Reflection

A Pre-Med’s Reflection on “The Cure”

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Ginu Kamani’s short story “The Cure” is anything but an easy read. It forces the reader to delve into gravely serious topics that are just soul-wrenching to any human with a conscience. In the story, a young girl is afflicted by a rapid growth disorder. Her mother, worrying that she will fail as a parent if her daughter is not married, becomes obsessed with finding some sort of treatment for her. In desperation, she hires a man who claims to be a doctor; a “sexologist.” This man’s treatment is to essentially rape the girl.

This story is infuriating on so many levels because it includes some of the worst aspects of humanity within it: pedophilia, rape, forced marriages, child marriages, health fraud, lack of freedom, ignorance, and a skewed mentality of what it means to be a mother. I doubt a single person can read this story and not feel some sort of rage or disgust towards the antagonists.

As a pre-med student, I aspire to be a doctor one day and help people who need it the most. Just the thought of people abusing the medical profession (which I know does happen) and disgracing the mere word “doctor” enrages me beyond belief. However, an important thing to realize is that frauds like that only exist because people believe in them.

Throughout this poem, Kamani makes it very evident that the main theme is about control and what each person can or can’t control in their lives. We can see this through the uncontrollable growth and general lack of ability to make decisions of the main protagonist. However, we can also read between the lines and see this main theme with the “doctor” itself. That man is only able to exert control over his patients because his patients believe that what he is doing is actually medicine, and his patients believe him probably because of a lack of basic education (or common knowledge for that matter since Ramdass, who is uneducated, knew what was actually happening). In other words, the patients’ ignorance presents itself as a form of lack of control. Being ignorant allowed them to be manipulated and abused, essentially giving over their ability to control what is done to them to “Dr. Doctor.”

The main point that Kamani wanted to drive through with her novel is to never let other people gain complete control over you. If you read between the lines like I did, you will know that a way to do that is to end one’s own ignorance; to find empowerment and more control over life through education.

Reflection

The Theme of Oppression in “The Cure” by Ginu Kamani

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In “The Cure,” Ginu Kamani uses Baby’s height and persistent growth to mirror instances in which Baby loses control over her life and other people restrict her ability to choose her own path. Baby’s growth is out of her control and something that her body chooses for her in the same way that her mother, Dr. Doctor,  and Ramdass make choices for her and try to control her fate. Modern medicine also comes into the discussion about Baby’s height as the common view is that “these days doctors have a cure for everything.” Baby’s mother entrusts Baby’s fate in the hands of Dr. Doctor, a sexologist, and allows him to sexually abuse her under the guise of knowing how to cure her as a doctor. Baby’s mother begs him to “find a cure, that’s all I ask,” showing her blind faith in a stranger just because of his title. Baby’s height serves as a representation of how modern medicine can be used to oppress women and young girls and to implement traditional conservative views of what a lady should be like. Baby’s mother herself is given tranquilizers to control her mood swings, and she can be seen also as a victim of social pressures in how she is lead to trust blindly in medicine and titles. Baby begins to take control over her life when she extracts her female fluids on her own out of rebellion against the doctor. At the end of the story, she recognizes that her growth as her becoming greater and more powerful than her mother, the doctor, and Ramdass who all have made choices on her behalf and she declares that she is “bigger than all of [them].” Baby states that her body will no longer grow. Although Kamani does not indicate whether or not Baby gains greater control over her life or if she is not forced into marriage and it is unclear whether Baby really stops growing, Baby’s outburst represents a pivotal part of the story in which baby takes control over her fate and rebels against their control over her life. Whereas before she could not control her own life nor her growth, here she declares that she will stop her growth, representing that she will control her life.

– Lauren Hodgson

Reflection

A Schizophrenic Society

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While madness, unpredictability, and chaos pervade the entirety of Breakfast of Champions, schizophrenia plays a unique role in explaining both the psyche of the narrator and the meaning of the novel as it relates to society as a whole. Schizophrenia is a spectrum mental disorder whose many symptoms include delusions, hallucinations, and fragmentation of thought; the nature of schizophrenia is so little understood that some define it as an umbrella term under which many different diseases exist.

In Vonnegut’s novel, the narrator fears that he may have inherited his mother’s schizophrenia. He demonstrates tremendous anxiety and arguably delusive behavior by inserting himself directly into the narrative, exploring the boundaries of authorial control by interacting directly with his own creations. He functions as an omnipotent creator in a fictional universe, finding salvation from pessimism when one of his characters declares that human beings are defined by their awareness, the quality which gives meaning to life and separates man from machine. This breakthrough allows the narrator to experience spiritual growth, but the act of confronting reality through a series of distorting lenses such as fantasy, irony, and satire is inherently schizophrenic. Our pursuit of truth in art is endlessly fragmented, a reflection of the endless mental fragmentation of society in an increasingly interconnected and vocal world.

If the human world were a single brain, what would control the pattern and flow of thought? An ideal world, like an ideal mind, might have a single dominant personality and one cohesive pattern of thought, but reality is far more complex. As seen in Breakfast of Champions, real society is an endless array of individuals whose lives carry equal weight, with no clear distinctions between major and minor characters. In this way, the most honest definition of reality is a culmination of billions of competing, equally important personal narratives. This chaotic, fractured, endlessly splitting notion of reality can be seen as an extension of the ‘split mind’ concept for which schizophrenia was named, as it applies not only to the condition of a single mind but also to the condition of humanity as a whole.

-Cara

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DDT and the Environment in the 20th Century

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DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) was a popularly used insecticide in the 1940s, first in WWII and then in agriculture. In the 1950s, it was used to combat the spread of malaria by killing mosquitoes, but this project failed in tropical regions. Its widespread usage also caused high rates of DDT resistance in mosquitoes. American scientists were concerned with the possible dangers of DDT since it first began being used, but this issue did not gain attention until Rachel Carson published Silent Spring in 1962. This book claimed that pesticides, including DDT, were causing great harm to the environment and human health. Soon after, Silent Spring garnered great public attention, ad JFK ordered the investigation of Carson’s claims. The EDF (Environmental Defense Fund) was created with the aim to ban the use of DDT, which was discovered to be toxic to marine organisms and a chief cause of the thinning of birds’ eggshells. Its comprehensive uses were banned in 1972, but DDT is still used for disease vector control. For example, DDT is sprayed on the inside walls of houses to kill or repel mosquitoes, and this method supposedly greatly reduces environmental damage.

DDT is thought to be the major cause of the decline of birds of prey like bald eagles and peregrine falcons. Egg shell thinning makes the birds more susceptible to embryo deaths and egg breakage. DDT’s are also chemically similar to estrogens and can cause hormonal changes in animals. Thus, it is believed they also damage the reproductive system and decrease reproductive success. Some speculate that DDT is carcinogenic, but the CDC reports otherwise. Additionally, there is an ongoing debate between people who oppose the use of DDT for malaria control due to environmental concerns and those who support its use in order to save more livess. Regardless, the use of DDT is frowned upon in the US and most nations, yet it is still used in controlled manners.

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Development of Pharmaceuticals in the 20th Century

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In 1900 the three main causes of death in the US were pneumonia, tuberculosis, and diarrhea. In 2000, the odds of dying from any one of these was 1 in 25 but only pneumonia remains in the list of the top 10 causes of death today. This can be attributed to the rise of better sanitation and vaccination techniques but the development of drugs also had a major role.

Pharmaceuticals began primarily with apothecary shops in the 19th century but a few preliminary drugs were discovered such as epinephrine, nor epinephrine, and barbiturates. In the post WWII period, several other antibiotics were produced and vaccines made for measles, rubella and mumps. Antihypertensive drugs and oral contraceptives were made as well. The Kefauver-Harris Amendment was passed in 1962 which enhanced drug regulation and forces manufacturers to prove that it was effective before a new drug went on market after thalidomide was shown to cause widespread birth defects in Europe. In the late 20th century statins such as simvastatin became a major development as they lowered cholesterol levels and reduced heart disease.

Overall the cost of the drug industry is extremely high. Industry wide research and investment cost $65.3 billion in 2009. It was also estimated that in 2003,  the cost for discovering, developing and launching a new drug over a 5 year period is $1.3 billion. However by 2010, development costs range from $4 billion to $11 billion per drug.

–Julia Ng

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Computers in the 20th Century

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The first electronic digital computer was created in the 1930s by John Vincent Atanasoff. While it wasn’t programmable, the machine could solve linear equations and used a paper card writer/reader as its storage mechanism. This machine established three rules that became the basis for future computers: it used binary digits to represent data, performed calculations electronically, and contained a system in which the computing and memory were separated. Although the computer was never fully developed due to Atanasoff’s leave from Iowa State College for World War II assignments, the 1930s also saw the creation of the first binary digital computers and the first programmable calculator, the Z2.

The creator of this calculator was a man named Konrad Zuse, who went on to create his next technological wonder that was aptly named the Z3. An electromechanical computer that became operational in 1941, the Z3 was the world’s first programmable, fully automatic digital computer. Later, the Z4 became the world’s first commercial digital computer.

As computers became increasingly sophisticated and increasingly widespread, organizations began to use them to simplify tasks and work more efficiently. Telephone exchange networks were converted into electronic data processing systems, and the US Navy had developed an electromechanical analog computer named the “Torpedo Data Computer,” which used trigonometry to solve the problem of firing a torpedo at a moving target. The world’s first electronic digital programmable computer, the Colossus, was also built for the purpose of World War II. The Colossus was designed by engineer Thomas Flowers for the purpose of cracking German codes.

In the 1950s, the first computer designed to aid US businesses was created. Eckert and Mauchly created the UNIVAC, or UNIVersal Automatic Computer. Instead of punched cards, it used magnetic tape storage to aid in data collection. This machine was used by J. Lyons & Company to calculate the company’s weekly payroll. The first home computer, the Altair 8800, is not marketed to the public until 1975. At the cost of $400, hobbyists could own their very own machine that did not include a keyboard, monitor, or its own programming language. However, two young men decided to try their hands at writing a coding language for the new computer. Their names were Bill Gates and Paul Allen, and they started the project by forming a partnership called Microsoft. Soon after, Apple Computer, founded by electronics hobbyists Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, releases the Apple II, a desktop personal computer for the mass market that amazingly featured a keyboard, video monitor, mouse, and random-access memory (RAM).

What started as an enormous machine that could only solve simple math problems soon blossomed into something truly life-changing. Computers became more and more complex over time, and it took less than a century for them to integrate into the public’s daily life. Computers are easy to use, and they make tasks easier. The Internet allows us to share information with each other at a staggering speed that was impossible just a few years ago. This technological innovation has opened up a vast world of knowledge and information for everyone in the modern world. Where will all of this advancement lead, you ask? Well, we haven’t come up with an algorithm for that just yet.

-Sofia

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Semi-Coherent Sentences of In-Class Cut-up

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1. After more than 50 years and strength to legitimize atte[ndance] and began to tap on disorder, Keith Connors.
2. Severely hyperactive and thousands of men, once shunned, angry-looking bird with a recognized as having a have taken part in problem.
3. Doctors against the pressure of accepted drugs like Addeen turning the parta to temper in the parcel on the desk; helping youngsters succeed who will throw a beyond.
4. A traffic light gonged; disorder had soared to 3 democracy’s big 100,000 in 1990.
5. Medication often assuaged, but our will is great; impulsiveness and I in his mouth, dropped, allowing a person’s under-intelligence to emerge.

There were a few more that might pass off as understandable, but these were by far the best ones.

Have fun with them!
Ricky Lozoya

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Cybernetics

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Cybernetics and systems science as academic domains were founded in the 1940s and 1950s. Cybernetic systems are defined as systems that are complicated, adaptive, and self-regulating. Systems science is a broader domain that encompasses cybernetics and other systems. Systems science theory states that however complex the world may seem, we can organize it into systems. Therefore, we can find general rules that apply to all systems.  Systems theory focuses on the structure of these systems, while cybernetics focuses more on how they work. These two domains are often studied together, as they both focus on information, feedback, and communication.

-Audrey

Source: http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/CYBSWHAT.html

 

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Gojira and Peaceful Japan: How People Worried and Learned to Hate the Bomb

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Unlike its sequels (American and Japanese), the very first Godzilla (Gojira in Japan) film was, not only about the fantastically epic monster-man battle, but also centered around the morality of using weapons of mass destruction. Truthfully, using an ancient dinosaur-dragon beast is a particularly strange way of highlighting such a serious topic, but if anyone has the right to talk about the human cost of WMD’s, it’s Japan. At the time this film was released, Hiroshima and Nagasaki had only just been bombed nearly a decade prior and reconstruction (emotional, psychological, and physical) were still taking place. So it makes sense that several of the scenes within the film seem to mirror what Hiroshima and Nagasaki looked like after being obliterated and many pieces of dialogue amongst the characters reflected the opinions of several scientists working on the Manhattan Project.

In the film, Gojira destroys a large portion of Tokyo, leaving smoldering remains and orphaned children that seem eerily reminiscent of the results of a nuclear explosion. In addition, the movie played around with the idea that in order to deal with an unstoppable, destructive force like Gojira (who is an embodiment of a nuclear weapon) another unstoppable, destructive force needed to be deployed. This mirrors the arms race on a small scale; the fear that no one entity can or should control such a destructive force and the only solution is to arm at least one other entity with an equally powerful destructive force. In the case of the movie, it was a WMD that sucked the oxygen out of water and destroyed all organic matter. The creator did not want to use it as a weapon, for fear that it would spark an even more intense arms race from that which was already going on between the USSR and the U.S. He was so afraid that many innocent people would be killed if his invention were to be used for some geopolitical goal that he chose to destroy his life’s work and die rather than leave a single trace of his weapon.

So what’s the message? Nuclear weapons are bad? That was already an established fact (especially to Japan), so why make a film highlighting it? I believe the Ishiro Honda, the director, wanted us to instead focus on the human reaction to a devastating attack. When a WMD

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Cut-up

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“Here today are tens of relativity, opened and a tall the understandable satisfaction of those isn’t just the door behind him their hopes fulfilled. But my thoughts who would be watching at home, to an older been able to from his pocket the flag goes by and the woman who will tell time by desk. The tall birds I don’t mean this to be sentimental. I mean humans 100 to slip through. We are all part of a continuum, inescapably.”

Anna Truong