I'm The Face (Click For Song)

My grades are in. The students were told them. I taught. We discussed the circles people have to go through - the lech lechah of life. And in Gemorah we discussed the way witnesses can bring additional proof even after questioning and sentencing are done. I ended that class with the story about the 2 guys who were late for an exam and said it was due to a flat tire. The teacher put them in separate rooms and gave them a one question test: "Which one?"

I sat with one student today and talked about things I can write in her Israel recommendation. it's been three years since I taught her. The deadline is coming up and the requests are piling on. I had four Torah guidance meetings today. People feel so many emotions and need to share and be heard.

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According to John Cleese, in his series "The Human Face," we can create 7,000 facial expressions, as opposed to crocodiles who only can exhibit one expression. The face consists of 44 muscles and two bones (skull & jaw). Unlike other body muscles those in the face are not connected to the bone and thus have great mobility.

I'm watching/listening to this program as I decompress through writing. My ear hurts. Hard to tell if it hurts less. An ear infection and its pain is kind of like being pregnant in that there really isn't such a thing as a little bit.

Cleese just did a feature about an arguing couple and how their facial expressions play into their relationshipo. They're flown to an institute in Seatle, where a Dr. named John Gottman - wearing a colorful kippah - hooks them up to machines, tells them when they argue their heart rates go through the roof and that her expression toward him is one of contempt and disgust. I looked up Gottman and according to Wikipedia he "was born in the Dominican Republic to Orthodox Jewish parents. His father was a rabbi in pre-WWII Vienna. John was educated in a Lubavitch yeshiva elementary school in Brooklyn, and currently identifies with Conservative Judaism."

The show (first episode of four) also includes a young man with Asperger's, who doesn't sense with him brain what the expressions of others mean - the way most people do. He trains himself to memorize the clues. It's touching to hear Cleese say that he respects this fellow's efforts. Also featured is a young girl who can't move her face, and is stuck with one plain expression. Her parents decide to get her an operation to allow her to smile. The operation is a success and the young girl becomes more integrated, being able to smile like most everyone else (including those who can but opt not to).

Cleese discusses the true smile of enjoyment versus fake smiles. The true one is very hard to force. He shows pictures of three women and asks the viewer to guess which one was happiest 40 years later. Dacher Keltner speaks about this study which claimed to predict happiness based on one photo (such as a college grad's yearbook shot). Of three photos they focus on, one person exhibited movement in two muscles - one around the eyes, the other nearby the lips. She exuded happiness and was happy 40 years later. The other two lack the eye muscle movement and are less happy (this claim is supported by one being divorced and the other not yet married).

Dr. Paul Ekman speaks about how people try to use their faces to hide their lies, and how faces don't cooperate. He is the basis for the key character of Lie to Me. On his website he tracks each episode and explains that they get right and what they get wrong. He tested people like judges and cops and found that it's just a matter of chance if they get who's lying. Only secret service agents scored high, catching the liars. Ekman claims that in a half hour he can teach how to spot micro expressions that give away the liars.

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I'd love to write more, but it's time for bed, time to rest my head, to go to my pillow, and float away, till it's a new day.

Imagination

Our fantastic fantasies

Keep us afloat