Flood break

I woke up in the middle of the night, hearing a blaring alarm that echoed throughout my entire village. It was an evacuation warning. As I rummaged through my things and drowsily stuffed in my clothes, I looked out my window and realized my entire soi was flooded. Although moving all my seventeen dogs and thirteen cats had been the highlight of my break, it was befuddling to witness the engulfment of the place I call home. Correction: The place I "called" home. As anyone can attest, the flood event is a traumatizing ground breaking experience for Thailand. Not only does it tests the new government's ability to handle issues concerning natural disaster, it also challenges the nation and its people as a whole. I chose this picture because it signifies the integrity of Thai people. Prior to the flood, Thai people had been amidst of political instability and conflict. However, according to my opinion, the unfortunate event that had reaped away the lives of many significant other is in fact an impetus that propels Thailand toward its hopefully eventual congruity.

Homeopathy? I Don't Think So.

I think the concept of homeopathy contradicts with the current science. The dogma that “like cures like” sounds irrational to me. In my opinion, this belief is absurd. It’s almost like you are saying that “fire can distinguish fire.” If this notion turns out to be true, we will have to redraw the rules of physics, chemistry and biology. In addition to that, I think homeopathic medicine only works in a placebo effect. It gives patients false hope that they are being healed physically. However, I think homeopathy only cures patients psychologically, making them believe that the substance they intake have therapeutic effect and will ease them from their sickness. There have been numerous amounts of scientists who try to prove the effectiveness of homeopathy in hope to discover a scientific break through as well as to win a million dollars James Randi bet against homeopathic medicine. Thus, the scientists try to conduct an experiment to prove homeopathy’s effectiveness. Nevertheless, as predicted, most experiment results in failure and debunk the theory that homeopathy is effective. However, there are some successes in few experiments. But, the scientists, who support homeopathy and thus may be subjective and bias toward the result, have conducted the experiments. The results there fore are not reliable and hence, I do not think that homeopathy is scientifically valid. If a doctor prescribed homeopathy to me, I would be suspicious and will eventually laugh it off because I find it funny how doctors would try to lure me into buying something that is not effective. Just for entertainment, I will probably inquire the doctors’ opinion toward the effectiveness of homeopathy and their substantiation. In addition to that, I will also ask the doctors about the side effect of homeopathy. I have a friend who uses homeopathy before. She thinks that it tastes sweet. But other than its delicious flavor, she does not think it helps her physically. However, it consoles her psychologically at the thought of at least being treated with something. I think homeopathy is different to some types of treatment for allergies. In a conventional treatment, allergy is mostly treated by antihistamines and steroids, which generally work for suppressing the symptom. Instead of giving an “antihistamines” that quell the swelling and vasodilation, homeopathy induce the symptom by giving a patient with a minute doses of the same allergen, which is the causative factor. This type of treatment frightens me because instead of stopping the allergic reaction, the homeopathic doctors are catalyzing it.

Cells' Self-Fulfilling Prophecies and The Tiny Humans

“If you could visit a cell, you wouldn’t like it.”

At the first glance of this excerpt, I was blown away with befuddlement. I have always imagined a cell as a harmonious utopia, where amiable organelles work together peacefully. This quixotic fantasy stems from my childhood love for the “Ozzy and Drix” cartoon series. The setting of this cartoon takes place inside the body of a teenager, Hector, and the characters are treated like people rather than simply cells. Ozzy is a white blood cell with a dark sense of humor and Agent Drix is a cold pill. Installed as private investigators, the partners vow to protect the well being of Hector from any viral threat. The fact that there would not be a place I could stand without being pummeled and ripped thousands of times every second from every direction within a cell has abolished my childhood dream. However, this epiphany allows me to see the grim reality, in which my cells have to follow their self-fulfilling prophecies to sacrifice and suffer from excruciating deaths during their military duty against the virus and bacteria. Thus, to prevent my cells from dying in vain, I will try to stay healthy.

“One respected observer, Nicolaus Hartsoecker, was convinced he saw “tiny performed men” in sperm cells.”

After reading this quote, I chuckled with bemusement; because as a child, I have always questioned the emergence of a baby. Although Hartsoecker’s hypothesis may seem absurd today, my theory as a child, without any biological knowledge, draws a parallelism with that of Harthsoecker. I used to believe that my mother accidentally consumed a seed and that seed grew into a tiny human (AKA ME!) But, as I grew up and learned more about biology, I realized how demented my idea was. However, I have sympathy toward Hartsoecker’s mistakes and embarrassment. Back at that time, with underdeveloped technology, it was sensible that sperms are homunculus, a supposed microscopic but fully formed human being from which a fetus was formerly believed to develop. But as time goes by, it is proven that these homunculi are actually sperms. This debunk of a once popular concept propels me to believe that what we believe today might be invalid in the future. Therefore, science is concocted from uncertainties and mysteries that continue to unravel everyday.