
The Science of Pixar's ‘Inside Out’ - aaronbrethorst
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/05/opinion/sunday/the-science-of-inside-out.html
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tfigment
As always Fresh Air's Terry Gross on NPR did an outstanding interview with the
Director several weeks ago. They go fairly deep into the trade offs of making
a movie and getting the science right or at least right enough to be
entertaining and still meaningful to the young audience.

"It's All In Your Head: Director Pete Docter Gets Emotional In 'Inside Out'"

[http://www.npr.org/2015/06/10/413273007/its-all-in-your-
head...](http://www.npr.org/2015/06/10/413273007/its-all-in-your-head-
director-pete-docter-gets-emotional-in-inside-out)

~~~
forrestthewoods
This was great. Thanks for sharing.

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smcnally
This is interesting to hear from science's PoV:

> "First, emotions organize — rather than disrupt — rational thinking.
> Traditionally, in the history of Western thought, the prevailing view has
> been that emotions are enemies of rationality and disruptive of cooperative
> social relations.

> But the truth is that emotions guide our perceptions of the world, our
> memories of the past and even our moral judgments of right and wrong, most
> typically in ways that enable effective responses to the current situation."

Is it generally accepted that the Logic 'vs' Emotion dichotomy is a false one?

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jczhang
No its not, but how do you account for feeling about something that goes
against your logic? Ie quitting a job without finding another. How is emotion
guiding logic in every case?

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reagency
Emotions motivate you to act to improve your situation instead of do nothing.
They may be illogical, but they kickstart the thinking process. Logic is
useless if you don't wake up and use it. Emotions are the first past filter to
bring issues to your attention.

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tokenadult
Another good set of comments about _Inside Out_ can be found in the
Neurologica Blog maintained by Steven Novella, M.D. He likes the movie for
some of the same reasons that I like it.

"Inside Out – A Neuroscience Metaphor"

[http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/inside-out-a-
ne...](http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/inside-out-a-neuroscience-
metaphor/)

~~~
amirmc
Unfortunately, that article perpetuates the same (false) dichotomy between
emotion and reason. It also suggests that emotions and higher-order functions
are 'competing' for control.

The reality is that if the brain regions known to be involved in processing
emotion are damaged/destroyed, then there are very negative consequences for
your ability to make _rational_ and _well-reasoned_ choices. In other words,
emotion (and emotional processing) is _critical_ for logical thought to
prevail. In that sense, I really like that the movie had emotions at the
'control panel' (I've yet to see it).

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teh_klev
Slightly OT, but hearing about this film instantly reminded me of a childhood
comic strip called The Numskulls that appeared in various DC Thomson comics:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Numskulls](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Numskulls)

[http://www.fustar.info/2006/12/02/193/](http://www.fustar.info/2006/12/02/193/)

[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=the+numskulls+comic+strip&ia=image...](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=the+numskulls+comic+strip&ia=images)

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mhurron
Wow ... I hadn't thought of the Beano for god knows how long.

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qznc
> One of us suggested that the film include the full array of emotions now
> studied in science, but Mr. Docter rejected this idea for the simple reason
> that the story could handle only five or six characters.

What is the full array of emotions? Having seen "Lie to Me" I know about the
emotions expressed by microexpressions, but I do not know if there are more.
"Joy" is not on that list. Either it is no emotion in the scientific world or
expressed differently. Any good links?

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alisey
Every basic emotions researcher comes up with a different list. But most of
the lists include some version of fear, anger, disgust, and joy (but not
sadness). "Emotional Brain" by Joseph LeDoux, chapter 5 has more info on
various lists. From the same book:

James Averill, a major proponent of social constructivism, describes a
behavior pattern, called “being a wild pig”, that is quite unusual by Western
standards, but is common and even “normal” among the Gururumba, a
horticultural people living in the highlands of New Zealand. The behavior gets
its name by analogy. There are no undomesticated pigs in this culture, but
occasionally, and for unknown reasons, a domesticated one will go through a
temporary condition in which it runs wild. But the pig can, with appropriate
measures, be redomesticated and returned to the normal pig life among the
villagers. And, in a similar vein, Gururumba people can act this way, becoming
violent and aggressive and looting and stealing, but seldom causing harm or
taking anything of importance, and eventually returning to routine life. In
some instances, after several days of living in the forest, during which time
the stolen objects are destroyed, the person returns to the village
spontaneously with no memory of the experience and is never reminded of the
event by the villagers. Others, though, have to be captured and treated like a
wild pig - held over a smoking fire until the old self returns […]

Averill uses “being a wild pig” to support his claim that “most standard
emotional reactions are socially constructed or institutionalized patterns of
response” rather than biologically determined events.

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Retric
There is another popular view that replaces 'emotions' with neurochemicals.
Basically, serotonin is an actual chemical with actual biological effects
which fit's closely with specific emotions.

In this view emotions are shorthand to describe an incredibly complex system
and as such fit biology into a social context. However, people's responses to
said emotions fall under social conventions.

EX: Hunger is something you can directly study. But, peoples responses to
hunger vary widely.

PS: This also extends to things like chemical intoxication. The loss of
coordination when drunk is inherent, singing drinking songs is a social
response.

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IAmNotACellist
It's always fascinating to see the Pixar PR machine at work. "Guys, this July
4th weekend remember that there's a great family movie called Pixar's 'Inside
Out!' Pixar made it, and it's family friendly, starring an eleven year old
girl and these various situations that you can relate to. Scientists think
emotions are good, but sometimes when they appear bad they're also good."

It was published July 3rd, too.

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rustynails
The science behind the movie was very clever. What has disappointed me is that
Disney/Pixar keep on pushing the sexism gambit in their movies. This movie
wasn't as bad as some of their others, but they are Consistently failing to
address gender in a balanced way. Does anyone male in this movie do/say
anything good? What about Frozen? The stupid (Wessleton) and nasty (Hans) are
only male. Brave? Same thread. The kings/Princes are all obnoxious and/or
stupid. Wreck-it-Ralph : Kowalski strikes Ralph across the face as a show of
might and it's meant to be funny (ie. The modern assertive woman who bashes
men as "humour") Several of the tinkerbell movies where ratchet & clank are
the typical stupid males (and in most of them, they are almost the only
males). To be fair. They do portray the southern belle as a dimwitted hick
too, which is the stupid southerner prejudice emanating from the U.S. civil
war. However, they did a great job with Tangled and Princess and the frog -
there's a much better gender balance in those movies. It's a shame. You take
your kids to see a supposedly family friendly movie and you cringe at the
sexism that is pushed by the writers and directors. Do you just shrug it off,
wondering if this prejudice won't rub off on your kids - or do you highlight
the sexism to your kids and ask how a large studio could be so consistent in
their bias, despite their deep attention to the science. I can't help feel
there is more sexism and more conscious sexism than there has ever been. It
really makes me sad.

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1stop
What about Toy Story, Incredibles, Cars, Up... Oh wait they completely
invalidate your point, I get why you left them out.

Or are you saying the sexism bias came in after the acquisition? So it's a
Disney thing? Ignoring the fact that they are a company based around a massive
Princess franchise, you are wondering why they like to manufacture princesses?

Did you forget the two male leads in Frozen? (Kristof and Olaf).

Do you point out the sexism in almost every facet of life to your kids? Or
does this dilemma just hit you at disney movies? If your children are
daughters, do you explain to them they should expect less from the world,
because historic statistics show they are going to get less? Or if they are
sons, do you explain how they will get more simply by being male?

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dufusmoo
The trailer completely turned me off seeing the movie. I don't think I'm going
to bother watching it, or showing it to my kids. Especially after "Up!" and
"Wall-e" failed to deliver.

The trailer was ridiculously sexist in a way I don't think is helpful to
anyone. The sexism was extremely negative IMHO. Surely you'd agree that the
level of sexism shown isn't really necessary?

While we're at it, can hollywood _please_ stop using "they've drunk too much
coffee and are now 'wired'" as a joke in kids movies. Overdosing on drugs
isn't all that funny...

edit: Downvote me? Why not respond instead.

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matt_s
An interesting aspect in the movie (spoiler a little) is that the premise of
the move from Minnesota to SF is because the dad got a new job. They touch on
it a little in the movie that it is startup related (from what I remember -
not necessarily a Silicon Valley startup but a new venture of sorts) and he is
spending a lot of time on it. To the point where some of the girls memories in
the past include all three of them and her newer memories have events with
only just mom because dad is working.

Is this a stereotype of sexism or is this more accurate to real life?

Another item in the movie is that both parents were big into ice hockey, which
does sort of break the stereotype about women don't do sports because they are
fragile or whatever type of BS (after watching women's world cup games I think
they play tougher than men's in some way - less extent of the fake-injury
crap).

Trailers are meant to tease people into wanting to see the movie. If you
reviewed trailers for a bunch of movies I'm sure you will see a lot of
stereotypes in play. What was it in the Inside Out trailer that set off this
remark?

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dufusmoo
Neither of those examples for me, are sexist. They're accurate examples of
what happens in life.

The trailer shows the dad, not listening to his wife, acting dumb, daydreaming
about sports, and then clumsily asserting the law with his daughter. I just
thought it was lazy and not well done at all.

Maybe I'm being hypersensitive about it. It was a total turn off to bother
seeing the movie though.

From the sounds of it though from reviews, it doesn't sound like a movie I'd
enjoy though. It sounds like a movie created for adult movie critics rather
than for enjoyment.

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matt_s
That part with the dad not listening is a very small part of the movie. My
guess is they included it in the trailer to show some funny part that appeals
to moms.

This exact scenario does happen in real life so I don't see that as sexist.

I get where you're coming from though. A lot of sitcoms have a theme around
big stupid oaf of a man being the plot line.

