adjusted to the polar opposite. When a man is short of water and is thirsty he gravitates towards water. When he is bereft of light he maximises his receptivity to light by dilating his retinas.
Similarly, when one’s life is “nasty brutal and short”, as is the case in the Third World the world over, the mind is sensitised towards and driven towards “the good life” which no doubt plays an enormous part in explaining the risks and trauma migrants undertake to get into advanced countries.
With regard to the now highly publicised arrests of prominent people in Bangladesh for alleged corruption, one has to take into account that the caretaker government is probably influenced mightily by the example of other countries where the rule of law is almost as straight as a school ruler and where corruption is something one reads about in the foreign news sections of newspapers.
To expect the standards of Finnish statesmen in Finland in the context of South Asia may, possibly, be over-rigorous and taking cross-cultural importations a tad too far.
Just consider: In say, a typical Scandinavian country, the judge and other court officials are all removed from personal considerations of the court case at hand. In the Third World objectivity is difficult if not impossible to attain.
In our part of the world “the personal touch” is everything. All things are done personally with subjective feelings attached. Everything and everybody is treated separately and uniquely. There are few generalised and universally applicable rules governing everybody.
Therefore, I am putting forward that this caretaker government adjusts its perception of politicians in recent times in Bangladesh in terms of the Bangladeshi context which is subjective and personal – not objective and impersonal.
Even the very concept of honesty is subjective. Just as a straight line can be made to look bent by putting it against a certain kind of background (the psychologists call this “figure and ground”) an honest man can be made to look dishonest by presenting him in a certain way to the general public.
Just think of any Third World leader who has been hounded out of office by the Western powers collectively. He has had pretty bad publicity hasn’t he? Well, pro-Western leaders in the Third World do the same kind of behaviour, if not worse, with little to no bad publicity.
As one American statesman put it: “He may be a SOB but he is our SOB.”
Therefore, I say, think carefully about how your judgements have been influenced by third parties before joining in the Establishment’s mass condemnations.
THE END
This article was published in the 15th march 2007 issue of the Bangla Mirror, the first English language weekly for the United Kingdom's Bangladeshis - read all over the world from the Arctic Circle to the sub-Antarctic.
