siyizhangblog-blog

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Annihilation, destruction or rebirth?

I watched this movie, Annihilation, with my friend in a cinema near the college. Usually, we would like to talk about our feelings with each other when we finish the movie but this time we didn’t. It was so complicated to summarize the main idea of this movie and my feeling to it even though I was totally attracted by its picture, music and lines. And I failed to fall asleep at this spring night and couldn’t stop thinking about it in a chorus of insects.

It was not the first time I encounter with this movie. In fact, I read the original work named the Southern Reach Trilogy two months ago. Jeff VanderMeer, the author who won Nebula Award in 2014 because of this science fiction novel created a mysterious and enthralling world for a romantic and also thrilling fantasy story, which was perfectly reproduced on the screen visually and aurally by director Alex Garland. A team of five female scientists consisting of a psychologist, a physicist, a geologist, a nurse and a biologist are sent into an area known as Area X to explore what is happening behind a shining border. The biologist, Lena, also wants to unravel the puzzle of her dying husband who is the only survivor of the previous expedition and find the way to save his life. Although the plot seems to be reasonable, it does gives the audience, especially, me a lot of surprises in terms of the atmosphere, the connotation and insight.

          Figure 1 Five female scientists (the second from left is Lena)

Why is the atmosphere of this movie so significant? Because the atmosphere is the essence of unique and evident Cthulhu style throughout the entire one hundred and twenty minutes. Different from other horror fictions, Cthulhu Mythos scarcely put a group of teenage friends into a dilapidated medieval castle hovered by a ghost, a desolate and cursed forest or a typical party with an unexpected visitor but intend to build a horrific, desperate, depressive and melancholy atmosphere and background which hits on viewer’s nerves all the time. Even without the specific symbol or incarnation of horror and fear, you can still feel the insanity contained in words and sentences. That’s how I felt when I first read the novel, At the Mountains of Madness, written by H.P. Lovecraft, the father of Cthulhu Mythos. The similar tension and anxiety grasped me again when watching Annihilation. No background music and no monologue or dialogue, just silence, the movie starts only with a woman (the biologist) in a white hospital gown sitting in a separated room. The whole picture looks dull and gloomy, which reminds me of a distant memory or a childhood nightmare in blur. More than the quiescent and depressing tone, the movie also successfully integrates fantastic and beautiful scenes with when following the female expedition to enter this unearthly Area X. The leafy and thick forest interspersed with small flowers, lucid stream and strange animals as if they come from the fairy tales. But remember, beauty always comes along with death.  

                 Figure 2 A book cover of At the Mountains of Madness

Quite a lot spectators left negative comments on the Internet to criticize the ambiguity and mystification of this film resulted in the weak and illogical storyline. However, in my opinion, it is unfair to deny the value of contemplation on the meaning of life. In the movie, Area X is surrounded by “the shimmer” that reflects everything, lights, sound waves and, most importantly, genes, the basic genetic materials in charge of growth and propagation. They are disrupted into small pieces and arranged into a completely new order, which explains those strange and incredible creatures like the twin deer and fish, a crocodile with shark-like teeth and a bear whose howling sounds like a man speaking. And the same effect happens on human who visited this area. We may think naturally that is a huge destruction and catastrophe to creatures in this area in that they are no longer themselves, but how about thinking of it in the other way? Instead of standing on a human-centered viewpoint, it can also be the prosperity of new life form and the beginning of an unprecedented era. Is it a death or a rebirth? That’s probably why Annihilation, a physics term, was chosen to be the appropriate title of this movie.  

                              Figure 3 Plants grow into human shape

                                    Figure 4         Twin deer  

                                         Figure 5          the shimmer

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” Said by H.P. Lovecraft. We are born to be afraid of things we have ever known or understood. That is what Area X means to us, no matter the characters in the movie or the audience. Nevertheless, human beings are too proud to give up so called “the most intellectual creatures and the center of this planet” without realizing how minimal we are compared with the infinite universe or something superior to us, which is also the main idea of Cuthulhu Mythos, a strong dispute to “Man is the Measure of All things”.

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The Big Brother is watching you, maybe not that bad?

The Big Brother is watching you, the most famous words in 1984 written by George Orwell, describing a suffocating and smothering world in the future, where everyone is disenfranchised and ensured no one resists the authorities under no condition. Although he has predicted that this horrible picture is around the corner, Orwell may have never imagined the advent of this prophecy would only arrive in merely seventy decades.

For he or she who the boundary of life, there is no more privacy and credibility when expose everything online. Social media, the Internet and cameras hovering everywhere not only know but record where we were, what we did and who we talked to. That’s why users felt so shocked and raged to the scandal months ago that Facebook failed to secure their data and allow Cambridge Analytic to monitor and analyze private life for political and profitable benefit, which reminds people of PRISM, a classified project disclosed by Snowden, a former CIA employer, to monitor individual mobile phone, e-mail, photos and videos etc. conducted by the U.S. government.

                               Figure 1 Edward Snowden in an interview

Nevertheless, the most petrifying part is more than confronting a transparent world but realizing the very existence of thousands of thousands eyes watching us and creeping into our psychological defense every seconds. About two hundred and fifty years ago, a British philosopher named Bentham proposed “panopticon” theory referring to “a new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example”. This ideal imagination of prison which could supervise prisoner outside and force them to rule themselves inside perfectly matches the current situation we are anxious about. Instead of walking like a free man on the street, everyone has turned into a timid prisoner who worries about every move and word reflect the reality of modern society partlly, just like Michel Foucault explained in his works, ourselves become the portion of the surveillance institution where power sweeps into every corner.

                                          Figure 2 Panopticon diagram

Although with all these problems regarding humanity and ethic in monitoring, the complexity of this dilemma goes beyond our imagination. Person of interest, a popular TV drama series on CBS seems to represent another side of surveillance world where crimes are committed and prevented by the supervise tools at the same time. By quoting Hilary Clinton’s speech “Just as steel can be used to build hospitals or machine guns, or nuclear power can either energize a city or destroy it, modern information networks and the technologies they support can be harnessed for good or ill”, the role of networks and technologies played in society depends on how we utilize them. The best example I could come up with is about myself. The week before attending school in Berkeley, I lost my mobile phone in a taxi on my way back to home from the supermarket. Thanks to the help of built-in GPS function and monitoring instrument, I finally located that taxi and retrieve my mobile phone. The Lesson I learn from this experience is, first, to take care of belongings all the time and, more importantly, new technologies assist people to solve the long-existent difficulties. In macro level, the police solve cases and arrest suspects using the monitoring cameras, fingerprint and DNA detecting machine and the government manage the traffic properly by recording video and identity system. We would scarcely picture the world without those technologies and tools handling trivial matters in daily life.

                   Figure 3 Finch and Reese (from left) in Person of Interest

Saying refuse to technologies and the Internet not enable to eradicate the monitoring crisis and admitting them does not mean to ignore the potential drawbacks, the most effective measurement is to build a strong supervisory system to constrict the government and companies’ behavior and deliver the right to people’s hands.

 http://image79.360doc.com/DownloadImg/2014/10/1504/46132653_1.jpg

http://i2.sinaimg.cn/IT/2014/0520/U5388P2DT20140520105047.jpg

https://gss3.bdstatic.com/7Po3dSag_xI4khGkpoWK1HF6hhy/baike/s%3D500/sign=db8d036537a85edffe8cfe23795509d8/738b4710b912c8fca4729cf8ff039245d6882105.jpg

https://cdt.org/files/pdfs/CDT-Regardless_of_Frontiers_v0.5.pdf

Bentham, J., & Božovič, M. (1995). The panopticon writings. Verso.

Farganis, J. (2006). Discipline and punish: the birth of the prison by michel foucault; alan sheridan. Telos, 1978(36), 169-183.

[siyizhangblog-blog]

The big brother is watching you, maybe not that bad?

The big brother is watching you, which is the most famous words in 1984 written by George Orwell, describing a suffocating and smothering world in the future, where everyone is disenfranchised and constricted to not resist the authorities under no condition. Although he has predicted that this horrible picture is around the corner, Orwell may never image the advent of this prophecy would only be after seven decades.

 To whom values the boundary of life, there is no more privacy and credibility when expose everything online. The social media, the Internet and cameras hovering everywhere not only know but record where we were, what we did and who we talked to. That’s why users felt so shocked and raged to the scandal months ago that Facebook failed to secure their data and allow Cambridge Analytic to monitor and analyze private life for political and profitable benefit, which reminds people of PRISM, a classified project disclosed by Snowden, a former CIA employer, to monitor individual mobile phone, e-mail, photos and videos etc. conducted by the U.S. government.

         Nevertheless, the most petrifying part is more than confronting a transparent world but realizing the very existence of thousands and hundreds eyes watching us and creeping in our psychological defense every seconds. About two hundred and fifty years ago, a British philosopher named Bentham proposed “panopticon” theory referring to “a new mode of obtaining power of mind over mind, in a quantity hitherto without example”. This ideal imagination of prison which could supervise prisoner outside and force them to rule themselves inside perfectly matches the current situation we are anxious about. Instead of walking like a free man on the street, that everyone turns into a timid prisoner who worries about every moves and words reflect the reality of modern society partially, just like Michel Foucault explained in his works, ourselves become the portion of the surveillance institution where power sweeps into every corner.

 Although with all these problems regarding humanity and ethic in monitoring, the complexity of this dilemma goes beyond our imagination. Person of interest, a popular TV drama series on CBS seems to represent another side of surveillance world where crimes are committed and prevented by the supervise tools at the same time. By quoting Hilary Clinton’s speech “Just as steel can be used to build hospitals or machine guns, or nuclear power can either energize a city or destroy it, modern information networks and the technologies they support can be harnessed for good or ill”, the role of networks and technologies played in society depends on how we utilize them. The best example I could come up with is about myself. The week before attending school in Berkeley, I lost my mobile phone in a taxi on my way back to home from the supermarket. Thanks to the help of built-in GPS function and monitoring instrument, I finally located that taxi and retrieve my mobile phone. Lessons I learn from this experience is, first, to take care of belongings all the time and, more importantly, new technologies assist people to solve the long-existent difficulties. In macro level, the police solve the case and arrest suspects by using the monitoring cameras, fingerprint and DNA detecting machine and the government manage the traffic properly by recording video and identity system. We would scarcely picture the world without those technologies and tools handling trivial matters in daily life.

 Saying refuse to technologies and the Internet disenable to eradicate the monitoring crisis and admitting them does not mean to ignore the potential drawbacks, the most effective measurement is to build strong supervise system to constrict the government and companies’ behavior and deliver the right to people’s hands.

 http://image79.360doc.com/DownloadImg/2014/10/1504/46132653_1.jpg

http://i2.sinaimg.cn/IT/2014/0520/U5388P2DT20140520105047.jpg

https://gss3.bdstatic.com/7Po3dSag_xI4khGkpoWK1HF6hhy/baike/s%3D500/sign=db8d036537a85edffe8cfe23795509d8/738b4710b912c8fca4729cf8ff039245d6882105.jpg

https://cdt.org/files/pdfs/CDT-Regardless_of_Frontiers_v0.5.pdf

Bentham, J., & Božovič, M. (1995). The panopticon writings. Verso.

Farganis, J. (2006). Discipline and punish: the birth of the prison by michel foucault; alan sheridan. Telos, 1978(36), 169-183.

[siyizhangblog-blog]

I am so sorry to hear that you got your wallet stolen during your visit to San Francisco. Thank you for reminding me to pay attention to safety on WeChat today. If you need help, please tell me and I will try my best to help you.

Mixed feelings

This is the first time in the United States.At the beginning, I was a little nervous and excited.After all, I came to a new place and faced the challenge of language .Maybe everything is going well, except for the customs card that was lost when I entered the country.

The next day I came here, I went to San Francisco with my friend. We visited Fisherman’s Wharf and Chinatown.We saw the sea here.It is a little green,not like the sea in my hometown,which is blue.But both are beautiful.We were very happy until I got off the streetbus and I found that my wallet was gone.All my things are inside.I started panicking.Finally I found that my wallet was stolen and everything was lost.I was so sad.

I thought that my life here might be like this,until met the teacher and classmates in the class. They are so friendly. Uber’s driver is also so friendly. I began to relieve and firmly believe that everything will be fine.

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Three blogs I recommend

Hello, everyone. Today I would like to recommend three blogs that I think is very helpful for college students to realize their dreams and improve themselves continually.

1)       The choice, the New York Times’ education blog provides the students with reliable information ranging from college ranking to critical advice. For international students who plan to apply universities in the United States just like me, it is an effective way to choose the very suitable one to spend your precious college life in.

http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/

2)       This blog aims to call for respect to oversize women and eliminate the long-time discrimination skewed by colored glasses. People are able to build more objective and equal opinion on fat people, especially fat women. Also, this blog offers great places to buy plus size clothing.

http://wtfplus.tumblr.com/

3)       A healthy body is the foundation of everything. If you want to work out scientifically and live a healthy life style during College time, College Diet is definitely the best choice for you to stay in good condition both physically and mentally.

http://collegedieting.tumblr.com/

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A Tough Trip to California

My trip to Berkeley, California became a nightmare. It seemed like that everything did not go very well. The day before I left, I lost my mobile phone on a Taxi, but I got it back fortunately. In 22nd July, Shanghai was heavily attacked by Typhoon “Anby”, the third one that has landed directly in Shanghai since 1949. The feeling about waiting for a typhoon is comparable to a young lady who is waiting for her first love, worrying about never coming or coming way too much. Obviously, this time this lady’s love showed up out of everyone’s expectation. Because of the horrifying storm outside, my friends and I were trapped in PuDong Airport for almost ten hours to wait for the delayed flight. After twelve hours’ flying, we finally arrived at SFO safely though felt totally worn out.