Saturday, April 24, 2004

Been a long time, hasn't it? Except for the date counter at the top of this page, I can't remember the last time I wrote an entry here. There are a myriad of reasons, not least of which is the fact that I spend almost 6 days a week (at least for the next few weeks) in the sunny island of Tekong, home to those that would steal a boy's youthfulness and replace it with steely determination and will. At least that's what the recruitment poster says, and I can't say I totally disagree...

Taking a moment here to digress, I have to wonder what would happen to me if I didn't have to wear green for two and a half years in my life. Of course, the most obvious image is that of a pale, overweight man. Scary. Perhaps the more important lesson, is being exposed to the ugly face of worldy politics, albeit in a slightly different environment. As they say, experience is the best teacher, and no amount of mugging in any educational instituition prepares you for this. Take it from someone who's been to the hinterland and back, you'll never love the treatment, but you always appreciate the results. Same with alot of other things in life.

Back on topic, I've had plenty of time to think these past few weeks, and have come to ask myself this question: have emotions, an integral part of the human psyche, made us stronger or weaker than the apes which scientists claim we evolved from? Leaving the Darwinian theory (or lack of one, according to the critics) aside, it's not an easy question to answer, because this author is himself a human, writing this with the emotion of self-righteousness.

Mankind has long been ruled by emotions: love, hate, joy, sorrow, jealousy, etc. What would often be the logical choice, has been pushed aside in favour of the other that better suits an individual's current emotion. Example, hate because of a past injustice is biologically harmful, constantly overproducing cortisone, the body's stress hormone. It raises blood pressure, weakens arteries. The logical choice would be ignore such negative emotions, but the human mind, clouded by anger, is unable to rationalize. The opposite is also true: where it would logical to a machine to retreat and regroup, a human in the throes of emotion would find it impossible to resist the urge to throw caution to the wind and venture forward, like the metaphorical image of the valiant knight battling the mighty dragon in order to win fair maiden's heart.

Further expanding, many of our everyday actions are intermingled with our emotions. Chocolate tastes good on its own, but the slab of sinful goodness is so tasty because the food also triggers production of dopamine, the body's reward chemical. We feel good, we feel happy, and so we begin to associate chocolate with the emotion of happiness. The next time you eat chocolate, not only do you taste the sugar, the milk and the cocoa, you also taste the emotion of happiness.

Someone once uttered this phrase: 'Hope...it is simultaneously the source of your greatest weakness and also your greatest strength.' I think this, in a nutshell, sums up what emotions matter to us, as a species. History is filled with stories of men and women who succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, and suffered unimaginable failures, all because the cold, rational choice did not appeal to them at the time. Of course, some emotions are more equal than others, more earth-shaking in their impact on our minds. Love, for example. And, of course, I'm feeling the emotion of self-satisfaction of finally finishing this article. ;)