My Thoughts on the Story "Making Mona Lisa Smile."

Lets be real first before we get started on the real thing. Who came up with all these weird names for facial expressions and facial muscles, my goodness I thought I was surely going to get taken out of class from laughing so hard at these weird names.

I think that using technology to read someone emotions is horrible stupid. I mean come on why invade someones privacy. Why trust a computer when it can mulfunction, and calculate wrong. Yet some might say its a good thing to invade others personal emotions by using technology to see what their feeling and figure out why their feeling that way. Not everyones facial tissue or muscles are the same nor can you predict what their facial expressions mean as of emotions. Using a 3-D computer model of someones facial structer you can see the muscles of the face in different forms and can tell what emotions are showing.

Example: Your orbivularis oris (around your mouth) tightens your lips to show your anger. So the people who agree with using this technology would rely on the 3-D facial model of someone and look for muscle tightening or high raises of the eyebrows, or tightening of the jaw.

People who do not agree on this would say you can not always believe what technology says. Maybe someones facial expressions are natural. For instence someone who was born with difunctional issues; a lip attacthed to their nose, if someone were to use a picture of someone with a lip disorder and the persons lips are tight they assume it is cause they are mad. When in reality they might just be sad because their lip is stuck like that, and your assuming it's tight cause their mad.

Paragraph 5 talks about humans calculating everyday. well for one when the author says, ' You can probably tell how a friend is feeling simply by the look on her face." What makes you think it's a she it could be a he or a she. Don't assume genders author. Simply some people have trouble showing the right emotions too. For instance you could be happy and have a frown on your face and if someone were to send it the the facial computer and ask what is she/his emotions right now. Well the computer would say they are confused, when really they are happy and just had their face rested in a frown.

In paragraph 6 it says that, " most human communcication is nonverbal, including emotional comunication. So computers need to understand that, too." Dr. Huang notes said.

So why do computers need to understand how we feel? If we want someone to know how we feel, we will let them know. What's the point in wasting time working on a computer to figure out how someone feels when you could simply ask and not waste money and time on a computer that could malfunction? The author say's that the Mona Lisa demonstration is intended to bring a smile to your face, while it shows you just how much the computer can do. Well it surely didn't bring a smile to my face.

Instead it made me think of lot's of questions on stuff like; what happens if your so called computer malfunctions? Where will everything go? Surely you have everything saved? Have you tested it on many people more than 20? Were those people all the same? Or were they different? Do you know what people will think of it, or how they will react to all this new technology? Why did you use technology? What happens when we go into a blackout and you can't rely on any of the technology? People will want answers and then turn on you cause you relyed on something that can't function without electricity.

Paragraph 7 explains some "encoding" emotions and what to do while looking in the mirror then the author says that those instructions are for a face that looks happy. Now if your smart and I shall hope you are, we both know if you go to a mirror and force your eyes to squint and force your lips to move upwards, and then raise your cheeks up. Lets just say that will not look like a happy face, it will look like someone who doesn't know how to smile and is trying ot force a fake smile that looks horrible wrong.

Paragraph 8 talks about how a muscle clue can tell when a politician or celebrity isn't being truthful. Well what if someone asks them a personal question and they don't want the whole world to know? And you go and use that computer on their 3-D face you made and tell the world they were lying to that question. Hm well you just ruined that for them and exposed them. Now I know what your thinking they wouldn't do that, and maybe your right or wrong. Their is always someone who can hack or get the full version of this what do you call it FACS, and that person would probably spill it to the world and thank you for creating that machine. Then you're sucked into the law suits and drama and people who would sew you for ruining the world or someones life.

In paragraph 9 the author says, " According to the Facial Feedback Theory of Emotion, moving your facial muscles not only expresses emotions, but also may even help produce them." Does it really? I mean you can't force a smile, and we all know faking a smile does not make you happy. These facts are from someone who probably just used a couple peoples facial expressions to get to publish his or her's book so why not ask more than a couple peoples opinions and what they say about all this.

I understand why you would want to read a studens emotional expressions during class to see how they feel and what you could do to make it better, but what if it doesn't get better and you try everything you can and their still sitting in calss bored and tired and not giving a rat? Then your stuck with a machine you don't need anymore and less money than you had because you wanted to spend it on a machine then asking the student's what they thought could help them.

Most people would spend money on machines to try to help kids because thats all their used to doing spending money on kids to make them happy, when in reality you just need to have them suck it up and pay attention reward them with things that don't cost a lot or something that doesn't cost anything.

This is my opinion and my thoughts.