POST YOUR TESTS HERE

1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as “Spock”, “Kirk”, and “Scotty”.

To use the metaphors of “Spock”,”Kirk”, and “Scotty” I recalled from one incident in which all three metaphors were used. On a fall night, my friends and I were on our way to a friend’s Halloween party, while on the 10 freeway headed east to Fontana a large SUV had struck my small sedan. The large SUV had struck my sedan so hard on my left side it made me hit another car that was too the right of me. In doing so I was a pinball between two cars bouncing from one car to the other. After I was free from the cars I had spun in a counterclockwise circle three or four times. I was able to straighten out my car successfully without hitting another car in the process, after the accident my friends had said it was miracle but the “Spock “in me logically thought it was not. The accident had logically made sense in such way that due to how I spun and the cars behind me saw the accident and had avoided me. When my Father arrived he was less than enthused. He had blamed me for the accident and said I should have seen it coming; this is when the “Kirk” in me came out with a fire. I defended myself and boastfully preached to my father that I did the best I could to make sure my friends and I did not die that night. In that argument that’s when “Scotty” took over and I told my father it was my skill and trained reflexes that had saved my friends and I.

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?
In my life I have had many coincidences, none such more special to me than my friendships with Andrew and my friend Dominic. Andrew, I had met him while working at retail store a few years ago. At the time we were both managing and during the long hours we had become close friends due to the stuff we have in common. A few years later we had found out that we actually had been baptized at the same church. It was big time coincidence because we were already good friends simply because we had stuff in common. Finding out that we shared the same religion and had shared the same church only strengthened our friendship. Dominic and I had a similar experience as well. I met Dominic in high school, along the road that is our friendship we had later discovered that our families had met before. Apparently our families have had a run in before we were born. My uncle and his aunt had dated in high school and they almost went as far as getting married. When we found out our families have history we laughed at the idea that us knowing each other was destined. It was simply a major coincidence.

#11632

1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as “Spock”, “Kirk”, and “Scotty”.

I was in the Air Force for 6 years. I recently held the job as an armorer (responsible for issuing and maintaining $2M worth of various weapons, ammunition and equipment. Twice a shift, I am responsible in arming up (issuing weapons and equipment) to the security forces (military police). There are two arming windows (small sized armored windows, that swing open to the outside of the building and we issue from there, as well as one door, with an optional arming window attached, on the inside of the building. The regulation is that we are to arm up on the outside no matter what whenever possible. When it came time to arming up outside for the winter, rain, wind or snow unless it reaches 32 degrees, we were instructed to continue arming up on the outside. Some of the other armorers, on other shifts would arm up on the inside because they did not care, and wanted to hook up the people arming up in the cold, so that they could be inside, with the warmth. My inner "Spock", when approached by others, those even higher ranking, and my own beliefs that it makes logical sense when snowing/raining with high wind, and very cold, even if not exactly 32 degrees, that arming them up inside should be true. Sometimes a stickler, my inner "Kirk" came out when defending the reason why I was not going to arm them up on the inside, causing some very negative attitudes from the others. My inner Scotty would come in, as the engineer of the whole arming up, and sometimes change direction and allow them to arm up on the inside.

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?

My unusual coincidence has been happening for several years upon years now. It is a numerical coincidence at that. I see it unbelievably less now, but it seemed as soon as I entered the Air Force, through my deployments to Iraq, I would see the number 333. I would wonder after several times of seeing the number from clocks, to gas prices, to building numbers. I told my mother about it after several months of this numerical coincidence and she would start seeing it as well. Her and I would actually end up texting each other 3:33 if our phone or a clock displayed the numbers. Several times I can recall waking up in the middle of the night to the number 3:33 in the morning. To this day she seldom sends me texts with 333 as I see it less. I was always looking for a meaning for it as I felt that the number 333 was following me. I even felt it was strange that I walked passed a barrier in Iraq with the number 333 on it. Several 333's to be exact.

It is actually quite simple to look at this numerical phenomenon/coincidence as chance. There is no meaning. Tell someone to not think about chocolate cake, and what do they think about? In my mind the more often I saw this number, the more my brain played the game of noticing, and I could notice it in places that most people would not. The same would go for vehicles. There was a time when I was younger, when I would notice an expedition. I then started seeing expeditions everywhere and though that it was so odd. Again, completely coincidental, as my mind was more aware of one particular number and or item compared to everything else going on around me.

1. A few years ago, my senior year in high school, my friends and I had strategically planned our senior prank, although it was somewhat of a failure, it was an intense night. In reference to the “Spock” metaphor, that night was planned with cautiousness and logical reasoning that went beyond anything a criminal would have thought of. We first unlocked the high school gates (method will be omitted) and entered the premises, all eleven of us dressed completely in black and bandanas covering our faces. As we entered the school grounds, our prank went into action. We scattered underwear, which included bras, underpants, and thongs, all over the campus. As we made our exit out of campus, we realized that the lights were on in the boy’s locker room. As we made our escape, we ran through the baseball field, and at that exact moment we observed that there were two police cars passing by the campus. In reference to “Kirk,” the arrival of the police cars gave me an adrenaline rush, in which I encountered myself with a plethora of emotions. At that moment I felt excited, energetic, and happy; however, at the same time I also had a feeling of anxiousness and fear. I also felt like vomiting. This was not only one of the most exciting times of my life, but also the most terrifying. In regards to “Scotty,” our survival, as I may put it, was based off “everyman for themselves.” As we saw the police car driving down the street, we immediately dropped to the floor and crawled to the exit. We reacted with our instincts at this point in our adventure, and were more focused on not being caught and getting out of there. When we finally exited the school premises, our parents came by and picked us up. This story may sound as if we were hired by the CIA or something, maybe fictional, but this is legitimate and a true story.
2. Throughout my twenty-one years of life, I have encountered many coincidences that may have seemed somewhat odd and unexplainable. For example, the idea of numbers as a sort of “sign” is a huge deal within my family. A few weeks ago, as a matter of fact, my brothers and I went on a mini vacation to Ensenada, Baja California. Ensenada was where my father was raised after having been born in Zacatecas, Mexico. After checking into our hotel, my brother noticed that our room number was “103.” My brother was astounded when he saw these numbers grouped together. My family is big on skepticism, so when he told us what he saw, of course, my other siblings were startled as well. My father has been deceased for about four and a half years now and his birthday was on 01/03/64, so of course seeing this number made my brothers think it was some sort of “sign.” They made a scandal about this because we were in Ensenada, where he was raised, and our room number was associated with his birth month and day. This next unusual event happened more to my friend than it did to me, but I was there to witness it. A quick background story: my friend’s brother is in the military reads the King James Version (KJV) of the bible, and at the time of this event they were having issues. It was during one of our semesters here at Mt. SAC that we came together to study and do homework at the nearest Starbucks. It was a really crowded night at Starbucks and there was this woman who could not find a seat and was rudely told by some other woman that she could not occupy the seat next to her. My friend, being kind as always, offered her the seat next to her and the woman was really grateful and said, “I’m glad people your age have such great manners.” As we were about to leave, the woman slid a Starbucks gift card toward my friend, and my friend claimed that it was not hers, but the woman told her, “it’s fine, take it. Thank you again.” As we exited Starbucks, my friend saw that the woman had written on the card “Thank you for your kindness. 6:24-26 KJV.” Instantly, my friend said it was a sign, and questioned what she should do about the situation. I merely saw it as coincidence, but my friend literally saw it as a message from the heavens. Bertrand Russell would most likely explain this as not thinking with clarity and exactness. “If you allow yourself to think inexactly, your prejudice is your bias,” states Russell. Seeing every repeating number, name, letter, or pattern, will not make it a sign, but a mere coincidence that this exact thing appeared at the moment where the person is most delicate. However, the ultimate question will always strike a person´s mind, is this really a sign, or is it just a fragment in our own imaginations?

Film Test 1 - Code:11632


1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as “Spock”, “Kirk”, and “Scotty”.

Sometimes when you don't have much time throughout the day for everything you need to do, it becomes hard to fit everyone into your busy schedule. Pair that with endless traffic on the road and you find yourself sitting on the freeway bumper-to-bumper for at least a few hours a day. With so little time and so much to accomplish, it seems like an impossibly difficult feat to achieve, especially when other people are also trying to invite you out. I've been put in this position many times before and I've noticed myself react differently at separate times.

I draw a connection between my choices and the principle of the Star Trek Metaphor. In one instance, I acted as Spock, my logical brain, and mapped out the distances between destinations, figured out time required, and realized that it just didn't make sense for me to make the trip that day on such limited time. In another instance, I let Kirk take the wheel. I had made plans with an acquaintance of mine from high school and I was really excited to see them again after so many years. I disregarded the rest of my day and chose to see an old friend. Finally, to my knowledge, the reptilian brain plays a major part in determining instinctual behaviors. This can be seen in the way people (myself included), often wake up and prepare for their day in a ritualistic manner. After implementing their routines into habit, these routines become their reptilian responses to "survive".

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?

I have heard from somewhere before that luck is not a real thing - it is merely the circumstance of being at the right place at the right time. With that in mind, the idea that any fascinating or unusual occurrence happens by chance can actually be attributed to being at the perfect space in time. When I was in middle school, I took a trip to China over summer with my family. While there, I bumped into one of my friends from school. I thought it was a pretty wild coincidence how we were both in the same city across the globe. Bertrand would probably explain that there are so many people moving around the earth and at such a rapid rate that it is not as big a surprise as you might think to see someone you know far from home. It is all about being at that exact place at the exact point in time. Another instance that I'm sure that many of you are familiar with is when you and a few friends are playing basketball and start heaving the ball full-court to try to score in the opposite basket. Although basketball is a game of skill, it becomes exponentially difficult to fully control the trajectory of the ball because of outside factors, including but not limited to, wind, ball spin, etc. Unless of you are really on-point with your shots, you are more than likely going to take a good number of attempts before someone makes it. When someone actually does end up making it, ask them to do it again. It usually isn't that easy to do it again back-to-back. When we start to take more attempts again, that's when you will start making the shots at a higher likeliness. If you could shoot the ball with the exact same amount of force every time, you would still need to have all other outside conditions to fit before the ball could go in. With a higher number of attempts, the chances of hitting the shot (experiencing the unusual coincidence) increases . Sometimes it really is the wind that is affecting your shot!

1.)“Spock, Kirk, Scotty” Code 11632

My whole life I’ve looked at things from a logical perspective (Spock). Always look for the logical thing to do. There are plenty of instances where I picked logical reasoning over emotional reasoning. One example was a couple years back, when a girl had asked me to go with her to get a drink. It was late at night, right after a long shift and she invited me to get a drink. Here comes where logical me started kicking in. I denied her request and instead I thought that I should just stay home and relax. I thought that it would be logical if I stayed at home rested and be ready to have work fairly early the next day. So I ended up rejecting her offer and stayed home. Which was not a bad idea. But sometimes I have thought things with my emotional reasoning (Kirk), which is not too often. I only use my emotional reasoning for things and people who I care about the most. I have done things for that person even though I knew it was not the right thing to do or something that I despised. When I and other people wanted to go and hangout I usually just go with the flow, never my choice what to do. I set aside my emotional wants and instead paved way for other people’s wants. Other people’s happiness is more important than it is to me, it sounds sad, but that is how I see myself being happy. Especially my relatives, I’d do everything for them, especially my sisters. My survival or the reptilian reasoning (Scotty) happens every day and everywhere I go. My survival or reptilian reasoning should be heightened. It should be for everybody, every day is a for survival, we live in a world where everything is competition, everywhere there are dangerous situations and we all must be prepared to tackle that situation. This will drive us to become who we are and that keeps us attached.
2.) Surfing Matrix

“Surfing Matrix”
Coincidence defines as a situations or events that happens at the same with time without apparent connections or causal. It can also be called a miracle or a luck. Surfing Matrix talks about coincidence and how things work and sometime chances of ultimate glory come in places or times that will never happen but happens because we could never know what happens in this universe. In my life on of the biggest coincident that happen to me was the day I was born, the same day my mother is having her 32nd birthday. I have never in my life has seen a son and her mother have the same birthday, which is quite fascinating. Another coincident would be having friends from the Philippines here in the United States. I moved to the United States about eight years ago. I never thought that I would ever see a friend of mine in the Philippines who will actually start their own lives here. They were pretty well off in the Philippines and to see them here in the States was pretty coincidental. Bertrand Russell and skeptics will explain this incident by most likely explaining the change in the environment in the Philippines and weight in the opportunity presented to my friend’s parents. Thought that their opportunity in United States outweighs the opportunity in the Philippines.

Reply to jamesriii:
The way you had your "Spock, Kirk, Scotty" incidents were a perfect examples of their metaphors. The "spock" made sure that your car accident situation did not overcome the "kirk" in you. And that is very important, keeping your composure to handle the situation without losing it. And of course, we need a little "scotty" in us to be able to secure the people in our environment.

First critical thinking test code: 11632
1. Drawing from the Star Trek metaphor, and using your own life as a template, describe three or more incidents from your life where you reacted as "Spock", "Kirk", and "Scotty." Feel free to tell it in story form.
An incident in which I reacted as Spock, Kirk, and Scotty recently would have to be this past summer,I met this guy on Instagram and we started dating the Spock in me told myself that I was rushing into things too quickly. After a couple of days he started telling me that he was no good for me and that all he was going to do was break my heart. But me being the stubborn person that I am I thought to myself that I could change him, but in reality I wasn't being logical at all. Everything was going good until about 5 months into the relationship, he completely disappeared for about two weeks, his excuse was that he broke his phone. But that same day I was on Instagram going through pictures when I saw a picture that he had posted , it was him and some other girl. He had been cheating, thinking I was never going to find out. I confronted him about it, and his excuse was "I told you that all I was going to do was hurt you." This brought out the Kirk in me, I couldn't help but to be sad and think that my world was falling apart. I had a flashback to the day he told me how he truly was, and all I could think was how could I have been so stupid. Later that night, the Scotty in me came to realize that I don't need a guy like that in my life, I could just be equally as happy being single or being in a relationship. Another instance where I reacted as Spock, Kirk, and Scotty would have to be my senior year of high school, around graduation time. I realized that our time in high school was coming to an end, and that we all were going to go on with our lives to do bigger and better things.(Spock) After about a couple of weeks later it was finally the big day, graduation day. I couldn't help but to feel sad, I was going to miss my friends and my small senior class of only 97 girls. I started to think about how much we had accomplished those 4 years in high school, my mood quickly changed from being sad to being proud of myself as well as my classmates. (Kirk) After our graduation ceremony I realized that we were all going our separate ways, and that we all had a strong foundation that would help us succeed in our college careers.(Scotty)

2. Drawing from the film, Surfing Matrix, and using our own life as a template, describe two or more incidents from your own life where you experienced an unusual coincidence. How would Bertrand Russell or a skeptic explain it rationally?
An incident in my life in which I experienced an unusual coincidence would have to be my senior year of high school. The day of Prom we were all getting ready because the limo we had rented was going to come in 2 hours. The limo finally arrived and everyone was super excited and couldn't wait to get to the location in which the prom was being held. We were on the freeway when all of a sudden the limo broke down, and we were already running late to the prom. We were all standing on the side of the freeway freaking out, after bout 25 minutes to our surprise a limo pulled over and asked us what happened. We explained to the driver that it was the day of our Prom and he offered to drive us to the location, when we got there we offered to pay him, but he told us not to worry that things happen and that he was glad that he could help us. A skeptic would explain this as just a person that wanted to help a bunch of teenagers out, they would say that it was no coincidence that it was just our lucky day.