In Continuum.

Here's a little fact about the human body. Every year, 98% of all the atoms in our body would have been replaced one way or another. First of all, I am not sure of how they measured this fact in the first place, if they actually bothered to count how many atoms there are per square inch in a human body. Anyway, it is so fascinating, though, if you think about it. It makes you think about how much of you is you, and how much of you is gone, physically. That is not to mention the question on how much of you belongs to your father, and how much of your belongs to your mother. You know how it began, always with the sperm and the egg, then the fertilization and then the fetus. It doesn't matter if you are a human fetus, a kangaroo fetus, or a baby cockroach. All life and objects in this world are made of the very same atoms, and these atoms are bound to each other in different ways to form different things. At least that is what I learned from the physics class, although the inability to see these atoms caused me to dislike physics very much as a subject. It was a strange concept to grasp, indeed, the way the table that I was using and the food that I ate for lunch were formed by the exact same basic atoms. 

I remember that palm-reading lady from Before Sunrise, the one that wandered the streets of Vienna to look for the next victim. Like Jesse, I am usually skeptical about such things, disbelieving in the implications and the underlying meanings. I've always been a man of science, believing in the tangible aspects of life. Anyway, she mentioned something in the film that got me thinking one day about the existence of humans, and how it all relates to this giant explosion that happened before the world was created. You know, the Big Bang, the thing CERN has been trying to create with that LHC thing, the biggest machine ever built by humans? Never mind, enough of that whole scientific geeky stuff, and let's get down to what I was trying to say at the beginning of this entry. She said something about how all humans, in fact all things, are stardusts. You know, the giant explosion caused everything to begin, with the planets being formed and the life created. No, I still vehemently hold true to the fact that God did not create the world in seven days. Even if he did, he should have spent seven more to correct the mistake that we, as a species, are. 

So, we are all stardusts somehow, all formed by the same basic unit on the atomic level of things. If we can somehow slice up the table into atomic pieces, then do the same with, say, a piece of dead skin, they'd probably end up looking the same in every aspect. It just goes to show how amazing our world is, so endlessly fascinating. Anyway, back to the whole 98% thing I mentioned earlier. It's interesting, isn't it? To know that, physically, the person you were a year ago probably isn't exactly the same person you are right now. Of course, you probably think the same and doesn't look a lot different from a year ago, but everything has changed atomically. I can't help but wonder how much of that original set of atoms are still existing in my body somehow, if I still have an inkling of those days in my body, if there is a part of me that exists from all the way back then. It is probably down to the atomic level right now, but I am pretty sure I still have that in me, somewhere, somehow. 

A friend of mine was telling me about how the dough they use in bakeries, and how they'd use only a certain amount in any given day and keep the leftover dough in the bakery. Next day comes along, they take out the leftover dough, make more dough, mix them together, and then the leftovers for the day gets used tomorrow. It kind of reminds me of how blood gets snowballed, in a way, in our bodies, the way our grandparents and great grandparents continue to circulate our blood streams even though they've been dead for a very long time. At least that was what I thought, until I realized that our atoms are actually replaced every year. This kind of means that I have been almost completely replaced twenty-two times in my life, with the structure on an atomic level completely changed. If we are just the sum of our parts, then doesn't the fact that our atoms have been replaced, make us different people altogether from the one we started off with? It is all a little science-fiction to me, but I like to think about things on a sub-atomic level anyway, the way everything works around these little sphere of electrons. 

When I was younger, I used to think that if we looked close enough, we'd be able to see atoms. Which was why I spent a lot of time behind a magnifying glass and staring at my desktop. I was determined to see how it looked like, but the results were never very fruitful. It almost always ended up with me giving up after about five minutes, or just being distracted by a random ant passing by. Ants are infinitely more fun than to see atoms anyway, and I'd go grab my UHU glue to glue those little insects up. Perhaps that is why we grow, maybe that is how we grow. In retrospect, we almost always look dumber a year ago as we are now. No matter how reasonable or justifying our actions a year ago may be, we almost always find a better way to get around things a year later. The version of us a year ago are always dumber and stupider than the version we are now, and the version that we will be a year from now is also going to be enhanced and improved somehow - why is that? I don't suppose I have actually went through some life-altering events, like surviving a plane crash or to be rescued from a deserted island or something. I haven't been through a lot, and yet I feel renewed and changed. It must be the atoms, it has to be! 

But of course, all of the above remains as a mere theory, like the words of the great philosophers that cannot be proven or unproven. The meta-physical aspect of the world is just so fascinating and complicated at the very same time, sometimes you just have to take the leap of faith yourself. I am just a student of communications who is taking philosophy as one of my modules right now, what do I know of the greater scheme of things anyway? It's interesting, for me, how a random fact like that inspired me to write an entry like this. I suppose when you look closely enough at everything under a magnifying glass, even if you don't eventually see anything, you still get something out of the whole experience. It reminds me of my insomnia days (which have, very thankfully, passed) when I laid in bed not wanting to think about anything at all. You would think that an empty mind would induce sleepiness, that if you somehow manage to convince yourself that you are not thinking about anything, you'd fall asleep from this self-induced boredom, right? It actually works the opposite way, and the more you want to sleep, the more awake you are. Even when nothing ever happens in your head, something is happening. When you aren't looking for something in particular, anything could happen.